PubMed · 2026-06-17
As mountain lion activity grew over nine years in a suburban Bay Area nature preserve, deer and other animals shifted their behavior — and woody plants became measurably denser — suggesting large predators can still trigger ecological chain reactions even in landscapes next to neighborhoods.
Statistical analysis confirmed that increasing puma activity over 9 years drove measurable changes in prey (deer, brush rabbits) and mesopredator (bobcat, coyote, grey fox) activity levels in a suburban preserve.
Prey and mesopredators decreased nocturnal behavior across the study period, suggesting they shifted their schedules to avoid temporal overlap with pumas.
Woody plant density increased across three vegetation surveys spanning 17 years in parallel with rising puma activity, providing preliminary evidence of a predator-driven trophic cascade.