
The Jaguar Is Made for the Age of Humans - pmcpinto
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/05/the-jaguar-is-made-for-the-age-of-humans/558650/?single_page=true
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LolWolf
A somewhat relevant and fantastic read on how large animals have shaped
society (and some other interesting thoughts), David Quammen's _Monster of
God_ , still remains one of the most fascinating reads I've managed to get my
hands on, to this day.

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iarejenius
David Quammen is a treasure. _The Song of the Dodo_ is one of my all time
favorites.

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dheera
> “I’m much more afraid of walking in grizzly-bear country than I am of
> walking in big-cat country,” Rabinowitz says.

Interesting. Given that big cats (mountain lions and the like) are ambush
predators I tend to worry more about them. If a bear were coming at me, I
would bust out my bear spray. If a cat comes at you, you'll never know until
the moment.

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arca_vorago
I grew up in bear, mountain lion, wolf country, and I can see both points of
view. SOP for a mountain lion is stand up tall, open your jacket or shirt (to
make yourself look bigger) but do not yell, speak calmly. Throw rocks and
fight back if necessary. This mostly works. The main incidents of mountain
lion attacks are in places where their habitat buts up against a dense human
area where they get lazy and stalk trail runners, bikers, etc.

A grizzly though. Make yourself look big... and don't run... but everything
else is pretty much what to do once you are already on the ground getting
chomped.

Black bears are fucking pussies most of the time.

That said, it's important to distinguish between the type of encounter,
between a surprise and stalking. Stalking (repeated sightings, etc) means the
animal is already considering you as prey.

You are right that if a big cat comes for you, you won't see it coming until
the last few seconds (read up on non-dog big cat hunts...) but honestly a big
cat is normally just warning you off it's territory. A grizzly is much more
likely to decide you look like a threat that needs dealing with or eating...

So I agree with Rabinowitz in general.

Story time, I recently was going up a canyon in a very remote area and came
across a track in the creek bed that froze me in place... because at a glance
I thought it was a mountain lion (remote canyons are a favorite for their
dens). My heart raced until further inspection indicated it was a black bear
track and was at least 2-3 days old... and I breathed a sigh of relief.
(sometimes its hard to tell what made traks, other times not)

Here, I found the pic I took for those curious.

[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BlackBearTracks.jpeg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:BlackBearTracks.jpeg)

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13of40
Story time: Last fall I was out deer hunting at a place I randomly chose off
the map due to my regular place being ravaged by a forest fire. So I'm
creeping along and I come up over a little rise, and I see an animal lying on
the ground up ahead. Can't really see any detail except for a lot of brown
fur, but it doesn't move so I assume it's a dead deer. Was about to go up and
poke it with a stick, when it jumped to its feet, looked at me, and bolted
into the woods. Adult mountain lion. It was a fun walk back to the car.

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reificator
My first thought when reading the title was the Atari Jaguar and I expected it
to be a piece trying to justify the UX of the console or something like that.

~~~
akvadrako
I thought it was talking about some new cars. It would have been clear if they
hadn't capitalised it.

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huffmsa
Just wait until the SpaceX satellites get internet coverage to the Jaguars.
They'll have worldwide stalking capabilities, 24-7-365

#GameOverManGameOver

