Bearpaw Season - Fall 2019

[Platensek-po]

Really cool! Thanks for sharing!!!

[DOUBLELUNG]

Love this thread!  I would never have guessed that mean cat for a female.  Just goes to show how hard it can be to judge large carnivores

[pianoman9701]

Love this thread!  I would never have guessed that mean cat for a female.  Just goes to show how hard it can be to judge large carnivores

He said it's a Tom.

[cbond3318]

Love this thread!  I would never have guessed that mean cat for a female.  Just goes to show how hard it can be to judge large carnivores

He said it's a Tom.

Assume DL is talking about the "mean old female" that put holes in all his hounds.....

Hope the pups heal up well BP, that guide must have some salt to have not shot when she first charged him. Wild ride!

[Rainier10]

Great job.  Getting my heart pounding to come over there and do it again sometime.

Fingers crossed all the dogs heal up, especially Ruby.

[bearpaw]

LOL, everyone likes Ruby, she’s got an unbelievable personality for sure! This morning we are looking for cats again stopped for a quick break.

[bearpaw]

Can’t seem to get that photo right side up from my iPhone? Back to hunting!

[Platensek-po]

Can’t seem to get that photo right side up from my iPhone? Back to hunting!

Gorgeous area!! Go get’em!!!

[Machias]

Good luck this morning!  Getting hammered with snow?

[bearpaw]

The tom quotas filled in southern Idaho, now we can only take females. Today I cut two different toms, it was hard leaving this smoking hot tom! I guess he will be bigger next year!

[Rainier10]

The tom quotas filled in southern Idaho, now we can only take females. Today I cut two different toms, it was hard leaving this smoking hot tom! I guess he will be bigger next year!

At least you got the picture right side up.

Is Brian hunting up north also or are you just hunting south?

[bearpaw]

The tom quotas filled in southern Idaho, now we can only take females. Today I cut two different toms, it was hard leaving this smoking hot tom! I guess he will be bigger next year!

At least you got the picture right side up.

Is Brian hunting up north also or are you just hunting south?

Brian is up north, today he got one in the rain, he said the dogs really struggled but they got lucky and caught the cat.

Today I cut a 53" tom, biggest I've seen this year, fresh track, I thought about running it just for photos but figured I better stay focused on getting my hunter a cat.

[bearpaw]

The next day I cut more tom tracks and a better than average sized 37" female, at daylight we started the dogs on the female track (when tom quotas are filled, you can only shoot females). It was a pretty long chase for a female, they don't usually go as far as most toms, but this one covered some country. She went through some big roadless country but came out close to another road, we saw the dogs go around an open hillside just before they jumped her, then she went up a tree pretty quickly, we could hear the dogs treeing from the road. She treed about 1/4 mile from where a tom had treed a few years ago, I could see that tree from where we parked the sleds to walk in. Even though the tracks looked female, the head looked female, and the body looked female, we had to make sure. In spite of various strategies the cat wouldn't move to get a good view of under the tail so Brandon climbed the tree to get the cat to move, that finally worked when he got close enough that the cat got a little excited! LOL

Daniel had walked in a new pup to the tree to help get him started. The pup did pretty good, especially when Ken shot and the cat hit the ground, next time we'll let the pup run the track with the older dogs, I think he's ready.

Congrats to Ken for a great shot on a nice cat!

[bearpaw]

The Road Hunter
Earlier in the season I found a tom track that came onto the road and then seemed to prefer road hunting. At this time there was a good crust on the snow and tire tracks in the road were frozen hard, the cat left the road about 6 different times but came right back onto the road, I'm sure he figured out quickly that he could sneak much more quietly down the road on frozen tire tracks than loudly breaking through hard crusted snow. In a couple places the cat walked more than a mile without setting a single foot off those hard frozen tire tracks.

It was intriguing but frustrating to work this track out, at two different road intersections Branden and I had to go both ways a long way to find tracks, and at the first intersection it was nearly a mile up one of the roads before I found where he left the road to check/leave scent at a big fir. At the second intersection it was quicker, Branden found a couple tracks and we were headed the right way again. After about three hours and 7 miles of road I finally found where I thought the tom left the road for good. I went another mile just to try and be sure but couldn't find any more cougar tracks so we headed back to the truck to get the hounds, the hunters, and get after this cat.

We loaded everything up and headed back to the last track (I hoped) with all of us on snowmobiles. By now it had been daylight for a while, as soon as we got back to the tracks we readied the hounds and walked them to the tracks, it was a pretty good track meaning plenty of scent and the hounds opened up baying loudly right away, we unsnapped them and the chase was on. We watched the hounds going between thick patches of aspen and suddenly just before cresting the top of the mountain, the barking picked up, the chase took a sudden turn to the right, I barely had time to say I think they jumped the cat and Cash started treeing, then Banjo, Lady, and Blue all settled in, we could see two big firs near the top, the cat was probably in one of them.

There was a road closer to the top that we rode into and everyone headed down from there. The guys were tying up the hounds and Kathy was getting ready to shoot then instantly the tom bailed out, with a few impressive jumps he was out of sight and headed straight downhill fast. It was much quicker to go back to the snow machines so Branden followed the hounds and cat, everyone else went back to the top to ride back down to the bottom where we started the cat.

The dogs caught up with the cat on the ground and there was a big fiasco, Branden come running in and I think that scared the cat enough he climbed the closest tree, a dead aspen. Branden called me on the radio and said the cat got ahold of some of the dogs, they were bleeding but it didn't look like anything serious, at the bottom of the mountain we headed in again, we could see the treed cat, he stuck out like a cougar in a dead tree with no limbs.

Kathy prepared to shoot, the guides tied up the dogs, boom the cat fell out, but he wasn't dead. I told Branden to follow the cat, we don't want to turn a dog loose unless we absolutely have to, there is nothing harder on dogs than a wounded cat. Branden was after that tom like a hound on a fresh coon track, the tom tried to lose him by circling around and then side hilling, then he headed uphill, but not too far, yes, Branden treed the lion himself without the aid of dogs this time. Brandon waited at the bottom of the tree with the tom glaring at him while Kathy, Doug, and Daniel hiked up the mountain and this time the tom died instantly when Kathy shot, in fact the cat had to be dislodged out of the tree because it hung up.

We got some nice photos, inspected the hounds, loaded everything up, and headed for the truck. It was another very exciting hunt with many memories for everyone involved. None of the dogs were hurt seriously, most of the blood was from superficial scratches and a couple bites that didn't cause any real harm, I felt lucky that no serious injury was inflicted by the cat, the dogs all healed up pretty quickly. Blue suffered the most serious injury from breaking the crusty snow most of the way up the mountain, he wore all the hair off the inside of his front legs and is still a little tender.

Congrats to Kathy on her dandy lion!

[bearpaw]

There is always a little healthy competition between guides, I think this is good, it keeps us sharp and eager to outdo the other, LOL. Daniel was the first to nail a cat this year. He had passed a couple smaller cat tracks and on this day he cut the tracks of a little bit better cat and his hunter Damon wanted to go after it. They started the cat about 8 or 9 am before I was able to get there, I finally arrived part way through, I made sure Daniel had things handled, heard the dogs locate and start treeing, the guys headed in on foot so I went back to my truck and took my hunter and spouse back to the house and started getting dinner ready. As usual Daniel did an outstanding job, he made all the right moves and we had our first completed cougar hunt for the season. I love it when a plan comes together, congrats to Damon from Texas.