Bearpaw Season 2024

[Rainier10]

Bring on the cougar hunting.

[jrebel]

Now if the can survive the winter and predators.....they will be even nicer next year.  Great looking animals

[bearpaw]

Now if the can survive the winter and predators.....they will be even nicer next year.  Great looking animals

for sure

[bearpaw]

Bring on the cougar hunting.

We saw some good cat tracks pre-season and then my first two hunters cancelled, one of my guides caught a good cat the first day of season and let it go, then snow went from bad to worse before another hunter could get here. We are waiting on fresh snow, raining right now, hoping it turns to snow, we have a guy waiting for the phone call.

[Rainier10]

Sunny day cat giving you a great opening for a bow shot. I get back over there with Kenny and do that again. So much fun.

[nwwanderer]

Did your guys get a look?  Female?  Great stuff, thanks

[bearpaw]

That cat was a Tom, and we never did get him, we found him again, or at least a similar Tom in the same general area twice this season, the first time the dogs followed him most of the day over several ridges and in the late afternoon we picked the dogs up crossing the next road to the south and found the old lion tracks there, we were still way behind him. The next day we checked all of the roads in the area, trying to figure out where the cat crossed out of there, but he didn’t as far as we could see. Some of the lower areas had hard crusted snow that he could’ve walked out out of their and we wouldn’t of seen a thing, so it’s not impossible that he slipped out on us and we just didn’t know it. Otherwise, he’s still in that area he crossed into which has three big canyons and several ridges, a cat could live in there for several weeks, making one kill after another, and servicing females.

The next time we chased him or a cat similar to him, he crossed several roads to the south of where we last seen him, we cut him three times crossing roads that night, he was really covering country, at the last place he crossed that we could find, we started his track at first light, unfortunately there were high winds most of the night, so we knew there would be some drifting going on, but you still have to try. We started the dogs and they screamed out of the canyon on the tracks, but as they approached the top of the ridge, everything came to a screeching halt and we could tell the dogs had lost the tracks due to drifting snow. Daniel waded up through thigh steep snow to try and help the dogs, and I searched all the surrounding roads to see if he had crossed again after we had checked them earlier, I even snowmobiled as far in the top of the ridge from a different angle so I could see the open southern hillsides just over the top from where the dogs made the lose, but from my vantage point near where the dogs lost the cat, I could scan the wide open hillsides for any visible tracks, and there were none, the high winds had drifted in even every deer trail. Our snowmobile tracks in many higher areas were completely gone from just a few hours before. Daniel had the same issue where he hiked in to help the dogs, everything was drifted in.

We kept an eye on that area, hoping that cat would cross again, eventually he did cross out of there, or at least it was a similar tom, but another hound Hunter found the tracks just before I got to that road, and he ran the cat, it was another windy night, and the cat tracks went very low and crossed into some flats where his dogs lost the cat and he couldn't find him again. We have both been hunting that entire area since then hoping to find that cat, but we haven't seen him again and none of us are sure exactly where that cat went after that or when he’ll show up again?

Keep in mind these tracks could have been different cats because you really never know exactly how many cats are in an area, and it’s really a lot of guess work on when and where one of these toms will show up again.

[bearpaw]

We did a December hunt with no success, we passed some smaller tracks but couldn't find the hunter a cat the size he wanted.  There was a serious lack of snow in all the lower areas and southern exposure, in some areas the cats could walk on top of the remaining icy frozen snow and not leave any tracks. With no snow in the forecast all the way to Christmas I decided to postpone our other December hunts.

Its sort of a perfect winter so far for deer and elk, there wasn't much snow in December, now in January we've had numerous small snow storms, but the snow has been mostly melting off the low areas and the southern exposure, so its been easy for ungulates on winter range, but there's still a fair amount of snow up high in the mountains.

The cats are pretty low now hunting deer and elk on winter range. We've been getting just enough snow after each melt to keep us hunting fairly steady in January.

[bearpaw]

The first January hunter was wanting a large tom, we have several toms that we've been watching for. We passed some females and on the third morning found a pretty good sized (36" from the back foot to front foot) female track. FYI - Most adult females will be 32" to 37" and occasionally a little longer, also female toes are smaller and more pointed than tom toes. Toms are usually 38" or longer with larger rounder toes, there are additional clues to what sex a cat is, but just the measurement is a pretty good indicator.

The cat had walked a road a short distance and then jumped off the road into the sage, we found where it caught a deer about 25-30 yards off the road, you could see where the cat layed in the snow next to the deer as it held onto the deer until it expired, then it started dragging the deer to a hiding place, Zach was following the drag marks, I looked over about 80 yards and saw a bushy low limbed juniper, I said I bet the cat drug the kill to there, sure enough Zach found the kill stashed under that juniper. The cat had opened up the guts and eaten all the liver as they most always do first, then it had eaten some rib meat and part of the backstrap off one side before leaving. Quite often a cat will eat more on a new kill but it was dark when Zach first found the track and I think he spooked the cat off the kill.

Allan said he wanted to go after this cat because the weather forecast didn't look too good for the next few days, so we walked the dogs to the cat tracks and released them, Zach was over at the bushy juniper at the deer kill and made sure the dogs got on the cat tracks leaving the kill. It was a pretty quick chase and the dogs ended up treed only about a quarter mile up the mountain from the road. (Cats usually stay within a few hundred yards of their kill until it is consumed.)

We got up to the tree and it was a good sized beautiful female, Allan said he definitely wanted that cat so we got the dogs tied back and he drilled her. She jumped when hit so Daniel and the hunter took off after her, Daniel radioed back that they found her about 150 yards down the mountain, he said he would put a dog leash around her neck and pull her to the road, he radioed back again when he was back at the truck, we released the dogs and they followed the tracks straight to the truck.

