Holy Mountain Lion Batman! – Why We Scout
We’ve always said that year-round scouting is a critical piece of cougar calling success. This is why we scout – patiently.
(Please remember that subscribing to Wildlife Callers Blog is free and requires nothing more than your email)
In a previous blog, we posted this scouting video from one of our trail cameras. The video shows a young lion walking down a hard-pan dry wash bottom
We noted right away that this lion was still fairly young and not going to be a ”shooter” for a couple more seasons. However, we thought the area looked promising and this particular drainage should have a more dominant lion in it. We were very right…
Mature Mountain Lion
Dave Martens Lion Scouting
Mature Mountain Lion
Note: The cougar in the bottom photo looks like he had a Ford F250 for dinner – whole.
This lion was photographed on a trail camera going both directions (east & west) in this drainage. I have cropped the photos so the fully developed & mature size of the lion can easily be seen. This is exactly the type of cougar we’re looking to call & hunt this coming year, and now we’ve confirmed one travel section of the territory he controls.
Someone will ask how we can be 100% certain that this is the same lion. In the absence of a distinguishing mark or tattoo, the short answer is, we can’t. But through our biology research and knowing what we do about their travel habits and strong territorial behavior, we are pretty darn sure this is the same big lion patrolling down “his” hardpan.
The job now is to walk up and down the hardpan and locate the areas this big cougar uses to lay-up for the day. From that field research we can then begin the process of calling into/through the area until we “catch him at home”. For information on that topic, see our previous post here: http://www.wildlifecallers.com/blog/2009/08/19/want-to-call-more-mountain-lions-call-them-at-home/
For more information about scouting for lions and bobcats, see our posts here:
http://www.wildlifecallers.com/blog/2009/09/26/bobcat-calling-scouting-scat-identification-photos/
and here:
Our most productive calling seasons begin in the off-season. We wish all of our readers the best of luck scouting for and calling mountain lions this coming season.
I’ll see you in the field,
Mark Healy
Subscriptions to the blog are free and always appreciated! Your comments and questions are always welcome as well.
Send your questions to mark@wildlifecallers.com
Thats a fat cat! Nice
Looks like he swallowed a beach ball
You got that right cuz! Scouting is the key! Looking forward to your next post!
Thanks Chad – Good luck calling this week!
He is a dandy Mark.
I wish there were trail cameras 15 years ago! I could have saved literally 1000′s of miles of scouting plus time spent.
But then again, I still believe that getting out and covering the ground is still the best way to go. The only difference is the camera is an extra set of eyes. Most would be callers have no clue as to how important scouting is for success. Few have the drive to do it. My records show that for every 10 hours hunted, I had almost 60 hours scouting time.
Steve
Good morning Steve – Thanks for the comment.
I agree with the ratio of hunting to scouting. We spend a lot of our time walking the long ridges and bottoms trying to find some small amount of sign from a resident mountain lion.
We used to be more random with camera placement, and got more pictures of black bears that anything. We had to go back to “the basics” of scouting first and then hanging up cameras to confirm the regular presence of a cougar.
What’s interesting is the fact that when the trail camera is in the right spot, we get mountain lion photos and not much else. They seem to follow a slightly different path then the other critters.
Well, the story / message here is: you get out what you put in. The harder we scout the luckier we get – go figure…
Best regards,
Mark Healy