Bearpaw Season - Fall 2012

[Wea300mag]

Very nice cat, well done!

[bearpaw]

Just dropped him, where he landed, story latet, .after we get off the mountain.

[elkoholic1]

 

[blackveltbowhunter]

Sweeet!

[Bean Counter]

OUTSTANDING!!

[BOWHUNTER45]

Sweeeeeeeeet ! 

[WAcoyotehunter]

Nice work! 

[bearpaw]

Sorry for the delay, we have been hunting pretty hard.

Mike & Michelle from Hawaii had been hunting for five days, this was the last day of Mike's hunt. Soren and Bjarke from Denmark had just started hunting, this was their first day out. Anthony, Brian, and I each headed out early in a different direction in search of mountain lion tracks. Bjarke was hunting with me, we checked out numerous drainages for fresh lion tracks, with the fresh snow and warmer temperature the animals were moving, I was covering ground fast as I could and knew sooner or later we should find cat tracks.

Suddenly there they were, fresh lion tracks coming off the hill and walking right down the road. At first glance I figured it was a young tom, bigger toes and a larger foot than females, but not as big of feet or as long of stride as the older tom we killed a couple days ago. We followed the tracks on the road and found where he went back up the hillside, I parked the truck and took the wheeler further in the road to make sure he hadn't crossed again. We know there is a big tom in the area, so I also wanted to make sure that cat hadn't crossed somewhere too. I went about 7 or 8 miles to the end of the drainage and found nothing so I headed back to run the cat from where the truck was parked.

I had sent a message to Brian that I had found a track, he and Soren were waiting when I got within view of my truck, suddenly the wheeler stopped running 100 yards short of the truck. It was disappointing to break down, but at least it happened when I got back to the truck. There was one time that morning I had taken the wheeler about 15 miles from  the truck checking for tracks. WWhhheeeewwww that would have been bad.

We pushed the wheeler to the truck and readied the dogs for the chase. Unfortunately we had seen tracks of 4 wolves in the same area a few days before, so I offered to run my two old dogs again, they don't have many years left anyway and it wouldn't be as big of loss if something bad happened. Brian also ran two of his young dogs so that we would have lots of noise and hopefully the wolves would leave us alone, those pups need some more experience anyway.

Tucker started to put his head down into a track and howled before his head even got close, this was a hot track, not more than a few hours old. We turned all 4 dogs loose and Brian followed them to try and keep up to prevent a wolf attack. The dogs quickly outdistanced Brian as they parallelled the road and drainage on the mountainside, I could watch and hear the race well from up on the opposite mountainside. I called Brian and told him he might as well drop out to the road in the bottom and we would run farther in the drainage with wheelers. I picked him up with the truck and we went to get the wheelers. We went farther in the drainage and stopped to listen, we could hear the dogs way up on top, it sounded like they were treed, so we headed in on foot. The mountainside was steep and it was a grueling climb with the slick snow on the ground. It took a while but finally we were getting close, we just happened to walk by an uprooted tree and could see the cat had been bedded in there, we could see the dog tracks too and all had headed straight up to where we could hear the dogs barking treed.

We finally made it to the dogs right on top of the ridge and were readying to shoot. Soren had killed a tom last year so the plan was to let Bjarke shoot the first tom, just as we readied to shoot the cat jumped out and headed down the mountain, luckily towards the wheelers and not toward the back side of the mountain. Bjarke's face told the story, I could see the disappointment, he was whipped and worried, we assured him the dogs would catch the cat again, but he was worried about being able to make it to another tree. It was only a few minutes and we could hear the dogs start treeing again below us.

We moved at as fast a pace as possible down the steep mountain and approached the next tree. As soon as we got to the tree Bjarke got a rest and Brian quickly grabbed the dogs, before the cat could jump Bjarke shot, the cat dropped to ground and took off, I told Bjarke to follow Brian and they pursued the wounded cat. I didn't want to turn any dogs loose for fear of the wounded cat killing them. Brian had one pup with him, they found the cat crouched under a leaning tree just waiting to pounce it's followers, Brian hollered at the pup to get back and Bjarke quickly shot the cat again. As soon as the cat died I released the other dogs to run down there, we tied them up again and took some photos, needless to say Bjarke was very excited about his cat. Once we were finished we headed off the mountain with hide, backstraps, and legs in the pack. Bjarke will get to try his first cat chops. 

