It doesn’t really get any scarier than this.
An hunter in Colorado found himself staring directly into the eyes of an apex predator while looking for elk last year and captured the heart pounding encounter on video.
The man had been stalking a gang of elk in the southern part of the state, but unknown to him, there was another creature eyeing up the same game animals, and that creature ended up turning the tables and making the hunter the hunted.
One of the 3,000-7,000 mountain lions that roam the Centennial State’s rocky landscape was able to spot the hunter and make a stealthy approach, which the man didn’t realize until it was staring at him from just a few short feet away.
While trying to stay hidden behind a tree, the hunter tries speaking to the lion and even throws some rocks at it, but that wasn’t successful and the cougar continued moving closer.
You can feel the tension in the air as the man realizes there’s only a few options left and they’re pretty high risk, high reward.
He could claim that his life was in danger and shoot the mountain lion with the bow or gun he was using for elk, but that would open up an investigation with Colorado Parks & Wildlife, and while I’m sure they would give him the benefit of the doubt, there’s always a chance that he’d find himself in some legal trouble. Also, if he happened to miss, that cat would sure be mad and probably go on the attack.
His other option is to stand up and make himself as large and menacing as possible in hopes the cat would get scared off.
The hunter eventually went with the second option and thankfully it worked. The cat turned tail and walked down the mountain, presumably going back to its original target of the elk herd, but man, was that a close call.
On one hand it’s incredible to imagine all of these beautiful predators roaming the forests of Colorado. On the other hand, seeing videos like this puts exactly what that means into a whole new light. I’m certainly pro-wildlife, but I’m also pretty pro-human, so it’s certainly a complex situation when it comes to predator management.
Fortunately, this didn’t end poorly, but it’s easy to see many opportunities where this could have gone wrong.
