At Least 6 Cougars Roam Park Area, State Survey Finds

State wildlife experts say there are at least six mountain lions roaming the area of the Orange County wilderness park where two small children have been attacked by lions this year.

The preliminary finding in a survey begun earlier this month casts doubt on previous estimates that there are only 1,000 of the big cats in the entire state, said state Fish and Game Department biologist Terry Mansfield, who headed the survey team.

But Mansfield said the numbers have not caused alarm among state wildlife management officials, who are trying to learn more about Orange County’s mountain lion population after the two attacks at the 7,500-acre Ronald W. Caspers Wilderness Park east of San Juan Capistrano.

“It would just be premature to say that this is an artificially high or low concentration,” said Mansfield, who on Monday released the preliminary finding of a survey conducted during the first 10 days of November. “It is too early to say that lions are super, super abundant down there. But there is certainly a viable lion population in and around the area.”

Orange County Parks and Recreation Director Hal J. Krizan said: “I frankly thought there were not that many in the Caspers Park area. But obviously we are learning an awful lot about lions these days.”

But Krizan agreed with state officials that the count is no cause for alarm, as long as adequate precautions are being taken.

The county-owned Caspers Park has been closed to the public since the most recent attack, on Oct. 19 when 6-year-old Justin Mellon of Huntington Beach was mauled.

The park is scheduled to reopen Jan. 2. But county officials have decided that children will not be permitted beyond a picnic area near the park entrance, and adults venturing onto nature trails and into camp sites will have to travel in groups of two or more.

Evidence of a sizable mountain lion population in the area was not unexpected, experts say.

The survey represents the “most extensive hands-on work” dealing with mountain lion populations by researchers in California since the mid-1970s, Mansfield said. But for years, residents and landowners around the park have reported sightings. Authorities at the Camp Pendleton U.S. Marine Corps base, about two miles miles south of the park, have reported that six mountain lions have been struck by vehicles during the last 12 months, Mansfield said.

Researchers conducted their 10-day survey in a 15,000-acre area that included Caspers Park and adjacent land, including the Starr Ranch Audubon Sanctuary. Researchers used paw prints, droppings, scratchings and evidence of deer and opossum kills in their efforts to count lions.

Mansfield stressed that the survey found “a minimum of six individual lions” in the area and said there could be more. Habits of the far-ranging, secretive, solitary cats make an accurate, absolute count in a short period almost impossible, he said.

Mansfield said wildlife officials also hope to learn more about the movements of the cats from two female adults that were captured, fitted with radio transmitter collars and released back into the wild.

So far, those two lions have surprised biologists by remaining in a relatively small area since their capture. The two lions--which were shot with tranquilizer guns, examined and then drugged again to reverse the tranquilizers’ effect--had wandered no more than two miles as of Friday, Mansfield said. Mountain lions, also known as cougars, have been known to range over 40 to 150 square miles in a month or two.

Mansfield said Fish and Game officials will continue to monitor the two cats with radio collars. He said it will be several months before state biologists reach hard-and-fast conclusions regarding either the cat population or their “home ranges.”

But he said it is virtually certain that “if there are six of them in that relatively small area, then the previous estimates of 1,000 in the state are really low.”

1 Lion Killed, 2 Sent to Zoo

Three mountain lions were trapped in the park after the March 23 attack that left 5-year-old Laura Michele Small of El Toro partially paralyzed and without sight in one eye. One of the cougars was killed and a mother and a cub were sent to a Salt Lake City zoo.

Officials believe that the cat that attacked the Mellon child is still in the wild.

Laura Michele was attacked while hiking with her mother along a stream near the dead end of a nature trail last March. A lion sprang from the bush and seized the child by the head. Hearing screams, Gregory Ysais, an electronics technician from Mission Viejo who was hiking nearby, started beating the cat with a stick. The mountain lion released the girl and disappeared into a thicket.

The attack on Justin Mellon seven months later was not far from the site of the first attack. The boy was walking ahead of his family on a hiking trail when he was seized by a cougar that attempted to drag him off. The boy’s father, knife in hand, rushed the cat, which released the youth. Justin required more than 100 stitches to close gashes on his head, chest and back and underwent preventive treatment for rabies.

Although the attacks “are cause for serious concern,” Mansfield said, attacks by cougars on humans are still “quite rare.” He said black bear and deer have been responsible for more attacks on people, and he said the state wildlife managers are looking for an approach to mountain lion population management that is “balanced out with common sense.”

Hunting Renewal Urged

The attacks have prompted hunting organizations to call for renewed sport hunting of mountain lions, which was halted in 1971. A legislatively imposed moratorium on sport hunting of the cats expired in January, but the state Fish and Game Commission has yet to set a new hunting season.

A commission spokesman said the panel will hear recommendations from various groups in February and will also hold a public hearing in March. In April, said Assistant Executive Secretary Bob Trainer, the commission will adopt regulations for the 1987-88 hunting season.

Trainer said the commission is receiving a great deal of mail from conservation groups and foes of mountain-lion hunting.

Mansfield said state wildlife managers can order mountain lion kills to protect human lives and curb livestock attacks without any action by the Legislature or the commission.