For twelve years I was one of a group that hunted the same 100k acre ranch southwest of Sanderson for MD for three weeks each Fall. There were 24 mostly experienced Texas hunters in the camp and everyone wanted to kill a lion. We never saw one although their tracks were often encountered. A lot of nighttime varmint calling also took place with fox, coyotes, and bobcats taken, but no lions seen.
We went through three ranch managers and the last one was an experienced lion trapper. He caught six in his first five months on the ranch. Point being that they can be fairly thick and never be spotted.
The ranch management believed they never lost any cattle to lions, but when a bear moved into the West end of the ranch he killed two yearling steers.
Oddly enough, there were three old wether goats left over from a herd they originally had near Beef Canyon, and they survived the lions. I guess deer were easier prey........ or maybe they couldn’t stand the smell.
When I hunted leopard in Zambia, one rarely saw them because they are nocturnal and secretive, but it was possible to shoot them by sticking a bait animal up in a tree, ideally against the setting sun and constructing a hide. Estimates were that there were as many as one million leopards throughout Africa, even within the major cities in South Africa, and it was silly to worry about extinction just because most people had never seen them and had no idea where they were.
We do have mountain lions in or near our neighborhood in the Sandia Mountains east of Albuquerque, though most of the family pets are lost to coyotes.
Norm
Last edited by Anjin; 01/28/19.
Norman Solberg International lawyer, lately for 25 years in Japan, now working on trusts in the US, the 3rd greatest tax haven. NRA Life Member for over 50 years, NRA Endowment (2014), Patron (2016).
