Getting pilgrims lions.....

[BIGBLUES]

I get sick of these guys that take every pilgrim that comes along and gets them a 50 lbs lion. If they want a lion let them do the leg work and spend there money on the fuel. Your nobody's hero except yourself when you try to be king daddy. A true lion hunter leaves them in the tree and does it for the dogs. Anybody can kill a lion, but only a houndsman can hunt a lion. Its understandable to kill a few for the dogs here and there, but leave some for next time.

[chsnlions]

X 2, preach it. fuel and dogs and dog food and time in the woods and ....... if they want to kill a lion they can spend the money, time and effort to do it. Leave the little ones and baby maker lions to grow and chase another day

[rfeen]

Hell yeah, do it for the dogs, i totally agree let them live, if we shoot all the cats it will become a dieing sport, especially in montana here we need to protect this sport we all love and know as our way of life.

[cohoundsman]

I agree fellas. We have caught lions for friends in the past, but they had to do the same work we do. My best friend for years thought that we would catch a nice one and then call him. It took about four years of catching lions before he relized...they aint calling. He wanted one real bad so he finally started putting in the time, effort, and leg work. the first lion we caught for him was a descent female. We convinced him that we should let her go and could do better. A few days later we put a nice mature 150lb. tom in a tree which he harvested. He understands now that there is more to it than just driving around and turning dogs loose.

[Mike Leonard]

This is an important post and trust me it goes on all over the place it has nearly wiped out the lions in many areas that use to be decent hunting and training areas.

Not always but the scenario usually starts out with some well meaning hunting enthusiast who gets to tag along with a houndmen and lo and behold they catch a lion and maybe or maybe not this guy is the trigger man but he tells himself I am going to do this on my own. Well he invests some time and money buys a few dogs and usually struggles for a few years and then spends that little extra to buy a dog that can actually catch a lion nd then overnight he is a master lion hunter. He gets his wife a lion, and then his kids, and then his Dad, and then everybody that praises him for being such a huntig whiz gets a chance to tag a lion with him. He notices that the lions usually begin to get smaller and younger in his area but none the less they are bigger than housecats and look huge to somebody who has never seen a cougar in real life. Usually about this time he gets the bug to start charging people for getting a lion and he signs up under and Oufitter or just becomes a illegal guide taking commenseration in the form of gas, gifts, meals and tips for his hunting services. Allk of which is highly illegal on public lands. He may geta little nervous about this when the Wardens start quizing him about this lion or that lion so he seeks out and outfitter and becomes a guide, road runner, track seller and gopher for a legitmate outfitter.

In snow lion country we see this all the time. You wonder why you see 10 trucks out on a section of mountains and they all seem to be talking to each other on the phone or radios.

It doesn't happen much in bare ground lion country becasue just buying a groke dog or two doesn't insure that a person is ever going to be able to consistantly catch lions but in snow country with good raods they will.

I know a guy who went on one lion hunt with an outfitter and killed a lion. The next year he bought two very good snow lion dogs from this Outfitter ad for the next 3-4 years he caught 90% of the lions he turned out on, and most of them went home in the back of the pickup.

Let's not kill our sport or the future of ou sport that our young people might enjoy!

[live to hunt]

BIGBLUES are you in an area that has no quota's and is open to the killing of all lions? Montana has permit and quota areas right? Are you more worried about over kill or is someone else closing your area and you are not killing them lions for your dogs?

[larry]

first week and a half of the Mt season had weather, HD 392 female quota was 2, 5 females were killed, mostly by the same people. Those cats need to be taken off the quota for the next two-three years to make up for the hit that caused. The system needs to be revamped as well. If a lion is called in after 1pm, it doesn't show up on the hotline til the following day and creates an extra day for the area to stay open on top of the 24 hour closure notice, if a guy plays it right, he can keep it open an additional 48 hours after he sees the last cat on the quota hit the ground. Hd's need to close the day that they are filled, everyone can call to check, the 24 hour wait period creating the extra day to run quotas over is no longer neccesary with todays technology of cell phones and internet. That HD this year is a prime example of what the simple minded, "if its on the quota it's ok" attitude can result in. It's a pretty safe bet not all of those 5 females were without young or pregnant.

[Diamond 7]

I agree leave em for next time.

A few years ago I treed a small cat and left it in the tree. It wasn't two hours later while I was driving through town and I spoted a hound rig with a cougar on top of the dog-box parked at a gas station, so I stopped to take a look. I heard the guy telling a guy looking at this 50 lb. monster of a cat where he had gotten it.
After hering the BS story, I'll bet money that monster of a cat was still in the tree I left it in and this guy drove by and struck it in the tree. I caught that cat right next to a road.

Smarten-up let these cats at least grow to maturity or we won't have any thing left to hunt.

