CHAPTER TWELVE
When Reggie got home that Friday afternoon, his mom was still at work, so he grabbed a handful of string cheeses from the fridge and went to his room. He got some tape and hung up Jennifer’s painting above his bed. That old picture book, he thought, I wonder if I still have it?
He went to his closet and pulled out a big cardboard box. It had the dump trucks and stuffed animals he played with and the books he read as a kid. Throwing all the toys over his back, his fingers felt a stack of picture books; The Hungry Caterpillar, The Giving Tree, Bedtime for Francis.
“Yes!” he shouted. There it was. He wiped the dust off of the tattered cover of Brother Eagle Sister Sky. There was the young boy with Chief Seattle in his regal feathered headdress. He plopped down on the bed and opened the cover and read the handwritten inscription.
My Johnny Boy, I love you and will always remember you.
Grandma Wanchuat.
He read it, the whole time picturing his mother sitting on the bed and hearing her sweet voice. He loved that book.
Then he jumped on to the internet. He began studying Joe’s California Carnivores website where it talked about the changing habitat that lions face in the region, when an idea popped into his head. Reggie searched the website for a contact form to ask a question. He wrote to the info@ address, hoping he might connect directly with Joe, and asked about the dangers of rat poisons to wildlife.
****
Later that evening when Joe Sartor got home, he felt the need to talk to Barbara. “I’ve been thinking lately.” Joe said as he pushed away his dessert plate. “Thinking more about teaching again, you know mentor a young boy”
“Good idea,” Barb shrugged, “You never did hear from Big Brothers?”
“Nah. When I called them a few months back, they said they just didn’t have any kids in this area needing a mentor and I pretty much gave up on it.” Then I got this email.” Joe said as his voice rose in excitement. “There’s this kid Reggie I met at the school lecture and he was real interested in my work and mountain lions. Good kid. One of the few really paying attention. Well, he emailed me today with a smart question and I’m thinking maybe he could volunteer at the office and I could mentor him a bit.”
“That’s a great idea,” Barbara said, “I bet he would love that.”
“PING!” Reggie couldn’t believe it. Right there on his screen was a message from Joe’s website. As he read it, he pumped his arms above his head: Joe just invited him to have a tour at his headquarters this Saturday. He quickly texted his mom at The Coffee Bean and got a tentative okay, but said that she wanted to meet Joe herself to be sure it was okay. Then he spent the rest of the evening pouring over Joe’s website and learning everything he could about mountain lions.
On Saturday morning, Reggie and his mom pulled into the parking lot of the big government headquarters building where Joe had his office. Reggie rang Joe and he came down to the lobby to meet them. Reggie noticed his mom had a surprised look on her face when she saw Joe. It was the same surprise Reggie had when he realized how much Joe looked like his dad. They took the elevator up to his office and the three of them sat down to chat.
Once Joe filled them in on the volunteer program at the agency and how he thought Reggie could help with his study of mountain lions, Reggie’s mom said, “Well I can tell that Reggie would love to help with all of that. How about if I let you guys get to it and get to work myself. Pick Reggie up at one, then?”
“One o’clock works for me,” Joe said, shaking Carole’s small hands. “I’ll walk you out.”
She waved him off and made her way to the door. “Not necessary. You guys enjoy yourselves.”
Smiling at each other across the desk, Joe said, “Good to see you again, Reggie, and so soon.”
“I know,” Reggie said. “I’ve been doing a lot of studying about
Puma concolor, and I want to learn more.”
“That’s a great attitude,” Joe said. “It’ll be fun sharing my love of these big cats with you.”
Looking around the office, two things immediately stuck out to Reggie. The first was a big table behind Joe’s desk filled with all kinds of electronic equipment, including three blinking and beeping monitors. The second thing Reggie noticed was a large framed photograph of a cougar mother nursing two cubs.
“You like the photo?” Joe asked.
“It’s awesome. How old are those cubs?”
“Oh, maybe just about 6-10 weeks old. At that age they have baby-blue eyes,” Joe said. “And they’ll keep those brown spots on their golden fur for about six months. You might already know this, but soon the mom will supplement her milk and start bringing meat to her cubs, you know, introduce them to their carnivore natures. By the time the cubs reach a year or two, the mom will leave them to fend for themselves.”
“After she’s taught them how to hunt and survive, right?”
“Right,” Joe said. “A mother has a pretty tough job teaching her cubs—the odds are stacked against their survival. The fathers don’t help at all, so how well the mothers raise them will determine the success of the population.”
“Yeah.” Reggie mumbled, thinking about his own parents. He shook away the feeling and said, “The cubs have to have both instinct and learning in order to survive, right?”
