Ya' never know what's up there.

marsh trapper said:

Here in Maryland the DNR and blackwater Refuge have released truckloads of coyotes to control deer populations..

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I wouldn't worry too much about them. Loads of coyotes here in SW michigan. Even found a fresh kill on my farm (a yearling they'd taken down -- the whole show was recorded in the snow, spurting blood and all). Despite their high population, our deer population is exploding and the state is doing their best to get people to take more does.

I had an on the road field rep/ emergency service , repair position for a company in Central Pa. , Western Md. , and Northern W. Va.. It was night and day travel 6 hrs. plus company car driving a day. Nothing to do but look at traffic , and wildlife going from customer site to site. Back in 1990 , the MTN. lion sightings started in my territory. I would talk to some of my customers in Pa. that had sighted the lions . All were credible , educated witness' , and over half were hunters , that were used to identifying animals before harvesting them. I attended one of the award winning Gary Alt , "kill all the deer in Pa." , Public meeting at a local high school. I told a local Pa. Blame Warden about the Mtn. Lion sighting I had , where I watched the big long tail cat for five min's along the road. Next day , a technologist from the local hospital on the way home , pulled off the road to watch , probably the same lion , on the same coal mine spoil pile where I had seen it before. She called her dad , a Pa. State Police Officer , described what she was watching , and he told her , don't get out of the car , and to leave the area ASAP.
I told the Pa. Blame Warden at the Public deer meeting what I had seen , and the Blame Comm. Officer essentially called me a liar to my face , and denied there was any possibility of lions in Pa.. I told him I would call the news media , first , then the Blame Comm. second , if I would find one killed along the road. Next morning , I almost got my wish. In Elk County , on the way up Red Hill Mtn , there is a four lane section of highway w/ truck passing lanes. I was the last of three cars in line , and a Mtn. Lion jumped over a highway guide rail on the west bound lanes , and jumped between the first two cars ahead of me so forcefully , it bounced off the steep road bank , fell backwards into the ditch , and took a couple seconds to regain it's footing to disappear over the road bank. All this took time enough for me to again assess the color , size , and length of tail for purposes of positive Identification . I can still picture the movements , of the big cat. Over the next six months , other credible folks reported to me the first hand sightings they had , as well. Too many credible accounts , in a short time to ignore fact. These critters must have been stocked in Pa.. Just as the Blame Comm. had denied stocking Coyotes , the Blame Comm denies the lion reports. What is next? , cross breeding timber wolves with coyotes , so as to make a "super size Coyote" ? Don't ask were that info came from. I know NOTHING...Sgt, Schoultz.

Can you trust a government agency? of course you can, just ask any Indian!

Gtrubicon said:

We have lots of kittens around here, this is my driveway.

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dang. those look big.

SwampBilly said:

I went hiking down the Peace River Monday here in Southwest Florida to shoot my 1863 pocket model.

Sitting on the bank under a shade tree contemplating my next Target, I hear something a couple of hundred yards or so behind me that didn't register it first until I sat and kept listening to it..... I thought I'll be damned if that doesn't sound like a lion...

Then I remembered that there is indeed a big cat refuge in that region. Yep, I was listening to a real live African lion bellowing. I thought to myself I sure hope they have that cat in a strong cage because if I had to shoot at him with this 31 caliber round ball that would be the last thing I ever did in my life. Lol.

Fortunately, the cat never made its way down to me or the river.

I couldn't imagine actually being faced with such a cat with nothing but a pea shooter.

If I was really fortunate the animal might avoid me on account of the nauseating smell emanating from my britches rapidly filling full of fecal matter.

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Peace River, is a beautiful place.
One of these days we're going to load up the canoe and float it down and do some camping and soak it all in.
Wife and I live close to the Withlacoochee River, we hunt, fish and hike there. We've heard some strange things in the pre dawn hours. Had run in with a pack of stray dogs a good number of years ago. They held their ground for a few minutes. Never any large Cat though.

Take Care Stay Safe

We have no deer, so the lions live on elk. (Lion killed right near my cabin, but not by me.)


Hard to imagine the carnage left behind After a Lion plays with an elk like a mouse... for hours!





Kinnikinnick grows wild near one kill sight. Interesting that the lions ate most of the large kinnikinnick patches with their elk meat. This was a lioness w/cubs.

