Encounter With a Lion Today

[BobR]

I am not allowed to go hunting on week-ends because the boss thinks I have way too many chores around here that need my attention. Our flood is gone and winter is back. We got new snow last night, so I talked her into taking a 4-wheeler trip this morning.
We left the house at 11:30 this morning. About noon, we were on one of my favorite logging roads when I saw some fresh lion tracks. She was lagging behind me a quarter mile or so because she doesn't know how to drive in the snow. I stopped to let her catch up, and that is when I realized the cat tracks were HOT. When she finally caught up, I showed her the tracks and explained that they were very fresh. This road is cut into a very steep mountainside. There is a very steep drop to the left and a six to seven foot bank to the right. The cat was right on the left edge and I noticed it stopped to look back twice. That is when I realized we were hot on its trail. Then I saw where it crossed over to the right side of the road and came back toward us. The cat did a nervous little dance, then it stepped away from the bank. It has placed all four feet in a radius of about a foot, and they tracks vanished.
I looked at that a minute, and then slowly raised my head to look up on top of the bank. I saw the cats tracks up on top going up into some brush. When Dee pulled up I explained how the cat had backtracked to this spot because the bank was the lowest at this point.
She could see that the tracks had vanished from the road and continued up on top. I told her that I bet the cat was in the brush up there watching and listening to us talk. She asked me where my gun was, and I told her it was at home. So she decided we should get the hell out of the area. We continued a mile or so on around the logging road. About a half hour later we were returning back on the same road to hit the main mountain road. When we got to that spot, I stopped and told her, I told you that the cat was up there. It had jumped back down on the road and back tracked to a long hogback ridge and took off down that. It had crossed our 4-wheeler tracks and kicked snow into them. Awhile later we bumped into a friend that was up on the mountain exercising his Plott and Walker hounds. I took Dee and our dogs home, and then went back up to show my friend a really good spot to exercise his hounds. We got home about 8:00 PM this evening and had a really fun day.
Friday night, I rebooted my computer, and I have to reinstall the software for my camera. I took a bunch of pics today and will post some tomorrow.
Bob

[Bearmanric]

BobR that sounds like fun. It's fun to see stuff like that give's ya a Rush. I'm going to try and go to the High Country tomorrow. cant take It any More. got to get out. Take Care. Rick

[Bobcat]

Hey Bob,

That is exciting about the lion!! I am glad y'all are slowly getting back to normal......you too Rick and Krusty!!

Bob

[jhoward]

great story
i know how your wife felt i called in a lion a week or so ago and i don't have a tag for one so i had to pass on it but it gave me a very ill feeling walking back to the pickup know that a lion was most likely watching me
you didn't say how the dog run went
did ya'll tree it?

[BobR]

Jhoward, These Dogs are just pups. Someone poisoned his experienced dogs last summer. These dogs have not learned to open up when on a chase. All we could do was follow tracks. The cat was running and the dogs were right on it, but late that night, they crossed the creek, and we could not follow beyond that. He called the dogs back with a horn. These pups are 9 months to 16 months. This guy usually hunts in Idaho, but is just training his new dogs. Yesterday all we found were bobcat tracks. Today another guy will be along that has a nine year old lead dog. This is what the pups need. This is all just for fun and training experience for the pups. We cannot kill cats that are treed by dogs here any more. I have lots of great pics, but cannot figure out how to get my pics out of my camera since I rebooted my computer. We got new snow last night, and the guys just pulled in our driveway. I told them to go on and I would follow on my Honda in a few minutes.
Bob

[BobR]

Bearmanric is here now. He will be here hunting a few days. We will keep you posted if anything interesting happens. Found a big cat track today, but the dogs lost it when it crissed a smaller cat's tracks
Bob

[jhoward]

good luck with the pups i know how frustrating dog training can be i train alot of dogs mostly cow dogs but i have some jack russells that i breed and when i was training them to hunt i didn't have a lead dog and i spent alot of time chasing things i didn't want to
that's pretty sorry to poisin a dog for whatever reason if they had a problem with you're freind they should have taken it up with him not kill the dogs
i have some neighbors with lion dogs and we just got some good snow so maybe i'll get to tree a lion this weekend i am looking forward to that hunt
here in co we only get 2 lion tags a year but you can buy them over the counter but you have to have one to kill a lion that you tree if you have a lion kill on the ranch you can kill the lion if you can prove that it's the one that killed the animal
well good luck

[Bobcat]

I don't know........the two of you together in one place? ;D

Keep us posted......

Good Hunting,

Bob

[BobR]

The weather has been a bummer here since Rick got here Tuesday. All we have done is freeze our tails off.
We have only got in one calling stand, and it started sleeting on us. A local guy was hunting whitetail deer sheds on my neighbors property the other day. He walked up on a lion covering a fresh kill. He returned just before dark to watch the kill with his rifle. He killed an 80 pound female. We have been with my friend and the dogs since Rick got here, and we have not seen a single lion track, just bobcat tracks, coyote and red fox.
We are going one more time this morning, and then we are going to start calling to get in some stands before Rick has to leave.
Bob

[Bearmanric]

BobR are you having fun yet. Nice Picture's going to go out in the next day or so. going to put the Johnny Stewart. Cougar in Heat on the Loudmouth. give that a try. Good Luck. Rick

[BobR]

Rick, I think cougar in heat is an excellent choice right now. I finally broke down and bought a new computer yesterday. The duct tape was coming loose on my old one, and it just would not work right. I got a good one this time. Now I can post some pics of our encounter with the cougar Sunday February 1st.
In this first pic, I had stopped where the cat came down the trail onto the logging road



In this second pic, you can see where the cat went up on the bank to look toward the sound of my approaching ATV



Now the cat has gone back down on the road and heading away from the sound of my ATV.



In this pic, you can see where the cat crouched to leap up on the bank to the right of the road to let us pass by.



When we came back by the spot where the cat had jumped up on the bank a half hour later, we saw where it had jumped down onto the road kicking snow in our fresh ATV tracks. We followed the tracks down a long ridge. In this pic, we have gone as far as we can on the ridge on our ATV's. We stopped to get off and look at the tracks and take pics. You can see the cat's tracks continuing into the timber down the ridge. One of our dogs is getting a nose full of the fresh cat scent.



This was a small cat, probably about 80 pounds.
Bob

[Bobcat]

I just love seeing those tracks.....it gets my blood boiling for a hunt!!

I am glad to see y'all out and about again after all of your weather/flooding woes lately!!

Good Hunting,

Bob

[Bearmanric]

BobR glad you got the new computer it will make it nicer. doing house stuff today. try to get out tomorrow. Rick