For a split second, Linda Dyck wondered if she should be running for her life.
Instead, she stood her ground and shot a rare and remarkably clear photo of a cougar running through her yard.
"He didn't pay attention to me really," she told CTV's Rachel Lagac�. "I thought, 'Oh, he looks fine. He doesn't look like he wants to eat me, so I'll take a picture.'"
Linda says on Sunday, two men first saw the cougar hiding in a bush just west of her property, and it wasn't long before it made its way within 10 metres of Linda herself. It got so close she paused before she took the picture.
"I saw his face, he has a beautiful face. I could have had such a beautiful shot. It just kills me that I didn't do it."
Linda said she was surprised to see such a big feline in her yard -- she's used to having her three smaller house cats around.
Linda said one of them is now missing, and she suspects the cougar had something to do with it.
"My two cats are spooked like crazy," she said. "Even now you come around the corner and they're just scared."
Manitoba Conservation says Linda Dyck did the right thing; cougars will only pounce if they feel threatened or if they believe what's running away is prey.
The Conservation spokesperson said a human has never been attacked by a cougar in this province.
Conservation tells CTV News it gets an average of 30 cougar sightings in Manitoba every year. Of those it's usually only one that is an actual sighting.
Thanks to Linda's shutter finger, there's no denying this cougar sighting is the real deal.
Linda has been told the cougar may or may not come back and she's keeping an eye out for it.
"I will always watch for him and hopefully I'll be there with my camera again," she said.
With a report from CTV's Rachel Lagac�.
