Dennis RomeroIt was a once-in-a-lifetime moment. And a motorcyclist who happened to be cruising on Mulholland Highway in the Santa Monica Mountains stopped in his tracks to snap this photo.
Kate Kuykendall of the National Park Service told the Weekly that of hundreds of mountain lion “kills” that have been examined over the years in the area, this was a first:
We've hiked in and studied 400 different kills made by mountain lions over the years and we've never seen one on a road.
This one was discovered Sunday morning along a remote stretch of Mulholland in the Malibu Springs area, she said. Irv Nilson was riding a motorcycle in the area and stopped to take these photos, according to Kuykendall.
Credit: National Park Service / Irv Nilson
The Service originally didn't want to give such a specific location because mountain lions like to stay around the area of a kill, but, given that several days have passed, Kuykendall decided to let us know.
This mountain lion is known to the Park Service as P-23, “a young female who has recently dispersed from mom,” according to a Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area Facebook post:
She dragged the deer into the dense brush shortly after this photo was taken for a little more privacy.
So now you know that when people talk about the wild life in the hills above Malibu, they really mean it.
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