WICHITA, Kan. _ Teens Evan Hutley and Will Glotzbach raced through darkness Thanksgiving night, headed toward an excited hound that sounded as if it had treed a raccoon in eastern Kansas. But that's not what Hutley found when he shined his headlamp upward.
"I looked up, and there was a mountain lion staring me right in the face. There was no doubt what it was," said Hutley, 16, of Paxico. "It was pretty calm. I wasn't scared. I was really just shocked. I knew it was pretty cool."
Cool indeed, especially after Hutley pulled a phone from his pocket and logged some video.
The teens, and Thunder, a 5-year-old black and tan hound, are probably the first to tree a mountain lion in Kansas in modern times. Though short and a bit shaky, theirs is one of the first videos of a confirmed mountain lion in the state.
"The first thing I thought was we needed to get it on video," said Hutley, a junior at Wabaunsee High School in Alma. "I wanted to make sure it was documented that we had treed a mountain lion and where it was at. People had to believe us."
