Mountain Lion Deadly 60 Bites

'On Deadly 60, I've had loads of incredible animal encounters.

'Here's just one of my many favourites.

'This is Deadly 60...Bites.

'It's close to midday, and temperatures are soaring,

'but we're on the road again

'on the search for our next deadly animal.'

This is the extreme south of the Sonoran Desert.

If I kept going in that direction for 10-15 miles, I'd be in Mexico.

It's a real, full-on, rocky wilderness.

Perfect habitat for the magnificent big cat we're hoping to find.

It's found throughout North and South America

and goes by many different names -

the puma, the cougar,

and here, the mountain lion.

'Mountain lions are such secretive creatures

'that to see one hunting is almost unheard of.

'Just catching a glimpse of one during the day is a privilege.

'So how do we know they're deadly?

'Well, firstly, by looking at their closest cousins.

'And secondly, by the evidence they leave from their deadly deeds,

'taking livestock, deer,

'even attacking the odd person.

'Their secretive ways certainly won't make them any easier to find.'

Fingers crossed.

'My guide is Emil,

'who's an expert at tracking mountain lions.

'Emil works on a project

'that records and studies the lions in this area.

'And they do this using some very clever camera technology.

'Cameras are hidden

'and take a picture of anything that moves in front of it.

'The question is - has it captured an image of a mountain lion?'

Let's see what we got.

This is an infrared flash

and it's actually taking a video clip

immediately after the photograph is taken.

-What is that?

-Peccary.

-No.

-It's not a razorback, is it?

-It's a black bear.

No!

-A nice, big, beautiful black bear.

-Wow!

What a great shot!

-Argh!

-There he is.

Fantastic! Look at that!

Look at that beautiful cat.

Oh, that is absolutely wonderful!

This animal ran through

-right where I'm sitting now.

-Exactly where we're sitting, yeah.

We'll have a video of this one.

Oh! Look at that!

-Wonderful!

-All right.

EMIL CHUCKLES

And she was here at 3:20 in the afternoon.

-Broad daylight.

-It's quarter to three right now.

Well, if we sit here long enough, you never know.

If we sit here long enough, one will walk by.

-Well, we saw a couple of lions.

-Great stuff!

That's absolutely fantastic!

Our mission to find a mountain lion has taken a really exciting twist.

Local biologists have tracked one particular mountain lion

that's been ranging through hundreds of miles of mountains.

But today they've got to try and capture it.

This could be our perfect opportunity to get right up close to a mountain lion.

'The scientists want to catch the lion to remove a tracking collar

'holding information about its movements for the last six months.'

All this modern technology, and our best chance of finding a lion

is old-fashioned tracking.

These dogs have been trained to pick up the scent of a mountain lion.

They're wearing GPS collars so we know exactly where they go.

With a bit of luck, they'll lead us straight to the lion.

They're looking very excited.

Good luck, guys!

'These sniffer dogs will follow the scent of the lion,

'and, like a domestic cat avoiding a dog,

'the lion will climb a tree when they get close.

'The dogs will then wait at the base of the tree

'until the scientists arrive to capture the animal.

'Without the dogs, the lion would just keep running

'and the team wouldn't stand a chance of getting near it.

'A mountain lion could cover a huge area in search of food -

'up to 100 square miles.

'And in this kind of habitat,

'that's a whole lot of holes to hide in.'

VOICES OVER RADIO

Just had the most amazing call on the radio.

The guys with the hounds have located the lion.

They think it's coming down the dry river bed we're on now, right towards us.

VOICES OVER RADIO

It's all going off on the rocks ahead of us.

-DOGS BARKING

-The dogs are going mad.

It looks like the lion's gone into a hole somewhere in these rocks.

VOICES OVER RADIO

DOGS HOWL

Where do we think the lion is?

-This hole right here.

-We can't get up.

We're trying to get up in there and look in.

'There's only one thing to do:

'in order to see if there's a lion up there,

'I'll have to climb up very carefully

'and have a closer look.'

-Can you see the end of it?

-Well...

There definitely has been a cat in here very recently.

Steve, does that thing go on back up in there or not?

No. Doesn't seem to.

It stops here.

All of a sudden, with everything going crazy

and us being certain that we had our mountain lion,

total silence.

The trail's gone cold.

It seems like the cat's managed to get out of the canyon and head off into the distance,

so our chances of finding it now are slim to none.

But we came this close.

Anyway, despite the fact that we didn't quite make it,

there has to be no doubt that a cat this beautiful that manages to range throughout the Americas

so strong, so powerful,

it's got to be on the Deadly 60.

'Whether we've seen one in the flesh or not,

'this awesome predator,

'capable of avoiding dogs, horses, trackers, and this camera crew,

'has certainly got to go on the Deadly 60.'