Mountain lion bird call

[frogmarch]

I am sure I've heard this sound a few times while hiking, but maybe it was just birds.

http://www.outdoorhub.com/news/2017/04/07/rare-trail-cam-video-know-mountain-lions-make-strange-sound/

[2naSalit]

1. I think I knew that

but it isn't a sound I would immediately associate with them. I know I've heard it before, and I'm pretty sure I didn't know what it was in the field as it were.

[frogmarch]

6. I'm glad I know now.

I am quite sure I've heard the sound before too, but we have lots of noisy birds such as blue jays and cardinals, and I probably thought that's what the whistler was. I never let my poodle out alone and I always stay with him. I will continue to!

[True Dough]

2. Mountain lions

The Andre Phillipe Gagnons of the animal kingdom!

[frogmarch]

5. :-D

Yep! I had to google him, but yep.

[pansypoo53219]

3. chippie or baby call?

[frogmarch]

4. I guess no one really knows why

they make that sound, but here's a snip from a blog I found:

Cougars are known to make a variety of calls including a hiss, a purr, a growl and the infamous caterwaul, but this sharp, shrill whistle sounds more like the call of a small bird than that of a 200 pound apex predator. It is still unclear exactly why cougars make this call, but it may be that this vocal incongruity is by design, allowing cubs to safely call out to their mothers and adult lions to call each other without alerting potential prey that they are in the area.

http://tejonconservancy.blogspot.com/2015/01/teton-tuesday-cougar-whistling.html

There are two videos at the blog of cougars/mountain lions making the sound.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

7. It wasn't the same sound, but there was a female mountain lion...

... that circled around my tent at night (various distances) when I camped at Point Reyes in California, and I assumed it was a large bird the entire time!

I'd mostly seen a variety of birds during the hike to the campsite, and little else in terms of wildlife, so that lead me to think that way too.

I recorded the calls and a ranger told me the next day it was a mountain lion.

She kept me awake pretty much all night! Maybe she liked my odor?

[frogmarch]

8. Wow!

How did you learn it was a female mtn. lion?

I'd have freaked when I found out it wasn't a bird making those sounds.

We have lots of the big cats where I live, and I have a healthy respect for them. Make that, fear of them.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

9. The ranger said it was a female mountain lion in heat.

I later found examples of that sound online, and it matched.

The one at Point Reyes was usually higher-pitched than this example:

I probably wouldn't have been too worried even if I knew it was a cougar the whole time.

However, I later thought about the people that I'd seen jogging on the main trail there, and I wondered if some of them could trigger a pursuit instinct? I would never want to jog where there's mountain lions.

[frogmarch]

10. I wondered about that!

It made sense to me that the females make those sounds when in heat. The ranger you played the sound for would have known what the sound was about.

I used to jog up and down our country road until the day two mountain lions came to smell the flowers outside our door one morning. Then I bought a treadmill.

Thanks for the video!

[Buckeye_Democrat]

12. You're welcome. Thanks for your thread too!

I didn't know they made those other high-pitched sounds as well. I'm in Ohio and I've never encountered mountain lions around here.

I think you were wise to stop jogging around there! It would probably be a bigger concern for a small person or child, and I'm neither, but I wouldn't want to risk it either!

[Sentath]

11. You wear cologne?

Photographers and even Wildlife Dept. trappers use it as a lure.

[Buckeye_Democrat]

13. No, especially not outdoors.

All of the food and toiletries were inside my plastic bear canister, and that canister was also inside a metal storage box (away from my tent) that was provided by the Point Reyes park.

My body odor might have been pretty strong at that point, though. Lol. I had camped around Big Sur previously and I didn't shower for a few days.

My campsite was located at one of the highest points of the park, and I've also read that predators like mountain lions tend to prefer higher elevations to look down for prey.

[csziggy]

14. Cheetahs make a similar chirp

Apparently most often to their young and their young to them.

[frogmarch]

15. OMG!

Until just the other day, I had never heard of mountain lions chirping, and now I find out that cheetahs do too! What's next? Surely not lions.

[Kali]

16. Great thread!

I did not know this, but I am sure I have heard it before.

[frogmarch]

17. For me,

every bird call is now suspect!

[panader0]

18. There are mountain lions around here--I've never heard them

but I've seen them a few times.
Coyotes on the other hand are very vocal. Last night they went off 3 or 4
times, quite close and loud. I love it. When I lived outside Tucson in the
mountain foothills (out in the boonies), the coyotes would meow like cats
to lure my girlfriends cats out. Magnificent animals.

[frogmarch]

19. Coyotes are wily!

I hope they didn't get your girlfriend's cats!

Coyotes took a cat of our neighbor's, we think. All we found was the kitty's collar, still fastened.

Now we live on the edge of town and have mountain lions running around. One early morning, my husband saw one chasing a deer up the street. A few hours later, a neighbor saw a mountain lion dragging a deer into the canyon that begins in her back yard. Same mountain lion and same deer, we guessed.

I used to enjoy watching the deer grazing in the meadow behind our house, but not so much anymore, and when I take our poodle outside, I guard him with a shovel in one hand and a shingle fork in the other in case a big cat gets ideas. My adult son suggested hanging very large no-pest strips around the yard.