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lion 4 of 5 allowed taken--young female from group of 3 (no hounds)
http://www.bismarcktribune.com/articles ... 141896.txt

Fourth mountain lion killed

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Nov 01, 2007 - 04:05:28 CDT
By RICHARD HINTON
Bismarck Tribune
A fourth mountain lion has been killed in the Badlands, leaving one cat to go before the season is closed.

The lion was shot Tuesday by a rancher north of Grassy Butte, or about halfway between Belfield and Watford City, in McKenzie County.

Details, including the name of the rancher, were few until North Dakota Game and Fish Department furbearer biologist Dorothy Fecske examines the carcass today.

Brent Schwan, the NDGFD district game warden who took the report, characterized the cat as a young adult that the rancher identified as a female. However, NDGFD examinations of other lions initially identified as females have turned out to be males.

"It's not a kitten. A rough guess from me is 55 to 70 pounds, and Iwould be surprised if it came back 6 or 7 years old," Schwan said Wednesday. "I'm not an expert at aging them. It's just from the cats I've seen, it's a young adult."

The rancher saw three mountain lions about the same size together as he drove along a road, Schwan said.

"He got out of his truck, and they were 50 to 70 yards away. He shot, and it ran off," Schwan continued. "He waited an hour or so and went and found it dead. He thought he had made a good shot, but he didn't want to push it."

Three lions traveling together could either be a family group or siblings traveling together, Fecske explained.

All four mountain lions killed this year have been taken in the Badlands habitat that NDGFD has identified as primary cat country. The Badlands zone with the quota is west of state Highway 8 and south of state Highway 1804.

The rest of the state has no quota, and that season closes March 9. No lions have been killed in that zone so far this year.

With one cat left in the quota, the challenge for NDGFD will be getting out the word if it's killed just before or early in the deer gun opening weekend. The season starts at noon CST Nov.9, and an estimated one of every nine North Dakotans will be hunting and likely far removed from information sources.

"It might be like last year (when the fifth cat was killed just ahead of the deer opener). We got word out on every line of communication we have, and it worked," said assistant wildlife chief Greg Link.

Circumstances surrounding the killing of the third lion are still being looked into, but an end appears to be near.

"I'm in the process of reviewing reports, and I anticipate initiating charges in the near future," Dunn County State's Attorney Ross Sundeen said Wednesday. That cat was killed Sept. 18 in northern Dunn County.

The second lion season closed Nov. 9 after the fifth cat was killed near New Salem. The inaugural season closed Jan. 15 when the fifth lion was killed near Grassy Butte.

(Reach outdoor writer Richard Hinton at 701-250-8256 or richard.hinton@;bismarcktribune.com.)

"It's not a kitten. A rough guess from me is 55 to 70 pounds, and I would be surprised if it came back 6 or 7 years old," Schwan said Wednesday. "I'm not an expert at aging them. It's just from the cats I've seen, it's a young adult."

This comment coming from the District game warden, him being an idiot is an under statement

not a kitten, 55 to 70 pounds, 6-7 years of age, young adult Do they even have a clue what was shot or what they are looking at 50# juveniles are not even close to a young adult and could never be mistaken for a 6-7 years old dang thing probably still had spots.

Apparently those fellas in that country need a little education. If this is the type of people that are hunting lions in S.Dakota they will be happy to know there population will not last long enough for them ever to achieve a hound season if they are gonna shoot the female kittens.

Oh I see, this is were you hang out

http://www.bismarcktribune.com/articles ... 364094.txt

Badlands mountain lion season over

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Nov 10, 2007 - 16:12:11 CST
By RICHARD HINTON
Bismarck Tribune
North Dakota's Badlands mountain lion season is over.

The fifth, and last, cat of the quota was shot west of Grassy Butte, ending the state's third season at 3:30 p.m. CST Saturday, Randy Kreil, chief of the wildlife division of the North Dakota Game and Fish Department said Saturday.

Initial indications are that the lion was an adult female that weighed approximately 90 pounds, and she was shot by a deer hunter, Kreil said. Other details are sketchy, including the name of the hunter. District game warden Brent Schwan took the report.

