A Lion in the Camp.

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Griz44Mag

70 Cal.
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Republic of Texas, District of Krum
This was caught on a game camera (4/5/2020) at the gates to the White Hat, a ranch I have hunted extensively in the past.
I spotted one from a ground blind a few years ago and the rest of the camp accused me of nipping while hunting....
Well here's the proof - This game camera was set by a firefighter from Lee County (now the current lease holder?)
That's a fairly rare sighting in Texas, as the big cats have learned it's best to stay away from people.

Mountain Lion at White Hat.png
 
Pretty rare sighting even at night. Saw one from a blind while glassing game trails one late afternoon west of Medina Texas years ago.
 
I’ve saw two in my lifetime in the wild... in Tn!

20 + years apart and in different locales.
 
While fly fishing the Missouri river ten years ago, I saw one dragging a mule deer fawn up a rocky hillside. Magnificent creatures, and very rare. I have seen their tracks near the river, but this is the only one I have seen.

ADK Bigfoot
 
Do these guys travel a lot, They have been seen in NW Missouri, but not constantly, we blame the conservation of planting them. An old rancher told me that if one is watching your hair will stand up on the back of your neck. Of course they are protected here, but with all the young'uns we have here one would probably get lead poison if it ate the wrong end of a gun.
 
Buddy of mine has some property in California and he has a few mountain lions that regularly visit a watering hole that he posts a camera on. He is not a hunter, and his property is not legal for hunting—just likes to see the nature. Pretty awesome looking animals, but I wouldn’t want to meet one up close!
 
Back in the 80's I lived in Vegas. Worked as a security guard at the old Sands casino. They had buildings for hotel guests out back. I worked the graveyard shift, one morning just before sun up there is a lion perched on a cement block wall at the edge of the property. who would have thunk. I also saw another one on the way back from a foray in the desert. I've seen bob cats here in PA .
 
I have seen two in the wild. Im pretty sure for every one that i see, i am seen by dozens of them.

One morning while bowhunting in 8 inches of fresh fallen snow i had made a large circle on a ridge and was returning walkin in my own tracks. I looked down and there were lion tracks in my tracks.:eek: i back tracked a bit and found where the lion had leaped out of my trail and bounded down the side of the ridge. I don't think I was being stalked though. It seemed more like the cat was curious. But, it was still kinda disconcerting!!
 
Seen a few here in AZ. The weirdest though was when Deer hunting in north Kaibab we saw the skeleton of a nice 4 point mule deer......wait for it................22 feet up a juniper/cedar tree! Them big tom lions are STRONG!

Others were just glimpses hauling arse away and a few (same one likely) crossing on highway late night. Had a small cat walking a road same direction as me last year and deer run towards us, he musta spooked em. Real small tracks, not cubs but little guy. Then we also had one cross in front of us in the truck driving to puck up Jake's elk last fall. We had a DPS trooper killed like 30-40 years ago when one jumper across the freeway chasing a deer and landed in his windshield.

They are a magnificent creature, taste like pork too.
 
They are occasionally spotted here in north Arkansas. The Game and Fish commission does not officially recognize them as being in the state. I have been told they can range as much as 600 miles.
 
We have quite a few of them in Idaho. I get pictures of them once in a while. I've yet to actually see one in person, did hear one scream several Springs ago while turkey hunting. They are, along with cow moose with a calf, the reason I carry a sidearm when archery hunting.
 
Years ago a buddy had a electronic call (first model, we talking late 80's), anyway it was a predator call. Recording of a Mnt Lion in heat! Stampeded cows and everything! hard to listen too, not as bad as the woodpecker in distress, that ya cant listen too more than 5-10 min!
 
Dad's hounds ran one out onto a sandbar on the Red river in the 60s. He lost 2 hounds but the pack killed the lion. He carried the one injured but alive hound back to the truck, leaving the dead lion on the sandbar.
The landowner/rancher knew dad had hunted that night, and rode a horse onto the sandbar and retrieved the lion, but the horse bucked him off and he had to walk back to the ranch.
I guess the lion skin is still on the ranch's dining room wall.
 
Seen a few here in AZ. The weirdest though was when Deer hunting in north Kaibab we saw the skeleton of a nice 4 point mule deer......wait for it................22 feet up a juniper/cedar tree! Them big tom lions are STRONG!

Others were just glimpses hauling arse away and a few (same one likely) crossing on highway late night. Had a small cat walking a road same direction as me last year and deer run towards us, he musta spooked em. Real small tracks, not cubs but little guy. Then we also had one cross in front of us in the truck driving to puck up Jake's elk last fall. We had a DPS trooper killed like 30-40 years ago when one jumper across the freeway chasing a deer and landed in his windshield.

They are a magnificent creature, taste like pork too.
Pic from 2010 N/W lower peninsula of Michigan near the Lake Michigan shoreline.
mountain lion pantry.jpg
 
I saw one, more of a glimps, in the Kofa Mountains just north of Yuma during the deer season of 93. Also heard it squaling the night before. During a hunt in eastern Az around Safford, we saw tons of tracks but never saw one.
 
In Colorado the mule deer population has been struggling for a long time. Population fluctuates up and down around 430,000. The wildlife people estimate that the lion population is 5,000 to 6,000. Hunters kill 35,000 to 40,000 deer each year. A Lion kills 40 to 50 deer per year. So lets go low on numbers and say there are only 4,500 lions and they each kill 40 deer per year. That's 200,000 deer per year!

Yet the wildlife experts "officially" don't know why deer are struggling!!
 
Officially we don’t have any in PA but many have been reported on Facebook. The most curious story is when a roadkill was hung up in the mans barn and “people” came the next morning wanting their animal back. GPS tracker ?
 

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