With the exception of humans, the mountain lion has the largest range of any terrestrial mammal in the Western hemisphere, from northern British Columbia to Argentina. They live in a variety of habitats, at home in forests, prairies, deserts, and swamps—they are very adaptable cats! Mountain lions are solitary cats, except during breeding or when a mother is caring for her young (cubs). But that doesn’t mean they don’t have any contact with one another.

The cats live in home ranges that vary in size from 30 to 125 square miles (7,770 to 32,375 hectares). These ranges overlap, so the cats share some parts. The home range of males tends to be the largest and overlap the smaller ranges of several females. Mountain lions find shelter to rest or get away from bad weather in thick brush, rocky crevices, or caves, which might be anywhere in their home range.

The cats may actually see each other once in awhile, but mostly they leave "messages" with feces, urine, scratched logs, or marks they scrape out in the dirt or snow. Mountain lions can also growl, hiss, mew, yowl, squeak, spit, and purr to get their message across with other cats, and they are known for a short, high-pitched scream and a whistle-like call. Even though we hear it a lot in movies and on TV, mountain lions don’t make that "wild cat scream" very often.

Mountain lions are powerfully built, with large paws and sharp claws. Their hind legs are larger and more muscular than their front legs to give them great jumping power. Mountain lions can jump 18 feet (5.5 meters) from the ground into a tree, and they have been known to jump 20 feet (6.1 meters) up or down a hillside. That’s the height of many two-story buildings.They can also run fast and have a flexible spine like a cheetah’s to help them maneuver around obstacles and change direction quickly.

Even so, mountain lions are mostly ambush hunters, launching at prey to knock it off balance. They have especially keen eyesight, and they usually find prey by seeing it move. These cats may be on the prowl during the day or at night, but they are most active at dusk and dawn.

Mountain lions hunt over a large area, and it can take a week for one to travel all the way around its home range. They eat a variety of prey depending on where they live, including deer, pigs, capybaras, raccoons, armadillos, hares, and squirrels. Some larger cats even bring down animals as big as an elk or a moose. But hunting these larger animals brings risk to the cats, and many mountain lions suffer life-threatening injuries received from a hunt, especially from a prey’s sharp horns, antlers, or hooves. Mountain lions often bury part of their kill to save for a later meal, hiding the food with leaves, grass, dirt, or even snow, depending on the habitat and time of year.

At the San Diego Zoo, mountain lions are fed a ground-meat diet made for zoo carnivores, large bones, and sometimes parts of carcasses.