(At the same time we were treed Anthony had found another tom and he, Michelle, and Mike had headed in to the tree, that story will have to wait, I have to head out hunting for now.)

[iRem]

AWSOME story and AWSOME hunt! Wish I could offered that kind of experience! Maybe some day!

[Bean Counter]

Great job, Dale! One less deer killer in the woods.

[bearpaw]

Here's a quick story about the other tom cougar that Mike from Hawaii killed.

Mike and two of his friends had hunted elk with us this fall in Idaho, Mike passed a 5x5 bull that he later wished he would have killed and one of his buddies shot a 5x6 bull. Mike also booked a cougar hunt this year and brought his wife Michelle along for the hunt.

Now it was the last scheduled day of Mike's cougar hunt, conditions were excellent and Anthony had seen a couple female tracks, but it was getting late in the morning and they had not found a tom track. Anthony decided to check out one last drainage and right at the end of the road they found a nice tom track, Anthony put the dogs on the track and the chase was on. The race was a quick one, the dogs zigzagged up the steep mountain and the cat treed right at the top, they could hear the dogs barking treed right at the top.

Anthony, Mike, and Michelle slowly made their way to the barking dogs, upon reaching the top of the mountain and the treed cougar Anthony was shocked to see "Bell" his best hound more than halfway, about 30 feet up a big fir tree. Bell was within 10 or 15 feet of the lion, the cat was very unhappy about that too. Without a choice and in order to try and save his dog, Anthony began climbing the tree, he made it within a few feet of Bell and then the tom got excited! He snarled at Anthony and came down the tree about 8 or 10 feet, the cat stopped almost within striking distance of Bell, she was going nuts and trying to bite the cat's tail. Anthony had quickly backed down the tree 5 to 10 feet trying to keep some distance between himself and the cat.

We don't know if Bell actually bit the tom's tail or not, but the cat jumped and Bell jumped after him, barking as she sailed through the air after the cat. Anthony panicked as visions of Bell having broken legs and ribs crossed his mind. The cat hit the ground and ran swifly down the mountain, Bell hit the ground and seemded to be moving slow, but she managed to get up and go after the cat as Anthony hurried down the tree. The cat ran all the way to the bottom of the mountain and headed up the other side. By now the hunters were working their way down the mountain, Anthony was glad to hear it when the dogs treed again on the mountainside across the canyon. Fortunately, Anthony could hear Bell and she was treeing, so hopefully she was going to survive the jump.

The hunters climbed down to the bottom of the mountain then part way up the mountain on the other side of the canyon to the tree. This time Bell was on the ground, so Anthony tied the dogs back out of the way and Mike shot the cat. Back at the house that night we laughed and talked about both of the successful hunts that day. So far Bell seems to be fine and it still amazes us that she made it that far up the tree and that she survived the jump without any serious injury. Congratulations to Mike and Michelle for their last day success, Mike got a very nice tom. 

[Ridgeratt]

nice kitty's

[bearpaw]

We ran another tom today but he was headed into private land so we had to intersect and pull the dogs. Then we tried running a bobcat but he was headed into some big cliffs so we intercepted the dog and got her before she got into the cliffs.

It was a rough day today... 

Soren is still hunting cougar with Anthony and Brian tomorrow, I have to catch a few hours sleep and then I'm driving to eastern Montana, Bjarke is going to hopefully shoot a 10 year old bison tomorrow. We'll skin him, load the carcass, and then try to drive back to Idaho tomorrow evening.

[bearpaw]

A cell phone photo of where the bull drooped!  Will add better photos soon.

[Skyvalhunter]

Nice pics congrats sounds like you have been putting on some miles