Hunting Washington Forum
Big Game Hunting => Other Big Game => Topic started by: justyhntr on December 25, 2018, 07:37:50 PM
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Christmas day found Crowinghen and I up in the woods for the second straight day. We walked into one of our favorite places to hunt both deer and predators. We are still going dual sport, I'm packing the bow for deer and Crowinghen the 243 for predator. On our way in we stopped at a spot that has been good in the past for predator calling. Crowinghen took her usual high spot and I dropped into a lower spot to call, but it wasn't my usual spot. This time I posted up a little closer to Crowinghen. I started out my usual way, 3 coyote howls, wait 10 minutes and then go into some prey distress scream. I was on it today, I was sounding like a baby bunny getting disemboweled by some evil predator. I kept expecting a gun blast at any time but nothing. After about 15 minutes I was getting bored so for a change of pace I grabbed my cougar whistle that I purchased from rainshadow. I don't usually use this call unless we are targeting cougars but for some reason I had that feeling even though I've yet to get a response from it. I crack off a few whistle then a couple more. I hear a bird a few hundred yards away chirp a couple times, then my brain catches up, heck ya, that's a cougar whistling back at me and it's coming. For the next 15 or so minutes me and this cougar are whistling to each other as it comes in. My heart was racing, this is about to get real. My biggest hope was that Crowinghen could hear it as well and would be able to get off a shot. It didn't pan out. The last time I heard the cougar it was about a 100 or so yards from me near a ridge line that Crowinghen would be able to see it. She heard it coming, knew it was a cougar, but never saw it. We're not sure what happened, it may have snuck in and just waited us out or it may have seen Susie, her position was a little exposed and the fact that I changed my location put her right in the line of sight for the cat as it came in. We did hear some birds griping about something so that may have been the cat leaving, we just don't know. It was still quite a rush having a conversation with a cougar and know it was coming.
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Good stuff! Thanks for sharing.
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Cool encounter. :tup:
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:tup:
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Go back until you meet face to face and kill it.
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Go back until you meet face to face and kill it.
That's the plan!
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That was the plan, but now I see the 653 and 654 will be closed for cougar January 1st. :bash: My frustration level is at an all time high right now. Next year the WDFW will be getting a lot less of my money, no more deer, elk, special permits or multi tags for me. I'll buy a bear tag,cougar tag and small game, hunt bear Aug.- Sept. and cougar Oct.-Dec. Won't need to think about quotas that way. Then spend that rest of the winter chasing bobcats and coyotes. The way my wife likes to collect road kill we'll have plenty of venison every year so we don't really need to hunt deer anyway.
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That was the plan, but now I see the 653 and 654 will be closed for cougar January 1st. :bash: My frustration level is at an all time high right now. Next year the WDFW will be getting a lot less of my money, no more deer, elk, special permits or multi tags for me. I'll buy a bear tag,cougar tag and small game, hunt bear Aug.- Sept. and cougar Oct.-Dec. Won't need to think about quotas that way. Then spend that rest of the winter chasing bobcats and coyotes. The way my wife likes to collect road kill we'll have plenty of venison every year so we don't really need to hunt deer anyway.
That’s funny, wife road kill.👍
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That was the plan, but now I see the 653 and 654 will be closed for cougar January 1st. :bash: My frustration level is at an all time high right now. Next year the WDFW will be getting a lot less of my money, no more deer, elk, special permits or multi tags for me. I'll buy a bear tag,cougar tag and small game, hunt bear Aug.- Sept. and cougar Oct.-Dec. Won't need to think about quotas that way. Then spend that rest of the winter chasing bobcats and coyotes. The way my wife likes to collect road kill we'll have plenty of venison every year so we don't really need to hunt deer anyway.
That’s funny, wife road kill.👍
3 deer and 1 elk this year :IBCOOL:
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That was the plan, but now I see the 653 and 654 will be closed for cougar January 1st. :bash: My frustration level is at an all time high right now. Next year the WDFW will be getting a lot less of my money, no more deer, elk, special permits or multi tags for me. I'll buy a bear tag,cougar tag and small game, hunt bear Aug.- Sept. and cougar Oct.-Dec. Won't need to think about quotas that way. Then spend that rest of the winter chasing bobcats and coyotes. The way my wife likes to collect road kill we'll have plenty of venison every year so we don't really need to hunt deer anyway.
That’s funny, wife road kill.👍
3 deer and 1 elk this year :IBCOOL:
Nice. 👍
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Oh that sucks! I didn't even to think to check if 654 was closed. Good thing I didn't get down to my moms property this morning! She called me and explained the sounds she was hearing in the timber by a creek that runs through her property. It was a mtn lion in heat! I was a little busy to run down there thankfully I guess if its closed. Probably don't get opportunities like that very often.
