Video Footage Reveals Mountain Lion Chase Leads to Death of P-61 on 405

By JENNIKA INGRAM | Reporter 

Dramatic video surveillance has surfaced revealing the mystery of what happened to mountain lion P-61 the night of his death on the 405 freeway.

On September 7, at approximately 3:09 a.m., the tape shows P-61 being chased up a tree by an uncollared mountain lion. More than two minutes go by before the lion pursues P-61 up the same tree, according to a sequence of events shared in a statement by the National Park Service.

The clips show another 26 minutes pass before a lion drops down from the tree and runs off, with a second lion in hot pursuit following closely behind.

Not even a minute later, what appears to be P-61 crosses the road and heads south, adjacent to the 405 freeway.

The final clip—at 3:36 a.m.—shows an uncollared mountain lion briskly walking under the 405 toward Sepulveda Boulevard where a construction crew is working under bright lights. Then, he abruptly turns around to head in the same direction as P-61, shared the statement.

Minutes later, around 4 a.m., P-61 was struck and killed, after managing to cross at least five lanes of traffic on the 10-lane freeway, in one of the southbound lanes. P-61 had successfully crossed the freeway on July 19 earlier this year.

Since 2015, biologists had spotted an uncollared male in the “patchwork habitat” between the 405 and 101 freeways, and believe he was “just protecting his home range,” according to the statement. Both lions were around 4 years old.

“This is what male mountain lions instinctively do and it did not end up in P-61’s favor,” said Jeff Sikich, a biologist with Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. “The difference is that this is real life mountain lion behavior playing out in an urban and fragmented landscape that is complicated by busy roads and development.”

Both fragmentation and an effort to avoid the Woolsey fire burn area may be increasing the frequency male mountain lions encounter each other.

P-61 is the 19th mountain lion and the eighth collared animal to die in a road death, according to a 17-year NPS study of mountain lions in the SMMNRA.

Vehicles and fighting among their own species are the two main reasons for mountain lion deaths in the region.

“With P-61, we have a documented conflict between males, which we think increases with isolation, and then likely running from this fight, he dies from a clearly human-related cause, a speeding vehicle,” said Seth Riley, the wildlife branch chief for SMMNRA. “But it’s incredibly lucky to be able to see how this unfolded.”