What to Do If There's a Mountain Lion in Your Office

A few weeks ago mountain lion found its way to an office courtyard in Santa Monica, California. Residents panicked and the animal was killed after attempts to tranquilize it failed. Business Week and Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks offers the following advice should you encounter a mountain lion in the work place.

• Don’t approach it, don’t run, don’t crouch.
• Instead, try to appear larger.
• If under attack, fight back with bear pepper spray, rocks, sticks, caps, jackets, garden tools, a firearm, or whatever you have at hand.
• Close a door between you and the animal
• Don’t try to be a mountain lion whisperer, "People think they can walk up to an animal and gently deal with it. You can’t."
• Don’t throw anything at it
• Just get away from it

Would you take shelter inside an animal?

Sleeping bag

"This may smell bad, kid, but it'll keep you warm until I get the shelter up... Ugh. And I thought they smelled bad on the outside."
-Han Solo, The Empire Strike Back

Continuing the topic of off-beat ways to stay warm, StraightDope.com was recently asked, "What’s the best animal to slice open and crawl inside to stay warm?" In Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, Luke is put inside a freshly killed tauntaun to avoid freezing on the ice planet Hoth. Would this work in real life?

Cecil Adams first offers some silly answers,

"taking shelter inside dead animals can’t really be considered an affordable housing option ... Many large warm-blooded critters would do, such as a bear, water buffalo, or rhinoceros. Historically, however, the emergency refuge of choice was a horse. ... Slice one open even in case of dire necessity and you’re likely to hear from one PO’d little girl or dressage buff. Cows are less of an issue, but you still take the chance of having PETA come over and picket your house."

Then he gets serious,

"I could find only one case where someone had actually climbed into an animal to survive the cold as opposed to trying to get on TV, namely an intrepid pioneer priest named Father Goiffon. [He became lost in North Dakota in a snowy November]  When his horse finally died, the enterprising priest cut open its belly and crawled inside the carcass. He was mostly successful — his equine sleeping bag saved his life, but he lost his leg due to frostbite."

Bottom Line

Cecil concludes with an example that also sheds some light on my question from a few days ago, when does cold weather became too dangerous to endure?

How much time would sheltering in a deceased animal buy you? Assuming a bitterly cold day (9 degrees Fahrenheit), a stiff wind (12 miles per hour) [about -5 wind chill], and a 500-kilogram cow with half its insides scooped out, and factoring in the heat produced by the resident human, my assistant Una estimates the cow’s body would lose about 3 degrees per hour. She concludes you’d have right around 15 hours, best case, before hypothermia set in.

Bear Attack!

"I don't think my parents liked me. They put a live teddy bear in my crib."
-Woody Allen

For the first time in 25 years a tourist has been killed by a bear at Yellowstone Park. Forty years ago when my grandparents went to Yellowstone, bears were common. People fed them from cars and my grandmother's scrapbook is filled with close-up bear photos (e.g. a bear sticking its nose through the partially open window). But Park Rangers knew this was dangerous so they moved the bears deeper into the park, made every trashcan bear proof and banned the feeding of bears. It worked. Fifteen years ago when my wife and I visited the park, we were lucky to see a bear far away up on a mountainside. Such sightings caused "bear-jams" as every tourist pulled over on the road to see the bears through binoculars. One brave (stupid) group tried to hike up the mountain to get a better view and were scolded and fined by a Park Ranger.

The man who was recently killed was hiking with his wife in the back woods of Yellowstone when they came unexpectedly upon a mother with cubs. They both ran but bears can outrun people. What saved the wife is that she dropped to the ground; the bear picked her up by her backpack, but then left her alone.

The recommended response to an angry bear is either to back away slowly, or to lie down on the ground and play dead. When playing dead, clasp your hands around your head at the back of the neck for protection against bites.

When camping in woods, keep food away from your car and sleeping area. Bears can rip open cars, trailers and of course tents. Put food items in a sealable bag and hang them on a tree about 100 yards from the campsite.

