{"id":52,"date":"2008-09-20T18:08:00","date_gmt":"2008-09-21T01:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/northerncaliforniahikingtrails.com\/blog\/?p=52"},"modified":"2022-04-17T15:29:25","modified_gmt":"2022-04-17T22:29:25","slug":"mountain-lions-and-hikers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/northerncaliforniahikingtrails.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/20\/mountain-lions-and-hikers\/","title":{"rendered":"Mountain Lions and Northern California Hikers: What to Do"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve done a lot of hiking on the trails of Northern California, but I’ve only rarely seen a mountain lion. Hiker interactions with mountain lions are rare. but you need to know what to do.<\/p>\n

\"Hikers
Mountain lion photo courtesy of Stephen Lea and Wikimedia Commons<\/a>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mountain Lions and Hikers: Northern California<\/h2>\n

I’ve done a lot of hiking in Northern California, nearly all of it in mountain lion territory. I like to think I’m a perceptive person, aware of my surroundings. I’m not one of those hikers who\u00a0walks the whole hike nose down, looking at the trail for the exact point of my next footfall. I look, I listen.<\/p>\n

Yet the only mountain lion I’ve ever seen on a hike was a dead one. It was in the mid-1970s in the blue-oak hills outside Anderson, California. I was trespassing on a rancher’s spread; perhaps he shot the lion to protect his calves.<\/p>\n

Mountain Lion in the Trinity Alps Wilderness<\/h2>\n

In the mid-1980s I had another sighting.\u00a0I\u00a0was driving down a dirt road on the way back from a backpacking trip to Grizzly Lake and Thompson Peak in the Trinity Alps when a lion darted across the road about a hundred feet in front and quickly disappeared.<\/p>\n

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The Top 100 Day Hikes and Backpacking Trips in Northern California<\/h4>\n

\"100The all-color fourth edition features the best trails in:<\/strong><\/p>\n