I never turn dogs loose to go after a wounded cat unless it's absolutely necessary. We always try to find wounded cats ourselves, most of the time they are dead, sometimes they are still alive and the hunter has to shoot again, occasionally we do have to turn the dogs loose to catch them again. This is how we do it because I've had too many dogs hurt over the years (and some have died) chasing wounded cats. Lions are deadly, if a wounded cat turns on a hound the chances are not good for the dog, so we try to track wounded cats down ourselves.

Here's some photos, you can see Rip approaching the juniper where the cat had hidden the kill and then all three dogs following the tracks from the kill:

[bearpaw]

more

[bearpaw]

You can see in the bottom photo her belly wasn't all that full, I'm reasonably certain we spooked he off the kill when we found the tracks in the dark.

[nwhuntinman]

Nice work. Dogs are great resources for conservation. Best way to be able to age and sex critters to take out the proper animals. I did a hunt in Wyoming last year behind dogs and was successful.  It was my second time as the first time over never did get new snow while being there. Put a lot of miles on snowmobiles everyday. Houndsmen are a different breed. A different tough. This hunt has a lot of different emotions and physical attributes. Anyone that has ever thought about doing one of these hunts figure it out and go. Experience that is so different from any other hunt. I'd post my cat but I don't want to take anything from this lucky hunter. Good work guys

[bearpaw]

We have killed some of the largest toms in the books so we get quite a few hunters looking for large toms. Record books are a listing of only the largest cats so obviously everyone isn't going to get a record book cat and sometimes just finding an older tom within a 6 day hunt can be tough.

After the last hunt I watched the weather a few days and there was another warmup coming, I figured cats would move, we still had a little snow and was supposed to get a little more, so I called and got the next hunter headed our way as soon as he could from Ohio. Peter is one of the hunters I had postponed from December, he was wanting a 140-150 tom or better. Again we searched for the toms we have seen but couldn't catch up with a fresh track. As luck would have it a good tom had crossed a day before Peter arrived but it was too old to chase. We had passed a couple females and it was getting colder again and cats weren't moving as much, I kept trying to find the last tom that crossed before Peter got here but that tom must have made a kill and be laying on it somewhere. On the last day of the hunt Peter said if we can find any adult cat he wanted us to chase it so he could take a look at it.

Luck was on my side that early morning, I found a decent sized female track, I called the other guys to come and when the guys got there we all headed up the mountain on snowmobiles. The cat had come down to a river to get a drink, it turned around and went back up the hill. I had seen this cat several days earlier when it last got a drink so I figured it had a deer kill up on the mountain above there. We put three dogs on the tracks, they would do OK where there was snow and then they would lose it in the bare rocky areas. Daniel hiked up the mountain to help the dogs and I circled around from the left in case it went that way. Daniel found two different deer kills, only about 100 yards apart and one was fresh, Daniel found fresh lion tracks leaving that kill and got one of the dogs lined out, I brought two other dogs over and got them lined out again and the chase was on with all three dogs headed the right direction.

The dogs worked their way up nearly to the top of the mountain and then treed, only a few hundred yards from the road on the top. We waited a while to see if the cat would stay or jump, it looked like it was going to stay so I found a place to turn the sleds around, I looked at my dog receiver one more time and could see the dogs were on the move again so I shut off my sled. I could faintly hear the dogs, then pretty quick we could hear them better, apparently the cat had jumped and it "with the dogs in hot pursuit" was headed downhill fast at an angle to our left. They went about a half mile and treed again behind us and much closer to the bottom of the mountain. So we found another turnaround and headed further back in to the end of the road.

The dogs were only about a quarter mile from the end of the road so we headed in on foot. Peter would hopefully get a good look at the cat and could decide if he wanted to shoot it. It was super steep, Peter had a knee replacement last year and had never seen any ground this steep in his life. The footing was difficult and I was worried Peter could slip and take a long tumble down the mountain so Zach give him a dog leash to hang onto and I followed closely behind, hoping we could stop him if he slipped. In reality if he had slipped all three of us might have taken a tumble!

It took us a while but we finally made it to the cat which was in a big gnarly tree. It actually was a little better cat than I had thought, Peter immediately said he liked it and was going to shoot it. We got the dogs tied back and Peter loaded a round and was taking aim, it's like the cat knew it, he started getting nervous and started coming down. I was afraid Peter would struggle to get to another tree so I told him he needed to shoot if he was going to shoot. The cat was headed down head first and was just about to jump, boom, Pete hit the cat, he snarled but I didn't see where the bullet hit, the cat hit the ground and was gone in a flash, Daniel took off following immediately, he saw some blood but lost the blood trail in a bare rock slide so I figured the cat must not be hit too hard and I cut one dog loose. Daniel radioed and said the dog was opening and moving the track so I cut the other two dogs loose.

We gathered things up and was starting down when Daniel called on the radio, the dogs had caught up to the cat and it was dead on the ground, thank god! I was really worried about the dogs catching a wounded cat on the ground and getting hurt, so that was fantastic news. We climbed down the steep hillside, notched the lion tag, and took some photos. The cat had ran straight toward the snowmobiles so it was a very short drag out with the cat. Peter was more than happy with his cat so that worked out well after all, even though it wasn't the big tom he had originally wanted. He had a great time but told us he had never imagined that the country could be so steep.

[bearpaw]

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[bearpaw]

This is how I measure tracks, from the front of a hind foot to the front of a front foot on the same side of the cat! I’ll measure several tracks and go with the average length. This is a 33” female!