[BIGBLUES]

Its permit and quota areas. the permit system has overrun the quota areas... So now you have houndsmen stacked up in the quota areas and the permit areas the number of tags climb every year do to permit holders lack of filling their tags. I don't care if you kill a couple lions for your buddies every year but try to keep it a respectable sport/tradition and don't take every pilgrim that comes along. If they would just return the permit areas back into general quota areas than maybe people would spread out a little and we would get the good diverse harvest that is needed. Not trying to say my opinion is right, but it needs to change because this isn't working. FWP has our hunting regs. all jacked up. They need to have a meeting and talk to the guys that actually run alot and see what needs to change.

[Jlhoutfitters]

well i cant agree more here in michigan we run bobs that we never kill because of poor color or to darn small and the same with bears. so i get what you are saying. I just returned from south central montana came out with my girlfriend and our dogs it was her christmas present. we ran 5 tracks + 2 kits over 7 days of hunting lion and found two or three others we didnt cut out on because of the age of track and time of day. cold trailed one large single track i belived to be a tom up mountain for about 2 hrs and the dog did great on it but hit a female with kits before jumping the "tom" and she went in a small cave and the kits that had a track of sub a yr old cat went down the ridge aways and the dog got messed up as to were to go stay at the cave or run the kits those we left alone. 2 days latter we found were the female with kits came down to the rd and went back up mountain we ran again just to take some pics cuz we had never seen a cat treed but lost them in the river and bare ground on the other side. but this lead me too a fresh kill made by a single cat and had been done just the night before only the front quarter ripped up and deer stashed just of the rd. the next day we turned out on it as the cat had been back and ate the heart and lungs dog took it out and about 1000 yrds up country he made a lose and headed on his back trail we headed up and found the dog running backwards on hit and miss snow and bare ground a bit of help and he was back on it and the cat treed just up from were he had lost it in the rocks. ended up it was a little over 100 lb female aged at around 6 or 7 by the biologist. she was dry and not pregnant and only the third cat in the district and first female so we felt pretty good about our hunt but both agree that the next cat we take will be a mature tom not that there is anything wrong with takeing the in quota female but i agree that to many killed will hurt the next couple generations but over harvest of males can do the same in big country if there isnt enuf to service the females so if we see less and less cat tracks of diferent age classes in that area its time to stop takeing them and just take pics and back out with it still in the tree. we as houndsmen of anytype need to be good stewards of our resources across the boards and take a look at current and local populations and make responsible decision each time we tree a lion, bob, bear or even coon if they are way down or real small its time to praise up the dogs walk away and tell that story proud!

[larry]

she was dry and not pregnant and only the third cat in the district and first female so we felt pretty good about our hunt but both agree that the next cat we take will be a mature tom not that there is anything wrong with takeing the in quota female but i agree that to many killed will hurt the next couple generations but over harvest of males can do the same in big country if there isnt enuf to service the females so if we see less and less cat tracks of diferent age classes in that area its time to stop takeing them and just take pics and back out with it still in the tree. we as houndsmen of anytype need to be good stewards of our resources across the boards and take a look at current and local populations and make responsible decision each time we tree a lion, bob, bear or even coon if they are way down or real small its time to praise up the dogs walk away and tell that story proud!

Just because she was dry doesn't mean she didn't have young still depending on her or a couple undetactable in her belly. There may well have been nothing wrong with taking that female, but you had no idea of the current populations to make the responsible decision you are talking about, you aren't from there. Sure she's on the quota, but how would you feel about taking a female, the first one, then finding out that the female quota was tripled due to the 24 hour close window? Better to just leave the females be in HD's that they aren't very protected from slob hunters, someone will give em their lumps, no point in adding to it in those places.

[jrob160]

Should have been the second one in that district?

[Bow]

very good post. it happens in every state we have it right here in NH with are bears. and you know the first ones to complain that there are no bears.

[shawn cole]

sounds like a dumb move on your own home town heros why is it every time a guy cant get a lion its always the pilgrims start hunting bobcats or something else you cant control every idiot out there so quit trying it will only lead to pulling your hair out some guys just dont have enough brains to realize what they are doing to themselves

[Jlhoutfitters]

well my grandparents live there and have for 25 years in the east boulder drainage and have hunted cats in the past and the population is in good shape according to all the locals and neighbors we talked to. Now i couldnt have known if she was preg however we took precautions to not kill a cat with young if there was any doubt that she might have had kits or even near kick offs we wouldnt have however she was the only track that was in the area never cut another set of tracks while running her. I do however agree that I wont be taking any more females but it was a first cat for my girlfriend and a first for me and we did it all our self with our own dogs we "worked for it" not just some pilgrim from the east riding someones coat tails and wont bring everyone and there brother out just to say we got them a lion but do plan on returning to hunt ourselfs again in the future but dont worry we wont be killing anymore females lol . now the biologist stated she was the third cat and first female from that area so thats wear that statment came from.