Field work in the Army was physically and psychologically demanding, and I loved it. After deciding to go back to grad school, I traded in my military career for a desk job. I miss hiking in full gear, sleeping under the stars, and being in the action.

I throw my pack in the back of her battered F-150. It stands out since there are not a lot of beat-up trucks in Silicon Valley, hell;you hardly see a truck here. As I enter the cab, a surge of excitement runs through me.She sure is a pretty woman. Wait, I don’t have time for a woman. But, it’s just one day, and I could use a break.

“Good morning,” she exclaims. “Today shouldn’t be too hot, but you’ll still need a lot of water. Don’t worry, I’ve got extra.”

Man, she has a great smile.

“I’ve got plenty,” I say.

“The trailhead is about an hour from here.” We head toward the freeway.

“How’s our lion?”

“The vet’s surprised she’s still alive. She has Mange, was dehydrated, and internally bleeding—all symptoms of rat poisoning. But the tox screen isn't back, so I don't really know for sure. If you make too many assumptions, you can miss a big clue.”

“What do you do to save an animal that has been exposed to rat poison?”

“The vet's giving her fluids, Vitamin K1, and broad-spectrum antibiotics.”

“And that works? She’ll live?”

“If our lion was poisoned by a first-generation rat poison, one that was developed back in the 1940s and ’50s, she’ll have a better chance of living. That would also mean she was poisoned by an old, ranch dump-pile. If she was poisoned by more recent, second-generation rat poisons, then our lion probably ate a deer one that a homeowner or rancher used for bait. Second-generation rat poison is more lethal, which means our lion will probably die, if that’s what got her. Until we get a confirmation, I won’t know what we’re dealing with.”

Since Ana gave me her number, I assume she’s single. I’ve never been one to ask personal questions, but I like the sound of her voice.

“What are you doing with lions?” I ask.

“I’ve got an NSF grant, it’s a continuation of my thesis, that is, so I’ve spent the last ten years tracking Apex predators in the Santa Cruz Mountains. It’s an island of wilderness surrounded by over six million people. Lions are at the highest trophic level. When they have problems, it’s a sign that we have a problem. I’m working with a number of area agencies, but my specific grant is to research how human encroachment and climate changes from global warming affect them.”

“How’d you know your lion was sick?”

“From her tracking device we saw she hadn’t moved for a couple of days. My intern and I went up to check on her. We found her under a bush. Then we carried her out.”

“You carried her out?”

“Me and my intern, yes. I always carry ropes and a muzzle. We trussed her up, and carried her out. That’s why my shoulders and neck have been bothering me.”

I look at her anew. That takes guts and strength. “What’s the plan?”

“I have a couple years of tracking data on her. Like most lions, she's a solitary hunter and is active at night. As far as I can tell, her kill rate is pretty typical, she takes a deer every two weeks or so. We've found some of her kills; she'll cache the body. It takes five days or so for her to munch through a good-sized deer before letting the lesser scavengers finish the job....”

I kick back and listen. It’s easy being with Ana, I don’t need to ask too many questions. She fills the air with technical information. Ana drives over Highway 92 to Half-Moon Bay, then down Highway 1 toward Santa Cruz. South of the Pigeon Point Lighthouse, she turns onto a side road. After about a mile, the pavement ends and the road turns to gravel. She stops the truck and pulls out her tablet.

She leans in closer to me to share her screen. “If you click the blue tab, you can see where all the collared lions are currently located. On missions like this, I try to stay away from the other lions.”

“Are you afraid that one will get you?”

“A man was killed down in San Diego back in 2004. Two women were killed in 1994, one in San Diego, the other in Sacramento. In 2014, a six-year-old boy was attacked while hiking with his family in Cupertino. The dad rescued him. Fish and Wildlife put that uncollared, juvenile male down—”

“—Is that yes or no?”

“There are forty million people living in California, most live within ten miles of a mountain lion. Over the last twenty-five years,three have been killed by mountain lions. And those three individuals were alone, and in the mountain lion’s habitat. We should be more scared of going to the homes of people who have pools.”

“We have an irrational fear of things we don’t deal with on a daily basis.”

“Yes, we do, which at some level, makes sense.”

The GPS leads us to a double-track dirt road with a fake lock-chain across the entrance. Since I'm riding shotgun, I get out and get the gate, then close it behind us.

“Are you sure it’s cool to be going on this road?” I question as I get back in the truck.

“Are you afraid that some crazy backwoods owner will come out and shoot us for trespassing?”

“An irrational fear of something I don’t deal with often.”

“I thought you were in the Army. Didn’t you take bad roads and backwoods routes?”

“Yeah, but I had a fully armed squad of highly trained men with me.”

“Ten soldiers with weapons...one wildlife biologist with a tranquilizer gun, same thing. Plus, I have a permit from the landowner.” She has a sense of adventure and a sense of humor. Let’s hope she’s not too outrageous in her views.

After about twenty minutes of going very slow on an old logging road, she pulls the truck over and parks. “I don’t think we can get any closer,” she says as she gets out and throws on a long-sleeve hiking shirt. “Do you have more clothes to cover yourself up with?” She catches me checking her out.

“I’m cool.”

