Pam Smyth has always had a live and let live attitude towards cougars — at least, until she and her dog narrowly escaped from one last week.

The Deep Bay resident said she is no stranger to cougars, having seen them on three other occasions.

Last Wednesday night’s experience was very different — and very frightening.

The encounter with Canada’s largest feline predator began Monday night, when Smyth was alone with her 13-year-old dog, Lupy.

“At about 7 p.m. I saw three deer go whipping by my place,” she said. “They were running. They don’t usually run.”

She dismissed the incident — mostly — but it left her feeling uneasy. That feeling was vindicated later that night.

“Around 11:45 that night I heard the kill,” she said. “The deer didn’t die right away. It sounded like the cougar was playing with it. It was like a cat playing with a mouse, letting it go and catching it again before they kill it.”

As she listened to the pathetic screeching of the dying fawn, Smyth ran outside.

“I couldn’t stand it any more,” she said. “I clapped my hands and yelled at it to stop. Then the noise went quiet and then I heard one final cry. It sounded like a woman sighing and crying, as if to say, ‘how could you do this to me?’”

Realizing she was outside in the pitch blackness with a large predator, Smyth retreated indoors, but sleep eluded her as she lay in the dark, listening to the crunching of branches as the cougar dragged its kill off into the bush.

Tuesday night wasn’t a whole lot better, with a neighbour’s normally passive dog suddenly kicking up a commotion at 5 a.m.

“I woke up and thought, wow, that dog is really stressed. It barked for at least half an hour.”

Smyth eventually got to sleep, but the next day, after she returned home with Lupy from a day of shopping in Courtenay, her unwelcome visitor got up close and personal.

“I always let the dog out on the deck last thing at night,” she said. “But that night I had a strong sense that I shouldn’t. I could tell she wanted to go out, but something said no.

Instead, she took her out the front door and kept her on a leash.

“She was about 14 feet from the front door and I was about six feet,” she remembered. “She was doing her business and then I just saw a flash of movement in my left eye.”

It was the cougar, bounding across the grass. It took two enormous leaps and then turned — directly towards the terrified woman and her oblivious dog.

“On the first leap I thought, what the hell is that?” she said. “Then I said, oh my God, it’s probably the cougar. Then I saw the second leap. I’d never seen anything run like that. It was a reddy-gold colour and It was like a hovercraft, low to the ground. I thought, this is cool. It was like a streak of lightning.”

Even as she thought that however, she began frantically reeling in her dog and backing up towards the door.

“By that time I knew it was going into a third leap and coming towards me,” she said. “It would just take one more leap to get to the front door. I didn’t stick around. I backed up and pulled Lupy in — and fast. I reeled her in, scooped her up and slammed the door.”

She won the race, but it was, she said, a near thing.

“I thought, thank God we’re in,” she said. “That was close. Too close for comfort.”

Smyth called the conservation office to report the incident and conservation officer Stuart Bates attended the scene. He said the incident was unusual, but not unique.

“Cougars habituate Vancouver Island and there are lots of deer and recoons. Was this unusual? Yes,” he said. “Has it happened before? Yes.”

Bates noted there is a green belt in close proximity to Smyth’s home and lots of deer sign. While he said the incident was somewhat disturbing, he has no plans to hunt down the cougar.

“The cougar didn’t come into contact with either her or the dog, although it came closer than we would like,” he said. “If the cat had made contact with the dog or with Pam, we would have gone in with the hounds.”

He noted conservation officers in the Nanaimo office have so far had 100 reports of cougar sightings so far this year. Of these, only nine involved possible attacks on pets.

Now, Smyth said she feels uneasy, particularly at night, and she won’t let Lupy out alone.

“Every time I walk out my door now I wonder where it is lurking,” she said. “Is it beside the garage? On the roof? At night I have flashes of the cougar jumping and how beautiful it was, but at the same time, it’s waking me up.”

The incident, she said, has changed her attitude about the big cats forever.

“I used to have an attitude that the cougars have their rights and we have taken over their territory, but it’s not so pleasant when you hear something being ripped to shreds.”

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