Authorities shot and killed a young female mountain lion Tuesday after efforts to tranquilize it did not work quickly enough.
By Ashley Archibald / Special to The Malibu Times
Santa Monica police shot and killed a young female mountain lion that had wandered into downtown Tuesday morning.
Members of the Department of Fish and Game first tried to tranquilize the 75-pound animal, but officers opened fire when it tried to escape, said Lt. Robert Almada of the SMPD.
The body of the animal will be transported to the California Wildlife Center in Calabasas, Calif., where officials will try to determine if there was any medical reason the mountain lion went so far out of its normal territory, said Cindy Reyes, executive director of the center.
Police first heard the big cat had come to town when a member of the public called in at approximately 5:45 a.m. saying that a mountain lion or other large cat was walking down Arizona Avenue.
The next sighting was reported by a maintenance worker at an educational facility at 1227 Second Street, where the animal had found a courtyard and rested.
Officers arrived at the scene and cordoned off the area and a crowd started to gather.
Many were older residents trying to get to their classes at the Santa Monica College Emeritus College, which is housed in the building where the lion took up shop.
Norman Torbati was there for a painting class. He’s traveled up Temescal Canyon in the past and has never been disturbed by a mountain lion until Tuesday.
“You never know, maybe they’ll give us instruction to paint a bobcat,” he said.
Fish and Game arrived and officials made their first attempt to tranquilize the animal with a dart at 9:15 a.m.
Though it made an impact, the effects of tranquilizer darts are not as rapid as people might think, said Andrew Hughan, a spokesperson for the Department of Fish and Game.
“It’s important to realize that darting is not like it looks on TV or in the movies,” Hughan said. “It takes five to 15 minutes to take effect. What happens then is you put a dart into an animal, and then what you have is an angry animal with teeth and claws.”
Members of the Santa Monica Fire Department then tried to use water hoses to keep the animal contained in the courtyard and the police shot it with pepper balls. It made a move to escape west and SMPD officers made the decision to put it down, Almada said.
It was moving in the direction of a daycare center and crowds of curious onlookers.
“We support that decision 100 percent,” Hughan said.
Many in the crowd were dismayed by the lion’s death, but Bette Harris, who was there for a digital photography class, acknowledged it had probably been for the best.
“They probably just did what they had to do,” Harris said.
Mountain lions are not endangered, but experts believe there are no more than 12 to 24 in the immediate area.
That makes any death a blow to the population, Reyes said.
“The mountain lion population is in a critical phase because there are so few of them left in this range,” she said.
That is in part because humans are encroaching steadily on their territory and at the same time are putting up barriers like freeways, which pen them in.
It’s not common for a mountain lion to wander into a dense, urban environment like Santa Monica, but it happens and is likely to become a more regular occurrence.
Last December, two mountain lion cubs were found in a residential neighborhood in Burbank, Reyes said.
“They were unknown and unheard of,” she said. “As their habitat starts to diminish, incidents like this will probably continue to rise.”
Ashley Archibald is a staff writer for the Santa Monica Daily Press. This article first appeared in that publication.