Bottom Line

Bear attacks are rare.  "It's really important to not surprise them," says one expert. Attach bells to your hiking gear and make noise so the animals know you are there. Most wild animals want to avoid an encounter and will move away. Never approach a wild animal with cubs or a carnivore eating a carcass. In both cases the animal will be protective and could turn aggressive.

Don't eat that armadillo!

"Or if there be any flesh, in the skin whereof there is a hot burning, and the quick flesh that burneth have a white bright spot, somewhat reddish, or white; Then the priest shall look upon it: and, behold, if the hair in the bright spot be turned white, and it be in sight deeper than the skin; it is a leprosy broken out of the burning: wherefore the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is the plague of leprosy"
Leviticus 13:24-25, KJV

The New York Times says, "Armadillos Can Transmit Leprosy to Humans, Federal Researchers Confirm."

'Using genetic sequencing machines, researchers were able to confirm that about a third of the leprosy cases that arise each year in the United States almost certainly result from contact with infected armadillos. The cases are concentrated in Louisiana and Texas, where some people hunt, skin and eat armadillos."

This is good news for doctors who have been puzzled by U.S. Leprosy cases in individuals who had NOT traveled to leprosy hot spots around the world like India, Brazil, Africa, and the Philippines. The microbe that causes leprosy is a fragile one; it won't grow in petri dishes and survives only a week or two in moist soil. So researchers had been stumped tracking the U.S. source. But in retrospect the answer is not surprising. Leprosy only survives in two animals: humans and armadillos. Researchers have long used armadillos to grow the disease for testing.

According to the Times,

Leprosy now joins a host of other infectious diseases — including flu, H.I.V./AIDS and SARS — that are known to have jumped from animals to humans. Flu is thought to have first crossed to humans from migratory waterfowl several hundred years ago. H.I.V./AIDS first crossed from a chimpanzee about 90 years ago.

Ironically the disease may have first spread from humans to armadillos five hundred years ago. There are no traces of leprosy in the New World before Christopher Columbus.

Bottom Line

Left untreated, leprosy can cause permanent damage to the skin, nerves, limbs and eyes. Contrary to folklore, leprosy does not cause body parts to fall off, although they can become numb or diseased as a result of infection; infection results in tissue loss, so fingers and toes become shortened and deformed as the cartilage is absorbed into the body. Until recent times (1940s), leprosy was incurable and slightly contagious, so those infected (lepers) were shunned or forced to live in leper colonies. It is sometimes called the oldest known disease and there are many references to it in the Old and New Testaments. The Law of Moses required lepers to call out "Unclean, unclean" to warn others from touching them.

Today the infection is readily cured but it's important to catch it early before nerves are permanently damaged. Before the armadillo link was discovered, southern doctors never considered leprosy as the cause for the numb fingers their patients reported. Leprosy just made no sense if the patient had never traveled outside the U.S.

Death by Crocodile

"See you later, alligator. After a while, crocodile."
- Bill Haley

There are many odd ways to die. Being killed by a crocodile is unusual. Dieing in a plane crash is actually quite rare. (You are over 2000 times more likely to die in a car crash). Now combine the two, killed by a crocodile on an airplane, and you have a type of death that may be unique.

In August a small plane crashed in the Democratic Republic of Congo killing 21 people aboard. It was obvious that the crash was caused by a loss of balance in the small aircraft while landing. Why unbalanced? The passengers where stampeding into the cockpit. Why the stampede? That was not so obvious until the lone survivor explained what happened.

A crocodile had escaped from a duffel bag that a passenger was smuggling it in. The terrified passengers and crew were trying to get away from the crocodile. (I wonder how big it was? I suppose even small crocs have big teeth.)  Ironically the croc survived the crash (but was killed afterwards.)

Bottom Line

Sometimes our response to a threat is more dangerous than the threat itself. Long ago I was driving the family car with my mother on board when a bee flew in the window. I started to panic and was watching the bee. My mother admonished me to keep my eyes on the road. A car crash would be far worse than a bee sting.

