Silverthorne resident Cody Thomas knew mountain lions lived in his backyard. He’d seen them on a security camera, lurking feet from the front door.

So, even though Timber — the family’s 85-pound black lab — is a “real athletic” hunting dog, Thomas said he was careful whenever he let the dog out at night. But standing on the porch just before bed Sunday, Thomas heard an “awful howl-cry.”

He said he knew instantly that a mountain lion had attacked Timber, who had wandered just out of sight onto the driveway behind the detached garage, not more than 30 yards away. It was about 9 p.m.

“That lion had my dog pinned down on the driveway and my dog was yelping,” Thomas said. “I just started running at (the mountain lion) and yelling. I could tell the lion was a little bigger than Timber. A little longer. But not quite. Honestly, it couldn’t have weighed a whole lot more.”

Thomas said he came within a few feet of Timber before the wild cat let go of the dog and ran off in the direction of the Silverthorne Elementary School, directly adjacent to his house. Timber is currently recovering after being rushed to an emergency animal hospital in Denver.

Other pets in the area haven’t been so lucky, though. Colorado Parks and Wildlife district wildlife manager Alex Strasser said there have been a handful of reports of missing pets in and around the Ptarmigan Mountain neighborhood over the past month.

At least three goats have also been killed in the same neighborhood since the start of the month. It is safe to assume that the culprit behind at least some of the attacks is a mountain lion that has become too accustomed to humans, Strasser said.

It is also possible — though impossible to say for certain — that the same mountain lion was involved in an attack on a dog a week earlier near Keystone, he said. Those pet owners saved their dog after tracking the mountain lion through the snow and firing two gunshots.

“The attacks are becoming more frequent,” Strasser said. “It’s never good. Especially when we’re having multiple lion attacks over such a condensed area. That’s a lion that has been habituated to people, and it’s not looking at its natural prey. It’s looking at goats. It’s looking at dogs.”

The Colorado Rocky Mountains provide natural habitat for mountain lions. Also known as cougars, panthers and pumas, mountain lions are powerful, elusive predators that usually hunt deer or elk. People rarely get more than a brief glimpse of a mountain lion in the wild.

But as Summit County has grown over the years, more and more people have moved into “mountain lion country,” Strasser said. While people can coexist peacefully with the predators, there is a real concern for people’s safety when a mountain lion starts to feel comfortable in residential neighborhoods, he said.

Colorado Parks and Wildlife is actively attempting to trap the mountain lion behind the recent attacks in Summit County in order to either relocate the cat or kill it, Strasser said. The wildlife agency will either lure the cat into a trap with a carcass or track and corner it with hounds, he said.

“In a case like this lion, where it’s hanging out in the same area, it starts to be a human health concern,” Strasser said. “We want to get that lion out of there.”

After the mountain lion attack in his driveway, Thomas said he is afraid for the safety of his wife and their infant twin boys as well as children who may be walking to or from the nearby elementary school.

Because his dog is larger than some children, Thomas said he didn’t really think a mountain lion would attack Timber.

Timber, who Thomas described as “like a kid to us,” sustained bite marks on the top of his head and around his neck as well as claw marks on his underbelly.

Heavily sedated, Timber does not have his usual energy but is recovering.

“It was just a sneak attack really. It was really fast,” Thomas said. “I was naive despite my experience with cats and hunting. They’re usually scared of dogs. Timber is a huge dog. But this cat was pretty bold.”