Freedom said:

We have no deer, so the lions live on elk.
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Hard to imagine the carnage left behind After a Lion plays with an elk like a mouse... for hours!
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Kinnikinnick grows wild near one kill sight. Interesting that the lions ate most of the large kinnikinnick patches with their elk meat. This was a lioness w/cubs.
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wow. that cat is big. congrats

Here in Pa. , there were always lions . I was six in the early 1950's , my dad took me to his friends camp in Clearfield Co. to teach me to fish for brook trout. In the morning , we hit the run full of brookies eager for the lunch fry pan. Dad and his friend were in sight of me , while they stood on the camp access road parallel to the stream. They were shocked when a big yellow/tan , Mtn, lion , jumped down off the high road bank onto the road , paused , and moved down toward the stream where I was fishing. My Dad and his friend ran down to me , and said fishing is over for the day , but wouldn't tell me why. When I came to camp at age 12 to hunt deer, Dad finally told me why he ended my fishing day so early six years previous. He told me about the Mtn. lion they saw near me , while I was fishing. I never heard the cat due to the noise of water falling among the boulders. About a month or so later , same year the cat was sighted near me , a Pa. Game Protector in Warren Co. Pa. , shot a lion w/his service revoliver. The picture of the dead cat , and Game Officer was in the Pa. Game News magazine. My father had the cut out article pinned up above his cellar work bench for years. Warren and Clearfield Co'.s are not close , so the cat we encountered , may not have been the same cat. It was not until 1990 , that many lion sightings became evident in Central Pa.. Back in the 1950' , sightings were few , and far between , while abruptly , in 1990's 20 sightings in the Central Pa. w/in a few months , by many credible witnesses. Two of the sightings were of black phase cats. Who knew??? Pa. Blame Comm. said all the witnesses were liars , . no cats in Pa..

Gum Slough Muzzleloader said:

Peace River, is a beautiful place.
One of these days we're going to load up the canoe and float it down and do some camping and soak it all in.
Wife and I live close to the Withlacoochee River, we hunt, fish and hike there. We've heard some strange things in the pre dawn hours. Had run in with a pack of stray dogs a good number of years ago. They held their ground for a few minutes. Never any large Cat though.

Take Care Stay Safe

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You probably have heard that the Peace River is world famous for pleistocene era fossils. I have spent thousands of hours standing in the river with a sifter. I love the Peace River. Have camped on it many times and it is where I took a feral hog with my 1858 years ago from about 80 ft.

I myself was born and raised in Ocala until the age of 16 and then moved to Tampa for about the next 16 years and after leaving there I have lived in DeSoto county for about 14 years.

I kind of miss Ocala but I know I would be very sad to see what it looks like now and you couldn't pay me a million dollars to move back to Tampa.

Recently a big Florida panther has been spotted in the myakka area. No telling what moves about in these southwest Florida woods after dark.

I was sitting down one afternoon under the State road 70 bridge over the Peace River, just sitting there being quiet and I looked up and a bobcat was strolling past about 40 ft in front of me and I think we both became aware of each other's presence at the same time.... He just continued upon his way unconcerned with me.

I have had a couple scary encounters here in Finland. First one was when i was fishing in northern Finland where i have my cabin, and i heard howling. I thought it was someone's dog, as there were lots of bird hunters around. It did cross my mind that i might have been a wolf, but i dismissed it as they are very rare there. I fished until dark and decided to drive back to my cabin, and after about 500 meters of driving i saw a pair of eyes in the dark, and after a few seconds there was a few pairs more. I turned on my long beams and i saw a wolfpack at the edge of the woods in front of me. I stopped and looked at them for a good 10 seconds before they disappeared back to the woods. After that i have been much less eager to wander in the woods alone, altough the chance of bumping into them again is terribly slim, but still i am a bit nervous. Another one was a bit more south where i live now. I was sitting in a ditch at about 5 am with my friend when hunting geese, the ditch was bordering a forest and a farmer's field where we had our decoys. We heard rustling and heavy footsteps of a large animal rustling in the woods, about 20 meters away from us. We sat still and let the animal walk past, of course we tried to sneak a peek, but as it was dark we couldn't really see anything. we jokingly said it could have been a bear, but most likely it was a moose, as bears are not very common at this area. Well, the animal actually was a bear, it had been photographed at the same morning only few hundred meters away on a road, and it ended up in the local newspaper.

Virtakuono said:

I have had a couple scary encounters here in Finland. First one was when i was fishing in northern Finland where i have my cabin, and i heard howling. I thought it was someone's dog, as there were lots of bird hunters around. It did cross my mind that i might have been a wolf, but i dismissed it as they are very rare there. I fished until dark and decided to drive back to my cabin, and after about 500 meters of driving i saw a pair of eyes in the dark, and after a few seconds there was a few pairs more. I turned on my long beams and i saw a wolfpack at the edge of the woods in front of me. I stopped and looked at them for a good 10 seconds before they disappeared back to the woods. After that i have been much less eager to wander in the woods alone, altough the chance of bumping into them again is terribly slim, but still i am a bit nervous. Another one was a bit more south where i live now. I was sitting in a ditch at about 5 am with my friend when hunting geese, the ditch was bordering a forest and a farmer's field where we had our decoys. We heard rustling and heavy footsteps of a large animal rustling in the woods, about 20 meters away from us. We sat still and let the animal walk past, of course we tried to sneak a peek, but as it was dark we couldn't really see anything. we jokingly said it could have been a bear, but most likely it was a moose, as bears are not very common at this area. Well, the animal actually was a bear, it had been photographed at the same morning only few hundred meters away on a road, and it ended up in the local newspaper.

