LOGAN, Utah — An alert was issued on the campus of Utah State University in Logan after a mountain lion was spotted nearby early Tuesday. The animal was eventually found and captured in the backyard of a couple who received the shock of a lifetime.
The cougar was first spotted in A cemetery by officers with the Logan City and Utah State police departments at around 6:45 a.m., before it moved towards the school and a notice was immediately sent on the Aggie alert system.
Eventually, the mountain lion moved away from campus and made its way into a local neighborhood, prompting a response from police and the Utah Division of Natural Resources.
"It come across the road, right in front of me, and I was like, that is a cat!," said Bertha Speth, who saw the cougar while driving.
The mountain lion, which weighed about 115 pounds and is probably two years old, was finally located in the backyard of a home just north of 1640 East and 1400 North.
"I was sitting in a work meeting and my wife comes freaking out saying, 'Hey, there are a bunch of cops and DNR agents in our frontyard,' said the homeowner, Dane Anderson, "and obviously, that gets you a little heightened, regardless of what's going on.'
After speaking with officers, the Anderson's went back inside their home and saw the cougar sitting in their backyard.
"We have three big dogs that normally we would just let outside, and thankfully, we did not because our pit bulls would have caused a big ruckus with that," Anderson said.
With the mountain lion tucked up against a fence, officers tranquilized it before removing the animal and taking it to the back of a truck.
DNR biologists will perform a health assessment on the mountain lion to determine why it made its way into the area.
"This one didn't show any aggression towards anything, we didn't hear of any reports of pets being killed," said DNR biologist, Sam Robertson. "It was likely just coming down because there is a lot of deer in the cemetery area."
In all, it was an eventful day before the clock even hit noon.
"The mountain lion part of it was scary," said Anderson, "but I would say the scariest part is when you have 30 cops showing up surrounding your house and you have no idea what for, and turns out there's a mountain lion!"
