a mountain lion leaps out and knocks you down, quickly going for your throat and throttling you.

Throttle?

I think about death too, though from a human perspective we are more 'prey' to bad eating, smoking, disease, robbery, and intolerance, than we are to Mountain Lions ... certainly in the UK!

Throttle?

Yes, throttle:

Main Entry: throt-tle

Function:verb

Inflected Form: throt-tled ; throt-tling

Etymology: Middle English throtelen, from throte throat

Date: 15th century

transitive verb

1 a (1) : to compress the throat of : CHOKE (2) : to kill by such action b : to prevent or check expression or activity of : SUPPRESS <policies that throttle creativity>

Sometimes strangle just doesn't work and throttle isn't used that much anymore. Besides, throttle has a more guttural sound than strangle, which seems to be more nasally pronounced. I tend to pay attention to things like the sound words in my pieces and in this case throttle seemed more appropriate.

The word I know, it was more that I don't think a Lion would throttle or strangle. A lion doesn't have hands with fingers; it has paws with claws, and teeth. A Lion would slash, sever, rip, tear etc.

The word I know, it was more that I don't think a Lion would throttle or strangle. A lion doesn't have hands with fingers; it has paws with claws, and teeth. A Lion would slash, sever, rip, tear etc.

Okay, so with further research using Google, I found that moutain lions and other big cats generally go for a bite on the back of the neck at the base of the skull to sever the spinal cord. For larger prey, or maybe prey they have little experience with, they go for a bite on the front of the neck, or to the snout or muzzle, to suffocate the victim.

So, I guess it depends on the amount of surprise a large cat has when attacking a human and how much fight the person can muster before the lion's mouth does its bit. Personally, I'd prefer being suffocated (throttled) to death, rather than possibly not being killed by a bite through the spine, which may only paralyze, leaving the mind to experience the joys of being eaten to death.

Another interesting item was that mountain lions do not eat stomachs, possibly finding the vegetable contained within unpalatable.

Oh, and the claws? Well, those are utilized mainly for bringing prey to ground so that the mouth can go for the neck.

Of course, big cats are like little cats and have a tendency to play with prey. You know, bat them around a bit, watch them try to get away then running up and pouncing on them, and after a while getting bored and leaving the scratched and bleeding toy to do whatever it is that forgotten toys do. People probably don't have enough prey mentality to act appropriately and would probably piss kitty off and end up as an after exercise snack.