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my family and I prefer bear meat to venison. It’s good!

Bears seem to be making a comeback in Pennsylvania. But we do not have a resident population here in southern Lancaster county. That said, we have had humorous instances of young bears trying to find a home in the area. My favorite was up a tree looking to enter a second floor office.

I'm not a fan of more bears in Pa.. According to research , black bears kill half of all whitetail fawns each year. The bear season in Pa. is held the couple days before Thanksgiving , when few hunters will be at hunting camps , and most will be enjoying pre holiday family time . The much lauded "early bear season" , is the same week as early muzzleloader deer season , and a host of other archery seasons. All this special timing , is in favor of the conservation of bears. Single hunters w/out snow , have little chance of finding a bear to hunt , unless they hunt over bait , an illegal method , and I know of no hunter doing this practice.

Gtrubicon said:

my family and I prefer bear meat to venison. It’s good!

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I would like to try, but as for now bearhunting is heavily debated and probably soon not allowed anymore in finland :/

oldwood said:

I'm not a fan of more bears in Pa.. According to research , black bears kill half of all whitetail fawns each year. The bear season in Pa. is held the couple days before Thanksgiving , when few hunters will be at hunting camps , and most will be enjoying pre holiday family time . The much lauded "early bear season" , is the same week as early muzzleloader deer season , and a host of other archery seasons. All this special timing , is in favor of the conservation of bears. Single hunters w/out snow , have little chance of finding a bear to hunt , unless they hunt over bait , an illegal method , and I know of no hunter doing this practice.

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Here in Southern Lancaster county I am beginning to think the deer population is getting out of hand. It is rural and people do hunt. But very many of the hunters go to camps upstate. My wife has had an unusual amount of deer damage in her garden this season. I walked into our dining room and saw a doe nibbling at ornamentals just outside the window. If not for the glass I could have grabbed her by the ears! Have a Daisy BB gun I use to keep squirrels off the bird feeders. Let's see if nose shots will scare the deer a bit.

Also, we will soon come into rut. Deer behavior will get unpredictable and sometimes problematic.

SOLANCO said:

Here in Southern Lancaster county I am beginning to think the deer population is getting out of hand. It is rural and people do hunt. But very many of the hunters go to camps upstate. My wife has had an unusual amount of deer damage in her garden this season. I walked into our dining room and saw a doe nibbling at ornamentals just outside the window. If not for the glass I could have grabbed her by the ears! Have a Daisy BB gun I use to keep squirrels off the bird feeders. Let's see if nose shots will scare the deer a bit.

Also, we will soon come into rut. Deer behavior will get unpredictable and

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I’d rather see you shoot one in the rear rather than the nose for fear of putting out an eye. Also. It’s illegal to shoot a deer with a BB gun in Pennsylvania

Gum Slough Muzzleloader said:

Wife and I live close to the Withlacoochee River, we hunt, fish and hike there.

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Living near the Withlacoochee now means you're in a world of hurt. The river is in high flood stage south of Nobleton and will have you in its clutches soon if it hasn't already.

I hope you are OK.

Patocazador said:

Living near the Withlacoochee now means you're in a world of hurt. The river is in high flood stage south of Nobleton and will have you in its clutches soon if it hasn't already.

I hope you are OK.

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We good. Thanks.

I lived right on the river for 14 year. Caddy corner from the Canone Outlet/River Rats. We now live about a mile and a half east of there.

Them folks are hurting for sure. I feel for them.

I saw some more wolves. I was beaver hunting with a friend of mine last weekend, we set up an ambush for beavers near their dam about 600m from our car. when we walked in there was fresh snow on the ground. we sat for about 5 hours with no sight of beavers, and then we returned to our car. we found tracks of 6-8 wolves that had crossed our tracks 250 meters from where we were sitting in ambush - i am completely sure the wolves knew we were there. Two days ago we captured shining eyes in a trail cam behind my girlfriend's house, only 10 minutes after we set up the camera in the evening. Pictures below.



One of the wolf tracks crossing ours.



The eyes we got on camera. Rather scary!