Smarter than the average bear

"I'm smarter than the average bear." - Yogi Bear

For you summertime travelers, here's a question I'm sure you've been worried about; if I travel to a National Park, what type of car is a bear most likely to break into? Well worry no more! The Journal of Mammalogy studied bear attacks in Yosemite Park published the following...

From 2001 to 2007, bears broke into 908 vehicles at the following rates: minivan (26.0%), sport–utility vehicle (22.5%), small car (17.1%), sedan (13.7%), truck (11.9%), van (4.2%), sports car (1.7%), coupe (1.7%), and station wagon (1.4%). Only use of minivans (29%) during 2004–2005 was significantly higher than expected (7%).

Bottom Line

Today it is rare to see a bear at a US National Park. My grandparents have photos of bears checking out cars when whey visited Yellowstone in the 40's. But I never saw one at Yellowstone in recent decades. Today any bear that gets near people is drugged by rangers and transported far away. Bears may be cute but they are dangerous; they can easily rip open cars and trailers to get to food inside. Do not encourage bears by feeding them.

Approaching Danger

Curiosity killed the cat - proverb

As described in the story Citizen journalism: 1, evolutionary instincts for survival: 0,

There was a massive gas explosion in Moscow that led to an inferno that injured
five people, raising questions about Russia’s ageing energy infrastructure and
the sanity of Russian civilians. … [In the embedded YouTube] notice how people
are not all running from the explosion; many are walking towards it, recording
the scene on their mobile phones

Humans are funny animals. They will panic over a disease that killed people in another country yet walk straight towards a local disaster. And I’m no different. I’ve always wanted to see a tornado so my inclination in college during a tornado alert was to go outside and look instead of sheltering instead and missing it. I still have not seen one.

When my wife and I visited Yellowstone National Park and the Canadian Rockies, we were warned about wildlife and “Bear Jams”. A bear jam occurs when someone sites a bear and everyone parks their car on the road shoulder and gets out to look. Now-a-days the bear is typically far away so in one case we watched as some foolhardy young visitors decided to hike closer to the bears. When a Park Ranger arrived, she was furious. She yelled at the hikers, chased after them and we could see her asking for their driver licenses (giving them a park ticket I suppose).

People appear to think of Yellowstone as a giant petting zoo. We watched photographers approach a mother moose and her child. Other tourists must have thought that the boarded walkways were a safe zone and would walk within feet of a wild bison while staying on the path.
Most animals in real zoos are not tame either. One extreme danger program on TV showed video of a woman who climbed two walls to get a better picture of a polar bear. The bear grabbed her leg through the cage bars with his teeth and wouldn’t let go. The zookeepers were pulling on the woman and trying to distract the bear. Fortunately her shoe came off and the bear let go to check it out. She was lucky to keep her leg.

Bottom Line

An important survival skill is to show proper respect for danger. We forget about risk when trying to get a better photograph or when rushing in to save a person. In a Red Cross First Aid/CPR class I just attended, the first step was always to evaluate the scene to determine if it was safe for you to approach an injured person. No point in you also being electrified, bitten by a rattlesnake, poisoned by gas or burned by a chemical and becoming another victim. The second step was to put on rubber gloves (to protect yourself) before touching the victim. You may save life but acquire HIV or Hepatitis.

Think before you leap towards danger.

Escaped rhino drill at Japanese zoo

"One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I don't know."
- Groucho Marx in Animal Crackers, 1930

How do you handle an escaped rhinoceros? For the answer check out this YouTube video of a zoo drill in Japan. (Via BoingBoing.net and Arbroath).



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgHQfxT7ImI

Bottom Line

While I doubt most people need to prepare for escaped rhinos, I included this clip to demonstrate the value of drills and especially drills well done. While the fake rhino with two men inside is rather cute, it does show the size of the beast and gives the zoo staff practice with crowd control, herding the rhino with sticks and staying out of the way. I'm sure the staff will learn much more from this drill than from a lecture or written instructions.