APTOS — Aptos High School went into a brief shelter in place Tuesday after multiple reports of a mountain lion on campus were shared with administrators.
Aptos High Principal Alison Hanks-Sloan told the Sentinel that the front office began receiving calls from parents around 12:59 p.m. Tuesday saying they spotted the puma near the school’s baseball field. The mountain lion, according to reports, then moved down a trail toward the archway at the school’s main entrance, continued along a row of fencing leading to where the campus turnoff intersects with Freedom Boulevard and eventually left the area.
“We got multiple calls that indicated that there must be a mountain lion or something that created an alert and we went into an immediate shelter in place and we informed our students, our teachers, our families and our entire staff,” said Hanks-Sloan.
Hanks-Sloan said the lockdown lasted until about 1:28 p.m. before it was lifted and classes resumed.
While the campus was sheltering in place, Hanks-Sloan said the school resource officer, a member of the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office , called in some backup and did a campus sweep to ensure the mountain lion had left.
Because the reports from families were that the puma had already exited the campus, Hanks-Sloan said the school elected not to involve any wildlife groups while investigating the issue.
“It’s the joy of having a school right in the middle of a canyon/valley,” said Hanks-Sloan.
Chris Wilmers, a professor at UC Santa Cruz and founder of the Santa Cruz Puma Project, agreed with Hanks-Sloan that this kind of thing comes with the territory for a school nestled within an enclave of wooded hillsides. Wilmers said he was a little surprised to hear the puma was out and about during the day in areas frequented by humans, but other than that, there was not much that was unusual about the big cat perusing the local terrain.
“The landscape around Aptos High is mountain lion habitat, plain and simple,” said Wilmers. “There’s natural native vegetation that surrounds and is part of the campus and it goes up into the hills and there’s plenty of deer there and that’s the kind of place mountain lions hang out.”
Though mountain lion sightings are rare, according to Wilmers there are about 40-50 adults pumas in the Santa Cruz Mountains that occasionally wander into neighborhood regions. One was captured at the Cypress Point apartments in Santa Cruz in 2020 after walking the streets for a number of days and a juvenile was spotted in 2017 crouched in a tree at the East Cliff Shopping Village Center before it was tranquilized by state officials and later released back into the wild.
According to the Associated Press, the first fatal human encounter with a mountain lion in California in 20 years occurred in March when two brothers, one of whom died, were attacked while out in a remote region near Sacramento.
Still, Wilmers emphasized that such attacks are extremely rare and should anyone see a mountain lion that is not behaving in a threatening way, they should keep a distance but appreciate the fleeting moment.
“For the most part, just by having big teeth and sharp claws mountain lions are not a threat to people,” said Wilmers. “If you see a mountain lion in your backyard or you’re driving by your kid’s school and see a mountain lion walk across the baseball field, I would just say: ‘Enjoy it.’ That’s a super rare view; you’re really privileged to have had it; probably never happen again to you in your life.”
Unusual puma behavior that should spark concern, according to Wilmer, includes the animal remaining out in the open for extended periods of time in a busy place without moving to conceal itself or behaving in a stalking manner.
Meanwhile, the mountain lion population in the Santa Cruz Mountains continues to face serious challenges. According to Wilmer, the major highways around the mountain ranges such as highways 101 and 17 have created habitat islands that result in a lack of genetic diversity which leads to physiological detriments and possibly extinction.
A Highway 17 wildlife tunnel at Laurel Curve opened last January to offer mountain critters safe passage to neighboring habitats and the first sighting of its being used by a uncollared male puma was documented in November.
“Mountain lions are using it, so that’s a positive thing,” said Wilmer.
But, he added, more work needs to be done and efforts are already underway to create similar crossings in nearby regions with high paw traffic.