Mountain lion and kitten spotted near Santa Rosa

Last week, Audubon Canyon Ranch staff were delighted to see trail camera footage of a mountain lion they have been monitoring, along with her surviving 8-month-old cub. Through tracking and observation, researchers have been able to provide education about mountain lions to school-age children. Their goal is to offer students an opportunity to learn more about these wildcats, and to dispel fears about the predators.discovered P1's three kittens when they were 10 days old. Two of the three kittens were spotted again in July at four months old, caught on camera learning “big cat” skills.

P1, an 11-year-old female mountain lion, has been helping researchers learn and educate others about the species through the ACR Mountain Lion Project.

In April, researchers

Audubon recently replaced their trail cameras after the Nuns fire destroyed the others, and were rewarded with rare footage of P1 and her lone surviving kitten near Bennett Valley.

“This is the first time we've seen P1 since the #NunsFire kept her dodging hotspots,” Audubon shared on their Facebook page. “Mom and her 8-month-old big baby look as sweet as ever. They were feasting on a big buck that P1 had killed a few days prior.”

According to researchers, survival rates for mountain lions are often around the 50% mark.

See the video of the pair below. If you turn up your volume, you can hear the wildcats vocalizing.