However, you don't want them to think of you as prey. How would you be prey?
By appearing to run away from them (as in jogging while wearing bright colors) while being plugged into music earphones or news earphones and oblivious to their existence. Or by riding a bicycle through their usually pretty rugged territory like Fire roads in brush on hills around Los Angeles or San Diego or Santa Barbara Counties or further north near San Francisco where I live near forests or streams or rivers.
So, NOT appearing to be their prey by running or bicycling away from them in their hunting territories is a good idea.
I grew up hiking in forests a lot from Washington State to California to Colorado and Arizona and Nevada and New Mexico and Oregon. So, I have had many experiences with bears but mountain lions would rather not be seen because of their nature being more like a big house cat in some ways.
But, if you are hiking or walking or jogging or riding a bicycle and you feel something you need to stop what you are doing and look back. By looking back (if they are stalking you). Sometimes this isn't a lion but a human and you still need to demonstrate even if it is a human that you know they are there because it might serve to help protect you. If you are on a trail and there are rocks or a big stick pick up a stick or rocks or a bigger rock to throw at the cat. This will help discourage it and it might even discourage a human stalking you too.
Today I had this experience near sunset on the coast in a forest where I knew something (likely a mountain lion was stalking me). This has happened many times before. It doesn't mean you can see anything but you need to take your senses seriously because they might just save your life.
A mountain lion usually will never initially attack you if it is a aware that you know he is there. Because any kind of wound keeps that lion from hunting and that is potential death for the lion and the lion knows this. So, if you are aware of it and it knows you are aware of it, it might still stalk you but it will then stay out of sight. So, today I picked up two large sticks to defend myself with one having a knob on it so I could really do some damage to it's face or eyes to drive it off. It's not about defeating a mountain lion because without a gun you likely can't do that. But, if you can injure it significantly by putting an eye out or crippling it somehow then it will leave you alone.
The problem is once it commits to attacking you then all this gets much worse. So, discouraging a lion attacker is important before it attacks.
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