Cougar Here

Not me, silly!  Although I'm flattered.  No, I'm talking about the real deal.  As wikipedia says:

also known as puma, mountain lion, mountain cat, catamount or panther, depending on the region,

We got one, or one of each, prowling our 'hood.  Here's the sequence of events:

Tuesday: Daughter gets a ride home from the bus stop from a family friend who said cougars (plural) have been spotted in the area.

Wednesday: Hubby goes to meet son to walk him home from school, but being macho, they take the path through the bush.  I pick up our daughter from her school after work.

Thursday: I meet a neighbour at the post office.  He tells me how much he appreciates my son walking his daughter home from school yesterday because they found cougar prints in their yard that morning.  (Was my son being a gentleman?  Was it just on the way to meet my husband?  Or is the neighbour's daughter cute as the dickens?  All of the above.)

Friday: Kids are off school, it's hubby's day off, Dad and Son enjoy a rousing game of snow pitch in the afternoon.  Cougars?  What cougars?

Saturday: Bottle sort at the school.  I take the bottles down in the car and run an errand.  Hubby and son are going to walk down and meet me there to help out.  My cell rings.  "Mom, you need to come back and pick up me and Dad.  There are cougar prints all around the house."

Check it out:

And here's one from where the snow pitch tournament was held.  Note that the paw prints are made ON TOP OF the boot prints.  We were joking that they were made fifteen minutes before I took these photos.  Heh, heh.  Let's go back in the house.

Note as well how deep this thing pressed his/her feet, just to intimidate us.

And why would the cougar choose our house to case?  Well, hubby spoils our darling house cat by cutting paths through the snow so Bud won't get his little belly wet when he does his security checks at night.  See?

The deer use these paths as a highway through the back yard, but apparently so does our new neighbour.  He--or rather they, because there were several paw prints and they made two different tracks  after the compost--went right down that path we all used during our Christmas Extravaganza.  Remember that night, dear sister and brother-in-law, when we hiked up the hill through the woods because we were too inebriated to drive and, in my case, too drunk to walk?  Right there.  I kid you not.

Although, I'll be honest and admit I did not have the nerve to walk all the way down there today and see where they came out.  Sober makes smarter. :)