PESCADERO — Authorities are preaching vigilance to residents after a mountain lion entered a Pescadero bedroom and snatched a 15-pound dog as its owners, just footsteps away, looked on in horror early Monday, according to the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office.
Deputies were called to a home in the 800 block of Native Sons Road, about a half-mile south of Pescadero Creek Road, for a report of the mountain lion encounter.
A woman who lives at the home told them that she and her child were sleeping in a bedroom with their 15-pound Portuguese Podengo at the foot of the bed, according to the Sheriff’s Office. She said they kept the room’s French doors slightly open so that the dog could go outside as it needed.
Instead, around 3 a.m., she woke to the sound of the dog “barking aggressively,” and when she turned toward the sounds she saw the “shadow of an animal enter the room, take the small dog from the bed” and walk out.
When the resident went out after the dog, she discovered large wet paw prints at the bedroom’s entrance. Responding deputies found prints suggesting a mountain lion.
Additional information about the dog was not immediately available, as the residents opted for privacy.
“The family is really shaken up by this,” Sheriff’s spokesman Detective Sal Zuno said, adding that none of the home’s three residents were injured.
Zuno added that there were no additional sightings or reports of the mountain lion or the now-missing dog since the report.
The Sheriff’s Office summoned the state Department of Fish and Wildlife to investigate as well. Zuno said the incident was “very rare,” as mountain lions tend to stay away from homes.
“They prefer deer, but at the same time, they are predators and do hunt,” he said.
The news circulated swiftly throughout the tight-knit community. In bucolic downtown Pescadero, the animal encounter perked up ears and evoked some alarm that a mountain lion would get so close to a human dwelling.
“It’s the first I’ve heard of an entry like that. This is very brazen,” said Kimberly Periat, a longtime resident who owns the Made in Pescadero furniture store with her husband. “I’ve lived out here since the ’90s, and and I’ve never seen a mountain lion.”
She did say that other residents have encountered the big cats indirectly through stealthy attacks on their livestock, but even that is seldom.
“We live amongst these animals, but mostly, you never know they’re there,” Periat said. “It’s scary that there is probably an individual lion out there that has become more aggressive, has a gene that makes it a little less shy. I’m so sorry for those people.”
In light of the encounter, sheriff’s officials are restating warnings that residents lock and secure their doors and windows at night and brush up on mountain lion safety tips at wildlife.ca.gov/Keep-Me-Wild/Lion.
“The location where this occurred is very rural area, and it’s mountain lion territory,” Zuno said. “Wildlife does exist there. It should be expected and people should be prepared.”