“Right again, Reggie. You seem to have a feel for animals.”
“I grew up in the mountains with not many people around, so my dog Hector and I became best buddies,” Reggie said. “I used to talk to Hector because we spent a lot of time in the woods together and I took care of him, including the time I had to pull thirty-one porcupine quills out of his face!”
“Ouch!” Joe said, “I bet he didn’t like the pain, but appreciated what you did to help. I used to talk to my dogs too, but now I talk to my lions on occasion.”
“Really?”
“Ha. Really. But only unofficially, though. Don’t tell anyone, okay?” Joe took another long look at the mountain lion photo and then turned his chair back to Reggie. “Didn’t you also tell me you volunteered at the Audubon Center?”
“Yeah. I mostly clean cages, stuff like that, but we sometimes get to bottle-feed the rescued raccoons and opossums. Sometimes, my buddy Isaac and I get to feed mayflies to this injured owl we named Puddles.”
“Puddles?”
“Yeah, because he gets excited when he eats and I always knew when he was going to pee all over Isaac’s lap and Isaac would get so pissed off.” “Ha!” Joe laughed.
“Yeah, but the people at the center keep telling me I have this uncanny ability to sense what an animal is feeling or needing. I don’t know if it’s true or whatever, but it might be.”
“That’s pretty amazing, Reggie.” Joe said. “My way with animals is more scientific and comes from years of study…though the more I work with them the better I understand them.”
“Beep! Beep!” One of the monitors started sounding and Joe ran over to check the figures crawling across the screen. He then looked through a stack of charts on the tabletop.
“You know what, Reggie? Let me show you how we monitor and track our collared cats. Pull up a chair.”
Joe explained how the equipment worked and what they could learn from the tracking signals. “These GPS blips show us where the animal is roaming in the territory. Like now…” Joe pointed to a cluster of tracking points. “Here’s my friend P12’s signal, and our monitor is programmed to raise an alarm if we don’t see the usual movement of the cat. We’re getting a little concerned over P12 lately because it shows here that he’s been staying in one small area for too long a time.”
“What does that mean?” Reggie asked.
“Well, we don’t know for sure, but it could mean he’s mating with a female that we haven’t collared or tracked, but we do know he’s not with P13 because we have her sixteen miles away. You know, mountain lions are serial copulators, so they stay together for several days.”
“What’s that mean?” Reggie asked.
“Cougar mating, is what I mean. When cougars get together to mate, it takes place over many days, with each day containing fifty to seventy separate mating acts.”
“Geez!” Reggie laughed. “So is that the only time males normally stay in the same location for that long a time?”
“Generally, yes. One time, I had the rare fortune to hear cougars mating. I was setting a snare when I heard what sounded at first like a pair of cougars fighting in the distance—screaming, yowling, it was incredibly loud and vicious. We know that they caress each other in foreplay, which is needed to induce an egg. Too bad I didn’t have a recorder with me, but I stayed for hours, late into the night. In between the yowling were short, sometimes longer periods of silence.”
“That must have been crazy to be out there and actually hear that,” Reggie said. “What do you think the yowls meant?”
“Good question; I assume that there was considerable communication between the pair.”
“You mean, like they were talking and stuff?”
“Well, we’re getting into unknown and subjective territory here, but I believe they were responding to each other’s dialogue; body language, smells, sounds, and so forth. We can’t understand it, but they understand each other in their own language.”
“Yeah! I totally believe they can communicate with each other,” Reggie added, “I read that the Zuni Indian tribe believed animals could communicate with humans, too, like my dog Hector and I did.”
Joe put a hand on Reggie’s shoulder. “You know, as scientists, we can’t prove that, but we can’t disprove it either. So, you may be right.”
“You know I read that many tribes, going back to the Stone Ages, believed there are Power Animals that have supernatural powers,” Reggie said with growing excitement in his voice. “Even more amazing, these power animals can convey their traits to a human and empower them. I thought it was so cool that a person can discover his own Power Animal if he goes on what they call a vision quest.”
Smiling broadly, Joe said, “I think some modern-day Native American tribes continue to practice vision quests.”
Reggie looked at Joe and for several moments and seemed unable to speak. Finally, he said, “Really? That’s so cool.”
“Yeah. I think I read somewhere, they also call them spirit animals.”
Getting even more animated, Reggie went on, “You know what else I read about? The Cochimi tribe of Baja, California believed the puma had spiritual powers. They refused to kill pumas when the Spanish priests, who ran the missions, told them to.”
“They must have been brave people to defy the Spanish who stole their land,” Joe said. “Those indigenous people were a lot closer to nature than we are today.”
