MicroWaveMar 18, 2024

Women pinned cougar during 'hand-to-hand combat' to save friend trapped in its jaws

https://lemmy.world/post/13259180

Women pinned cougar during 'hand-to-hand combat' to save friend trapped in its jaws - Lemmy.World

The cat dialed back pressure through its crushing jaws, and the friend was able to pull away, fellow cyclists said in an interview one month after the incident east of Seattle. A group of Seattle-area cyclists who helped one of their own escape the jaws of a cougar recounted their story this weekend, saying they fought the cat and pinned it down. The woman who was attacked, Keri Bergere, sustained neck and face injuries and was treated at a hospital and released following the Feb. 17 incident [https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cyclists-fight-cougar-rare-attack-east-seattle-leaves-woman-injured-rcna138515] on a trail northeast of Fall City, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife said in a statement. Bergere said she spent five days at an area hospital and was still recovering. Fish and Wildlife Lt. Erik Olson called the actions of her fellow cyclists “heroic” in the statement. But the extent of the cyclists’ battle with the 75-pound cat wasn’t immediately clear then.

Show threadSupraMarioMar 18, 2024
And they killed the cougar…wtf… you’re in it’s territory.
Show threadricecakeMar 18, 2024

If a wild animal attacks a human, we typically kill it, if for no other reason than to keep it from doing so again. We also need to know what caused it to do so, like if it had an infection that made it particularly aggressive or something.

We’re animals too, and vastly more dangerous. It’s silly to think we won’t defend ourselves.

Show threadSupraMarioMar 18, 2024
Cougars are known to attack anything. They’re literally top of the food chain. They already had it pinned, all they had to do was sedate it, and cage it, check it out at a vet and then release it. We need predators big time in NA, there is a reason the deer population has gone chaotic and they now have tons of diseases. There was 0 need to euthanize this animal.
Show threadsomeguy3Mar 18, 2024
Normal Cougars are not aggressive to humans. If an individual cougar becomes aggressive to humans, it’s not a normal cougar and it is killed.
Show threadSupraMarioMar 18, 2024
When you’re in their territory they absolutely are. This is like saying grizzly bears are calm animals and don’t attack people unless there is something wrong with them.
Show threadsomeguy3Mar 18, 2024
You’re very much wrong. Normal behavior of cougars and yes bears is not aggressive to humans or hunting humans. They want nothing to do with humans and their normal behavior is to get away from them.
Show threadSupraMarioMar 19, 2024

The fuck are you talking about…

www.adn.com/alaska-beat/article/…/11/

We’re prey animals to them until we’re not. Stop spewing uneducated bullshit. You’re a walking lunch box to most predators on this planet. They’re not really afraid of us until we make ourselves seem like a harder to kill meal.

Study: Most black bears that attack humans may see them as prey

There are nearly a million black bears in North America, but over the past century and more they've killed only 63 humans, says a new study on black bear behavior published today in the Journal of Wildlife Management. The study's lead authortells The New York Times that the increasing rate of deathsin recent decades is the result of more humans entering bear habitat. What's more remarkable, says Stephen Herrero of the University of Calgary, is that the vast majority of black bear attacks are by male bears likely hunting for food, not females protecting cubs. Continued on jump

Anchorage Daily News
Show threadsomeguy3Mar 19, 2024

Lol this is the second time I’ve seen that link. People furiously googling and getting one result. So here’s what I said before:

That article said 1) they are out hunting. Not that they are hunting humans, but I’m pretty sure you read it as such. And 2) “testing you out as a possible prey item,” said Dr. Herrero, a professor emeritus at the Univ". Testing mf testing. By bears in deep country that don’t have much experience with humans. They do not default think that you are prey. I’ve had bears size me up and you can just see their mind is “what are you, hey you’re not prey” before wandering off.

Anyway what I wanted to convey is that normal behavior (which is the vast, vast, vast majority of behavior) these animals do not see humans as prey. But yes in the very, very, excruciatingly rare occasions they attack humans, a portion of that can be something went wrong in their brain or in the situation and they may have seen you as prey. This is extraordinarily rare, as you can see by the rareness of attacks to even begin with. But people want to read that as normal behavior is hunting humans as prey, which it’s not. It’s the edge case. There’s a huge difference which I hope you now see.

I can’t keep correcting you all day, so ciao.

Show threadSupraMario
They post it because it’s fucking true. We are prey to bears and large cats. Stop acting like we’re not. They will turn tail usually when we present ourselves as a harder target, but acting like we’re not prey to them is stupid as fuck. It’s also rare for us to be attacked because we have destroyed their habitats and killed most of them off. Mt. Lions are considered threatened species and are just finally making a comeback. It’s like people saying wolves don’t look at us like a walking ham sandwich because there hasn’t been that many attacks…no shit because we killed pretty much all of them off.
Mar 19, 2024 at 2:04amWeb