WATCH — Exclusive: Mountain Lion vs. Coyotes on Los Angeles Street

LOS ANGELES, California — A mountain lion confronted a pack of coyotes on a residential street on Wednesday night, a rare sight that is a reminder that for all its urban sprawl and congestion, L.A. remains surrounded by wilderness.

The standoff took place at approximately 10:45 p.m. in the Marquez Knolls neighborhood of Pacific Palisades, an affluent area on the northwest side of the city, nestled between the Santa Monica Mountains and the beaches of the Pacific Ocean.

As families settled down to sleep, the neighborhood was roused by the barking and yelping of coyotes. That, in itself, is not so unusual: coyotes frequently emerge from the mountains and hunt for small rodents — including dogs and cats — on the city periphery.

What was unusual was the reason the coyotes were making such a commotion: they were frightened by a large adult mountain lion, which apparently had been hunting in the area.

The lion pursued the coyotes, who scampered away while barking and howling in an apparent attempt to discourage the lion. Finally, the lion disappeared into the brush and returned to the scrubland above Sunset Boulevard.

According to the National Park Service, “Los Angeles is one of only two megacities in the world (the other is Mumbai) that have big cats living within the city limits. In a place more often associated with freeways and traffic, the fact that the city can support such large-ranging animals is a testament to the quality of open space and the habitat connectivity that still remains.”

The National Park Service has monitored about 100 lions in the Los Angeles area over the past 20 years. The species, whose numbers swindled over the course of the 20th century, has been protected since California voters passed Proposition 117 in 1990. Hunting is forbidden, but the lions can be killed legally if they attack livestock.

One lion in the area, P-22, is famous for haunting the mountains near Hollywood, occasionally appearing on local surveillance cameras. It is very rare, however, to see them in the open.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.