Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Mountain Lions of west Texas

poboy you are mistaken with the picture, a similar pic maybe but not this one, no. I have a few other pics from the same area for credibility if need be. this pic is the first time ive posted it anywhere and the owner of trail cam never posted it.

But, but, my buddy's dad's third cousin's ex-wife's illegitimate step son swore it happened!

stxhunter,

NOPE. I have NO idea who /what "mudhen" is other than a swamp-bird that is "duck-like", the nickname of the F15 AF fighter & when I was stationed in Northern VA/DC a very unflattering term for a slovenly/homely girl..

Inasmuch as I've had a few incidents with El Tigre, when I was stationed down in LA at HQ, USASOUTHCOM, I know just enough about them to not want a "close encounter of the 3rd kind".
(For starters, I cannot count the times that a jaguar set off our "intrusion alarms". - I suspect that the local folks' livestock attracted the cats for "an easy meal.)

I had one "visit my tent" one night , as we found his prints at about 0630 the next morning. - Didn't see El Tigre & I was pleased that he didn't choose to "have a snack".

NOT a few peasants in that area have passed out by a campfire, dead drunk & were rudely awakened by being bitten.

yours, tex

Yep...it would be a first....

Ummm.....

LOL.

Don't bother, Greg.

To All,

About 10-12 years ago, a fellow "who had a few too many" called the Bell County TX Sheriff's Office to report that he had seen a tiger in his neighborhood.

Out of curiosity, a deputy responded, to find that the drunk had NOT seen a tiger.
Instead, it was a "more or less tame" cheetah, that belonged to a couple in Copperas Cove & was loose & "out for an early morning stroll".
(The county's animal control officers were called & the "pet" & owners were reunited after payment of a hefty fine.)

yours, tex

Round here we got we call Malaga Mud ducks. Nasty little bastids.

Tex/Darla,

my money is on mudhen for this type of stuff.

YMMV

Barry, I know a couple of the Biologists in Abilene. They may no be the brightest of the bunch, but even they’re not that dumb. 😜

Agreed!

lay em on their side in sunlight, and you can see the spots

Lol, you two fuqkers are in trouble now!!

Nah, were good. It’s just from the waste up.

Poor Jag got shorted aye?

🤷🏿‍♂️

Bwahahaha!

Around campfires I have heard a story of a circus truck that crashed on I-25 in the vicinity of Greenhorn peak. A black panther supposedly was not recovered. There is folklore of people seeing it and seeing it's descendants interbred with the local ones.
I've got some property a few miles from there where I get some photos but no black ones yet.

I don’t know about West Texas lions, but I know for a fact that Wyoming lions kill and eat livestock.

Lonny;
Good afternoon to you sir, I hope that the day down in your part of Idaho was as bright and clear as it was up here across the medicine line.

Honestly it's the first day we've seen that much sun down in the valley for a few weeks so even though it wasn't enough to melt the snow much, I appreciated seeing the sun.

While I've never chased our Okanagan cougars myself personally, a whole lot of my acquaintances have and before they closed their shop a buddy had a taxidermy business just down the road so we got to see a lot of local cats brought in that way.

We had enough cougars a few years back that the Ministry upped the annual allowable harvest to two cats per season, though I can't say I know any of the houndsmen who actually killed more than one a season.

I've got some connections to the local ranching community - have been on a branding crew for more than 25 years now - and honestly can't recall anyone blaming a cougar for a cow or calf kill.

They will however eat horses with gusto and when the winter snows get deep some years they'll kill a fair few. I want to say there were more than a dozen horses killed in the south valley in the winter of '96, but last winter we had more snow actually and I can't recall anyone reporting a horse taken so there you go.

There are less horses around than there were in the '90's I suppose, still I can't explain the difference.

Another poster - Fireball I believe - asked how many deer a cougar will kill and I'd think at least one deer/sheep sized animal a week would be a minimum for an adult cat.

Way back in the day a local guide told me he was chasing a huge tom one valley to the east and it killed 3 adult moose in a couple week period. Now I'd suggest that it would not have killed that many if they'd not have been chasing it perhaps, but that's a guess on my part.

The video sorta touched on how elusive they are and for sure we've only laid eyes on one cougar - and one lynx for the record too - in our years of kicking around the back country. We've seen kills and tracks in the snow, but only saw the one cougar.

That all taken into account, wolves moved in here about a decade back and despite my efforts in trying to see one - calling, etc - I've yet to see one of them too.

Lastly in all the years I've been here in BC - 35 coming up in a month or two I see - I can't recall anyone mentioning a black phase cat, but just because I've never seen or heard of one doesn't mean they don't or can't exist.

Anyway thanks for reading my ramblings on a Sunday afternoon and all the best to you as we hopefully head into spring sooner than later.

Dwayne