Sometimes, residents call conservation officers when they think they have seen what may have been a cougar.
Sometimes that turns out not to be the case, if the animal turns out to be a bobcat or maybe even a coyote.
But there was no doubt what animal was in Stephane Alberola’s front yard early Monday, leaving a fresh set of tracks in the snow.
From the right side of Alberola’s security camera on his front yard on Foreman Drive in Silver Valley, a cougar strolls across his driveway, before disappearing into the dark, at about 5 a.m.
Several sightings of cougars have occurred in Maple Ridge the past year, with many occurring during last summer’s dry spell when drought keeps prey from moving around too much, making it hard for cougars to get a meal.
Conservation officers recently had to kill a cougar that had made itself too comfortable in a trailer park in east Maple Ridge on 287th Street. It likely was dining on house cats which are prey for cougars.
Another cougar had to be killed in August after a goat was killed. The Conservation Officer Service urges people not to leave out anything that can attract cougars or their prey.