Santa Rosa Woman Fights Off Mountain Lion Attack

A Santa Rosa woman recounted Tuesday how she fended off an attack by two young mountain lions in a neighborhood field.

Nicole Lentz said she was walking her four-month-old Labrador puppy, Piper, in the Santa Rosa’s Skyhawk subdivision about 4 p.m. Monday when the encounter began.

“I was taking Piper for a walk,” she said. “We walked down this trail…I got her off the leash and we walked another 20-25 feet.”

“Then I saw what I thought was a bobcat. As soon as it saw us, it just came running straight at us. I could see it was trying to get her (Piper) from behind… I started kicking at its face…That’s when I saw the other one up behind me. I started hitting that one with the leash.”

Lentz, who has lived in the neighborhood for three years, said the two cats hissed and clawed at her and her dog.

“I don’t think they were cubs with a mother,” she said. “They were about a year old. They were her (Piper’s) size. They were hissing and showing their teeth. They were clawing in the air.”

Lentz said retreated into a neighbor’s backyard, but the cats continued to follow. Fortunately, they were driven off her neighbor’s three dogs began to bark.

Santa Rosa police officers responded to the area and cornered the two cats in a backyard. But the cats were able to escape into a nearby field.

“We did notify (the California Department of) Fish and Game,” police Sgt. Eric Goldschlag told the Santa Rosa Press Democrat. “They advised us to try and allow them to make their way back to their natural habitat.”

Lentz wasn’t the only area resident who has encountered the cats. Rachel Palmer told KTVU the cats had recently confronted her and her young daughters.

“They looked like cats in our front yard, but bigger,” Palmer said. “They were pretty big…The girls and I got out of the car and went up to the porch. There was one on the porch… I made the girls get back in the car and I went back to the porch. I clapped and yelled at it and it ran off.”