Cougars vs. Blue Tongue....what is the bigger problem??

[jrebel]

With all the blue tongue conversations, I thought I would show what I think is the bigger problem.  Here are a few pictures in just the last few weeks.  I have decided to keep all the cougar pictures from this point on and at some point send them to WDFW as a WTF??  This is a way bigger problem than blue tongue will ever be and WDFW has no answer / solution.  Makes me sick. 

Feel free to add cougar pics with general location to this post.  All of my pictures are from 121. 

Hope these post upright.  I will have multiple pages as I can only post two at a time. 

[jrebel]

two more

[Special T]

High predator levels will prevent a recovery. Several areas are now in the throat of a predator pit.

[jrebel]

A couple more

[jrebel]

Some older pictures. 

[jrebel]

More pics

[shmacker]

Also in 121, it’s a bad photo but on my computer you could make out a third cat in the back.

[jrebel]

How about some babies. 

[jrebel]

Another lone baby.....really late too.

Last picture is clearly bait.....Here kitty, kitty, kitty.   

[hunter399]

1/3 cougar,1/3 poachers,1/6 *censored* WDFW and wolves,1/6 bluetongue
With that said it's just personal opinion,there all problems,amount of problem is up to you to decide for your area.
But I might of been seeing things,don't really know for sure,
I was driving through chewlah today past the hunter check station and I thought I seen a dead cougar hanging off of someone's tailgate .
That would be good if it was.

But since it's bluetongue vs cougar.......
This year I would say bluetongue .......
Long run or overall all years combined cougar are a year round killer year after year.

[jrebel]

1/3 cougar,1/3 poachers,1/6 *censored* WDFW and wolves,1/6 bluetongue
With that said it's just personal opinion,there all problems,amount of problem is up to you to decide for your area.
But I might of been seeing things,don't really know for sure,
I was driving through chewlah today past the hunter check station and I thought I seen a dead cougar hanging off of someone's tailgate .
That would be good if it was.

But since it's bluetongue vs cougar.......
This year I would say bluetongue .......
Long run or overall all years combined cougar are a year round killer year after year.

Yes, Cougars kill year around 365 days a year.  There is no effective way to kill them....well hounds....but that is illegal. 

Closest I have been to killing one was this week when we heard one vocalizing.  It had to be within 100 yards and I still couldn't find it.  The NE corner is super thick with brush so you can be close and never see them. 

[Seabass]

There’s no doubt that we have too many cats but they don’t do what blue tongue, can and has done, in a month of a single year. If cats did that we would have run out of deer long ago.

Yes, cats kill year round but they don’t kill at near the rate that blue tongue does.  EHD can and has killed 25-30% of a herd in the affected area in a single season….cats don’t do that.

I get what you’re saying and I agree that we should be doing something about it but cat’s aren’t worse than EHD.

[Seabass]

I also hunt 121 exclusively. I have had cats on camera as long as I’ve used cameras (20 years).I have been hunting the same 10-15 miles since 1997. I have seen good years and bad years during that time. Cats have been a constant.

In 2014 I killed a cat from my tree stand. She came in shortly after I missed killing my target buck.
Last year I put a buddy in that same stand and he missed a big Tom…killed a great buck the next day. There were a ton of good bucks alive and on camera at the end of last season…as of yesterday I only have 1 of them on camera this year… same spots.

[jrebel]

There’s no doubt that we have too many cats but they don’t do what blue tongue, can and has done, in a month of a single year. If cats did that we would have run out of deer long ago.

Yes, cats kill year round but they don’t kill at near the rate that blue tongue does.  EHD can and has killed 25-30% of a herd in the affected area in a single season….cats don’t do that.

I get what you’re saying and I agree that we should be doing something about it but cat’s aren’t worse than EHD.

I don't doubt that in a certain time period (usually 3-4 months) blue tongue kills more animals.  Blue tongue only occurs once every 7-10 years.  Cats in that 7-10 year period have to kill equally as many, or more than a single incident of blue tongue.  I remember hunting 121 back in the 80's and seeing hundreds of deer daily (mostly farm fields).  Now in those same fields, your lucky to see 10-20.....this is not because of blue tongue.  This is because of predators. 

To prove my point....  The Palouse has the same, if not worse blue tongue events.  I have lived through two of them and know many farmers that have seen more.  The heard will be devastated after a bad blue tongue event.   3 years later the heard is back to normal numbers, why is the NE corner not rebounding.  I would argue predators.  The Palouse doesn't have the same amount of predators....thus the deer can rebound from a bad blue tongue event. 

What am I missing? 

 

[vandeman17]

I had a cat chasing a doe and fan this past weekend next to my stand. Heard a doe blowing to my left and a few minutes late, a yearling was hauling tail behind me with the doe right behind. About a minute later I looked down to my left and the cat was sitting there staring at me. With the position of my stand and the tree I was up against, I didn't have a shot.

I agree with Johhny that its the consistency of kills that a cougar and other predators make that make them the bigger problem over to whitetail herds than sporadic blue tongue outbreaks.