Yesterday morning I found 1 of our 4 goats dead; 99% sure it was a cougar kill.
I called state dispatch and they put me in touch with the on call officer for Klickitat County and he gave me permission to kill this cougar on my property before I ever took the first shot. If I was unsuccessful he planned to get a tracker on it.
Set up my blind 20yds away from the kill and set up my game camera. Planned to sit the kill from 7pm until I couldn't keep my eyes open. I prepositioned all of my gear including my 12ga loaded with 00 Buck and my 12" 375JDJ Contender loaded with 220gr FN.
At 6:58 I looked out the bedroom window and sitting over the kill was the cat about 70 yds from my back door. I scrambled to the safe loaded my .270, got a little buck fever and missed.
I sat in the blind until 11pm and couldn't keep my eyes open any longer so came in. At 12:10 I woke up and thought I saw a flash from the game camera, not sure, I waited until I got a couple more flashes so I knew he was back on the kill.
I reloaded my 270, walked my fence line trying to get within range of a spotlight shot. I could see eyes when using my red lens headlamp but when I tried to use my spotlight for the shot he disappeared. Because I was close to my blind I slipped in and about 20 minutes later I heard him dragging our goat, now 40+ yds away from the blind. When I spotlighted the area I settled the croshairs behind the front shoulder and dropped the Tom in his tracks.
The Tom was probably a juvenile , hardly a scratch on him and teeth were not dulled. He was 6'4" long and I'm guessing 120-140lbs.
Game Officer came this morning, we chatted, he took some pictures and left with the cat. Hopefully the cat was working alone.