“This place is loaded with Poison Oak and ticks. What skin isn’t covered with clothes will be covered with welts by the time we get back. In an hour, we’ll see who’s cool.”

“I’ve got a long-sleeve shirt.” I pull it out of my pack.

From the back of her truck, she pulls out a daypack that looks like it’s been well-used, then she holds up some energy bars. “Do you want some?”

“I’m ready.”

She smiles. Man, I like that smile.

“Okay, Brody, let’s get going.”

I watch her mark our location on her app, fire up a Yagi antenna and receiver, and start the tracking feature on her GPS.

“Nice equipment,” I comment.

“I can’t imagine what they did before we had this technology. We wouldn’t have found our female for months without it."

We walk along the pitted dirt road we’d parked on.

“Do you read ‘topo’ maps?” I ask.

“I learned to as a college intern and now I’m teaching Jack, my college intern. Weekend warriors orienteer for fun. My job demands that I’m good at it. Unfortunately, it’s getting to be a lost art.”

After about five minutes of walking, she stops to check our position. I stand close and look over her shoulder. She smells good, like something soft and fruity. My mind comes back to the moment when I see Ana draw her finger over the map.

“I think this will be the easiest way. It shouldn’t take us long to get back on my lion’s trail.”

The terrain is steep, but not too steep for a skilled hiker. I follow her and am impressed. She reminds me of my youngest sister outdoorsy and tough but, I’m not classifying Ana as a sister-type.I don’t have time for a girlfriend. Still, I’m going to enjoy my day with her. When we get to the bottom of the ravine, she pulls out her iPad to check our location. I peer over her shoulder and watch her toggle between satellite imagery and a map of the cat’s tracks.

“I didn’t realize you had this level of detail on wild animals.”

“We don’t have the people or systems in place to monitor them on a daily basis. But we have data from accumulated observations. I took the points we had and generated a GPX file of my lion's path. That file lets me see it on my GPS. Eventually, we’ll get funding for real-time, data transmission that’s used as a warning system. If we had that equipment, and one our large carnivores got into an inhabited location, one of us would be notified. It'll be nice to have the technology to capture an animal before it gets in trouble.”

Ana stuffs the iPad and GPS back in her pouch and pulls out a compass.

“Old school,” I say.

“It’s hard to hike with an iPad, even a mini. I have a solar panel that I can use to recharge it when I’m away from the truck for a long haul, but that's just more weight to carry. I can always rely on an old-fashioned compass and a paper map; the GPS doesn't always work under a dense canopy. When you were in the Army, what did you use?”

“GPS and compass.”

“So nothing any fancier than this.”

“A little fancier, but similar.”

We enter a redwood forest. Walking here is easy, since the foliage isn’t too dense under the trees. Ana keeps up a good pace. Eventually we hit a clearing filled with dense shrubs.

“Over there is where we can pick up our lion’s path. We’ll need to skirt around the clearing, since it’s too dense with shrubs to head straight through," she says.

“You know this area well.”

“I’ve been hiking this range for almost ten years.”

The two of us walk single-file in silence. She’s good at picking a route, and I can’t help but to admire the view, she has a fine ass. After another twenty minutes, she stops, pulls out her devices, and checks our location.

“We’re close.” With her antennae up, we walk a bit farther. “Now we’re back on my cat’s trail.”

About five minutes later she pulls a bag out of her pocket and squats down next to some scat. “Looks like coyote.”

I get down on my haunches near her. “How do you know?”

“The size, it has to be an animal that weighs at least eighty pounds. In this area, that’s either coyote or lion.” She picks up a stick and points to the scat. “Coyotes are omnivores. You can see field mouse parts, like bones and teeth, along with plant parts like berries and seeds. Look at those huge manzanita seeds. Lions love deer, so their scat is full of deer hair. We have an overabundance of deer in this area, so there’s no need for cats to eat anything else. People are scared of large carnivores, but we need them. They help to keep the other animal populations in balance, especially the deer.”

“Are you for or against hunting?”

“Hunting in season, clean-killing animals that need to be culled, now that’s good wildlife management. But when some asshole poisons animals, kills endangered species, or kills animals out of season that’s bad animal management and is rightfully illegal. I fully support that the offender should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

Using her iPad and the GPS, she takes photos of the scat and marks the spot where it was found. She picks up the scat with a bag that’s already numbered. “When I get back to the lab I can test it. If there’s a contaminated site, we’ll see traces of the toxins all over the place. Typically, we find lower concentrations, the farther we get from the site. If we can’t find the problem visually, we can zero in on the likely places by analyzing the scat.”

“This is fun.”

“Yes, it is fun, kind of like a scavenger hunt. I love my job. It’s the best job in the world. I get paid to hike.” She stops and looks me over. “I don’t even know what you do. The only thing I know about you, is that you are the first appointment at the chiropractor's on Tuesdays and you spend a lot of time checking, what I assume are, e-mails and texts.”

“You, too, go to a chiropractor on Tuesdays. I would think with your job you wouldn’t have too many problems.”

“A car accident started my downward spiral. Carrying a pack exacerbates it. Then doing stupid things, like sitting in a little blind for hours and carrying an eighty-pound cat out of a ravine, doesn’t help.”