# Couger trees teacher



## msiebers (Jan 17, 2000)

I thought you might be interested in this story Born2hunt.
Four years ago, the Washington st. legislature outlawed the use of hounds to hunt Mt. Lions. This story is just one of many incedents since that law was enacted.

Cougar sends teacher fleeing up three trees www.peninsuladailynews.co...97578.html 
PORT ANGELES NEWS
Tuesday, May 16, 2000
By Bill Lindstrom 

This story has so many twists and turns, movie script writers would have a field day with it.


A substitute Port Angeles schoolteacher won't soon forget the stroll he took on a sunny Monday afternoon. Walter Carter, who moved from Seattle to the Eagle Ridge area overlooking Freshwater Bay west of Port Angeles, spent nearly an hour hopping through three different trees with a mountain lion in hot pursuit. 


Carter, 39, said he had been working on his property when he decided to take a break and go for a hike. An experienced woodsman, Carter said he was in thick brush when ``I heard something off to my right. At first I thought it was a deer, but it didn't act like a deer. I tried to sneak around, then I saw it.'' What he saw was a medium-sized mountain lion.

Rotten log

"I started yelling and screaming at him, but he didn't go away. He started toward me, a real serious walk. I grabbed a big log and was going to throw it at him, but the log was so rotten it crumbled in my hand.'' When yelling didn't faze the cat, Carter said he ran for the first tree he could find -- a 6-foot to 10-foot pine. That was a mistake.


``I climbed up, but it started bending over and I was hanging there upside down,'' Carter said. ``I was real scared then. I was only two or three feet off the ground. The cat looked like he was going to pounce. "I got out my pocketknife and threw it at him, but I missed. Then I took my car keys out and threw them.''

The cat then retreated about 40 feet into the brush -- the keys were not for a Cougar, apparently. The keys were never found. That was all Carter needed to spring to another tree, this time a bit taller. Again, the cat pursued. 

Pocket change

Carter climbed higher and higher. He made another attempt to frighten off the cat by throwing all his coins at it. It worked. The cat retreated, but kept the man in sight.

Carter headed for still a taller tree. The cougar came out of hiding and again stalked the fleeing man.

Carter was more comfortable in this tree as the mountain lion sat at the trunk. ``I didn't think he would come up the tree, but if he did, I was ready,'' Carter said. ``I broke off about a 10-foot stick and I was going to poke him with it.''

Carter also figured it was time to get out of this mess. Fortunately, he had taken his cellular telephone with him. He called 9-1-1. It wasn't long before two officers and two neighbors were near him.

``They couldn't find me,'' Carter revealed. ``That was frustrating. I was making a lot of noise, but there was no trail there and I was hard to find.''

Escorted out

Finally, the officers made their way to the tree and brought the relieved man to freedom. "I wasn't going to come down until somebody came and got me,'' said Carter. 

Apparently during the noisy period, the cat decided it had enough.

"There was no cat, but we saw tracks,'' said Sgt.Nick Turner of the Clallam County Sheriff's Department. "He was a pretty excited guy,'' Turner said when Carter hit the ground. He was talking a mile a minute.'' The activity brought out the whole neighborhood as sheriff's deputies worked with area residents to try to locate the man. 

Eagle Ridge resident Paul Beck, 43, was in the area to pick up his daughter, who was visiting a neighbor. He and another neighbor, Todd Simmons, joined officers to try to locate Carter.


Beck, a real estate agent for Windermere Realty, said it was Simmons, an engineer with Angeles Composite, and Turner who first located Carter. ``I've lived here all my life and I have never seen a cougar,'' said Beck, ``and I didn't see this one either.''


Carter said ``it'll be a few days before I get over this, but next time I go hiking, I'll be prepared".

Just think if this would have happened in michigan with the proposal relating to Black Bears a few years back.


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Mike


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## born2hunt65 (Jan 22, 2000)

Thanks for the info


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