May Provide Basis for County Decisions on Park : Major Study of Caspers Park Cougars to Begin

A major study of mountain lions in Ronald W. Caspers Wilderness Park is set to begin late today or Wednesday, state officials said Monday.

The study will be undertaken over the course of several days by a team of biologists, wardens and hunters. Its goal will be to find, count and analyze the tracks of any cougars that may have been in the park in recent days. The results of the survey could be used by the Orange County Board of Supervisors in deciding on the park’s future.

The park has been closed since Oct. 19, date of the second mountain lion attack there in seven months.

“State Department of Fish and Game personnel will go into the park with no intent, per se, to track a specific cat,” department spokesman Pat Moore said Monday, referring to the animal that eluded hunters last week after clawing and biting a 6-year-old boy the preceding Sunday.

“It’ll be a quick study to give us the feel for lion activity in that whole area, and we may even use a spotter plane as part of the operation, with no special attempt at capturing anything,” said Earl Lauppe, regional wildlife management supervisor for the Fish and Game Department.

However, if during the operation, the team should come across a particularly bold, aggressive cat, they would try to tranquilize and capture it for study, Moore said.

“They would be looking for such signs in the cat as the possibility it may at one time have been in captivity (and therefore lost fear of humans) or that it had a lactating cub nearby (which would make it take aggressive action),” Moore said.

Additionally, if the opportunity arises, the team might capture a cougar and fit it with a radio so its movements can be followed.

Both the Trabuco District of the Cleveland National Forest and the National Audubon Society’s Starr Ranch preserve adjoin the county park.

Caspers Park, seven miles east of San Juan Capistrano on Ortega Highway (California 74), was ordered closed for 60 days after the attack on Justin Mellon of Huntington Beach on Oct. 19. Supervisors at their meeting Wednesday are expected to discuss various proposals on what should be done about the 7,500-acre wilderness park, also the scene of an attack on 5-year-old Laura Michele Small last March 23.

Tim Miller, manager of regional facilities for the county’s Parks and Recreation Department, said attempts by a tracker and two dogs were made over the weekend to locate a cougar that was sighted by a sheriff’s helicopter crew last Friday.

“They found tracks of two cats, one large and one small, but by then the trail was old and didn’t lead anywhere,” he said.

Meanwhile, another park official, Tony Gimbrone, said mountain lions apparently are beginning to worry rangers in at least one San Diego County park.

He said Jim Lovewell, of the 1,000-acre Heise Park near Julian, in the mountains east of the city of San Diego, reported several sightings in recent days and “apparently needed to get some information on what to do about it. He asked for some samples of the signs we have posted at Caspers warning about lions, and I’m sending them to him.”