I have done volunteer work with CA Dept of Fish and Game and the Society for the Conservation of Big Horn Sheep dealing with guzzler (desert water source) maintenance.

One guzzler was located a short hike from the parking spot. I walked up the hillside to the ridge crest which lead to the guzzler a couple hundred yards away.

The trail is a game trail up the hillside. At the ridge crest point, the desert rock has been scrapped away leaving a very dusty area where there is always sign of bighorn sheep.

I spent about an hour with the guzzler maintenance work and associated transect survey counts to estimate the number of sheep that visit the area. During that time, I had an very eerie feeling I was being watched but saw nothing.

I got back to the dusty spot on the ridge to begin the hike downhill and noted a very unsettling sight.

There were cougar tracks over the top of my tracks...

That was in broad daylight and within about an hour of my passing that point. And, I was only a couple hundred yards away...