Reggie looked up at Joe, hesitating a bit, and then said, “You know, Joe, I believe my Tribal ancestors came from Baja.” “Boy, now there’s a connection,” Joe smiled.
“I think so, too, but my dad thinks…” Reggie paused for a second, and then in a softer voice, continued: “My dad says that I’m American now and to forget about that silly stuff about our Indian ancestors and whatever. He doesn’t have much of a connection to his Indian roots.
“That’s too bad,” Joe offered.
“Yeah. My Mom told me he left the reservation with his parents when he was a kid. She told me his dad wanted to build houses in the LA area.”
“That sort of explains it, I guess.”
“Anyway,” Reggie said. “I love learning about the mountain lions. Do you think they have an understanding of humans?”
“Sure, yeah. In a way, they have to. Over thousands of years living with the indigenous peoples, and then hundreds of years being with the Europeans, they’ve had to learn how to survive among us.”
“And, what they learned became part of their instincts,” Reggie mused.
“Exactly,” Joe said. “It’s almost like memories or stories passed along from generation to generation.”
“So,” Reggie said, “could it be that their ancestors are, in a way, alive in today’s lion mothers? Like helping them teach their cubs how to live with humans?”
“You could say that, sure, but you probably couldn’t prove that,” Joe said as he looked from the monitor and then back at Reggie. “You know what, Reggie, all this talk has my instincts kicking in and I think we may have a real issue on our hands here. Look at P12’s steady signal; his lack of movement is starting to get me pretty nervous. It’s been several days since we tracked him near P13 and she’s far away now. He could be injured from being hit by a car or maybe shot by a poacher, or, of course, another lion could have gotten to him and he’s hurt. I’m starting to think I should get out into the field. Hate to do this to you since you just got here, but would you mind if I called your mom to come and get you? I promise we can get together again soon.”
“No problem, Joe,” Reggie said. He was sorry to have the day end so soon, but he understood that this could be a serious situation and he would hate to keep Joe from helping P12. “Just let me know what happens, okay?”
Joe grabbed his phone and then held up his hand to Reggie. “Will do, I promise.”
****
Not far down the canyon from Joe’s office, Lupine-boy had his own problems. For several days now he had an itching irritation around his nose, eyes, and ears, and he constantly scratched his head with his paws.
As the days wore on, Lupine-boy broke his skin with his claws, and blood oozed down his face. He lost patches of fur around his head and his ears leaked puss, which attracted flies that bit at him. Rubbing his head in the underbrush didn’t help; it only brought further irritation to his skin.
Lupine-boy became lethargic and lost his appetite. He had no energy to find a meal, or even water. Without sustenance, he felt the call of death. He lost weight and the infections from the open sores entered his blood stream. He dragged himself along the canyon floor, dying of dehydration and starvation. It wouldn’t be much longer.
****
Joe called his team, and with their radio antenna, receiver, and equipment, they drove to the nearest last tracking point on the road. There, they picked up P12’s signal, and hiked down toward a densely treed section of a steep canyon.
Normally, he would not risk a crew to track down a lion that was not already snared or trapped, but Joe had the feeling that his favorite cat was in trouble. When the radio signal got stronger, Joe had the crew move cautiously so as not to surprise the wild animal. With binoculars scanning the canyon floor, one intern raised his hand and pointed. Moving super slowly now toward the cat, they found P12 lying down, chest rising and falling at a rapid rate: the animal was in serious distress. Taking out his blow dart gun, Joe moved closer in for the shot.
The dart’s almost silent ‘whoosh’ and muted ‘thud’ struck P12 in the flank. The cat twitched and then raised his head, but quickly dropped it back to the ground. When Joe first saw him lying there, he knew P12 was in a bad way, but he was grateful to see he was still alive. Once the drug took effect, the team moved in. Lifting P12’s head, Joe knew immediately what had happened to him.
The mountain lion had mange, and possibly worse.
Scientifically, it looked like mange, usually caused by feeding on a carcass of an animal that consumed rat poison. Joe had seen that scarred and bloody head on two other mountain lions that died from mange. P12 was infested with thousands of almost invisible blood-sucking mites that feed on an animal’s soft tissue. If not stopped, infection and dehydration, coupled with lack of energy and starvation, usually meant death.
Reaching into his medical kit, Joe found the medications that might have a chance to reverse the condition. First he applied the topical creams and injected him with Vitamin K. Then, Joe gave him this new drug called ‘Revolution’ to aid in recovery. After taking a few quick measurements, and putting on a new tracking collar, he took a blood sample to bring back to the lab for testing. After administrating the drug antidote, he left his favorite cat with a pat on the head and a silent prayer.