Burned mountain lion finds a home in Petaluma

A mountain lion cub singed in the Southern California wildfire is recovering at Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue.|

Charmander was 5 months old when he was found in a drainage ditch in Ventura County just before Christmas – thin, scared and badly burned by the same unforgiving flames that devoured his home.

It’s rare to spot a mountain lion in such close proximity to people, but the young cub was in dire need of medical care and had been separated from his mother during the Thomas Fire, which would go on to burn more than 280,000 acres in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. He would eventually find longterm care in Petaluma.

“He’s been through a lot – our focus was providing him the supportive care he needed,” said Diana Clifford, the lead non-game veterinarian at the California Department of Fish and Game whose team cared for the young cub in the days after he was found.

The cub’s name, drawn from a fictional character from the adventure game Pokémon, seemed to be a fitting one after his fiery past.

“Charmander is a Pokémon that breathes fire … mountain lions, they’re fierce and he is a kitten, but one day he’ll grow up to be a big, fierce fire-breathing cat,” said Clifford, who is also a research scientist at the University of California, Davis Wildlife Health Center. “It was kind of suggested once and it sort of stuck.”

The cub was taken to a Rancho Cordova facility where Clifford and her team provided pain relief and affixed sanitized tilapia skin on his paws to help facilitate healing.

The fish skin was used in trials in Brazil, and UC Davis’ Chief of Service in the Integrative Medicine Department Jamie Peyton suggested using the innovative treatment for the cub and two injured bears also rescued from burn areas, Clifford said. The tilapia skin undergoes a two-day preparation process that removes odors and isolates the hard outer layer of the fish, Clifford said.

“Amazingly, he really started improving really quickly and the staff noticed he’s a very curious cat,” she said. “He quickly started exploring all the places made available to him … we tried to keep him busy because it was clear he was curious and wanted to be doing things – we hid meatballs all over the place to keep him active and engaged and moving. He’s just a really tough cat.”

During his rehabilitation, Charamander was fed a carefully regulated diet of meatballs comprised of ground beef, whole ground chickens and turkey hearts and underwent basic training to help ready him for transportation to his future home in captivity in Petaluma.

Mountain lion cubs stay with their mothers until they’re about two years old, and young cubs who are on their own have a low chance of survival, Clifford said. Since Charamander’s mother was missing and his native habitat was destroyed, sending him to the Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue in rural west Petaluma made sense, she said.

He arrived at his new home at the rescue Feb. 1, and is settling in 400 miles away from his fire-scarred birthplace. He’s been placed in a large enclosure that mimics his natural environment, and is getting acquainted with Nicole, an older female mountain lion who’s been at the faculty since 2016, student teacher Natalie Jones said.

Nicole’s mother was killed by poachers in Trinity County, and she’s now part of the facility’s educational program, Jones said. The rescues’ staff hopes Nicole can bond with Charamander, who will eventually become an educational ambassador during the facility’s public tours on Saturdays.

“Nicole is a pretty nurturing mountain lion and we feel like once they get used to each other and get to know each other, she can take him under her wing, or her paw, and mother him,” Jones said.

For now, Charamander – who goes by the nickname “Charlie” is resting up and getting used to his new home.

“He’s just sitting here, being a mountain lion – they kind of lounge … they’re kind of like big house cats and they like to lay around and do what cats do,” Jones said.

The 36-year-old nonprofit has a history of caring for mountain lions, Jones said, and has acted as a refuge for a menagerie of other animals, including wolf dogs, owls and foxes.

It’s a slow time of the year, but staff is gearing up for an influx of other orphaned animals in the spring and summer, Jones said.

(Contact Hannah Beausang at hannah.beausang@arguscourier.com.)

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