The shooting closes the season in what NDGFD considers prime mountain lion habitat that is west of state Highway 8 and south of state Highway 1804.

The mountain lion season in the rest of the state will stay open until March 9 because there is no quota. No cougars have been killed outside of the Badlands yet.

The cat was put in a freezer at the ranch until NDGFD can do a preliminary examination Tuesday.

"Being there was access to a freezer, there was no urgency," Kreil said.

http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/article ... 567308.txt

Mountain lion tally rises to nine
By Katie Brown, Journal staff Monday, November 12, 2007
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Two more mountain lions were killed Sunday according to the South Dakota Game, Fish & Parks Department, bringing the total count for the Black Hills mountain lion season to nine.
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John Kanta, GF&P regional wildlife manager, said one of the lions was a 1-1/2 to 2-year-old female that was in excellent health.

Kanta said she was shot near Exit 17 north of Interstate 90, which technically makes the kill a prairie harvest despite the fact that she was in close proximity to the Black Hills.

He said that, judging from her location, she was likely dispersing from the Black Hills toward Wyoming, which is common.

The other was a radio- collared male between 1-1/2 and 2 years old, also in excellent health.

That lion was harvested in the central Black Hills.

The mountain lion season began in the Black Hills Nov. 1 and ends when 15 female lions have been killed or 35 total lions have been killed, whichever comes first.

Kanta said he did not know whether the people who shot the lions Sunday were hunting deer at the time.

The prairie deer-hunting season began Saturday. The Black Hills deer season began Nov. 1.

Contact Katie Brown at 394-8318 or katie.brown@rapidcityjournal.com

I find this report disturbing--two of the five lions killed were in family groups. All five were females. This kind of stuff does not happen in front of hounds...

http://www.bismarcktribune.com/articles ... 142690.txt

All five cougars killed were females

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Nov 14, 2007 - 04:04:21 CST
By RICHARD HINTON
Bismarck Tribune
That all five mountain lions killed in the Badlands season were females isn't a surprise to the biologist who examined them..

"When you have a population of mountain lions that are lightly hunted, females are more abundant," North Dakota Game and Fish Department furbearer biologist Dorothy Fecske said Tuesday afternoon after she did a preliminary examination of the fifth cougar.

The subadult males take off in search of new territory, and the subadult females don't travel far from where they are born, Fecske said. An adult male's territory can accommodate anywhere from one to five females, Fecske added.

This latest - and last - female killed in the Badlands lion season was another sub-adult, Fecske's analysis showed.

The cat weighed 84 pounds, and its age was estimated between 1½ and 2½ years. The lion measured 76 inches from the tip of its nose to the tip of its tail. And the cat hadn't nursed in the past, Fecske said.

A Dickinson hunter, Wes Jensen, shot the cat Saturday, officially closing the cougar season in zone 1, which is considered key habitat for lions. The season remains open in the rest of the state until March 9. No cats have been killed outside of the Badlands so far this season.

Like the fourth cat, this cat was traveling with two other lions when it was killed. Whether the trio comprised three siblings or a mother and two siblings is unknown.

"This is an indication that we have quite a bit of breeding activity occurring in the Badlands region," said Fecske. And in that breeding population mix would be the mothers of these latest subadult cats, she added.

Word the season had closed apparently got out to hunters who still were after their deer on opening weekend because no other lions were reported to NDGFD as the fifth lion, Randy Kreil, chief of the wildlife division, said Tuesday.

The mountain lion fitted with a radio collar continues to meander in the Badlands.

"At last estimate, it's using an area of about 140 square miles. It appears to be establishing a territory in the Badlands," Fecske said.

(Reach outdoor writer Richard Hinton at 250-8256 or richard.hinton@;bismarcktribune.com.)

GF&P retrieves orphaned mountain lion kittens

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Nov 16 2007 4:06PM
Associated Press
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http://www.kxmb.com/News/181596.asp

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) State wildlife officials retrieved three mountain lion kittens after their mother was shot and killed in the hunting season in the Black Hills.

George Vandel in the Department of Game, Fish and Parks says the mother and kittens all wore signal-emitting radio collars as part of a research project, so it wasn't hard to find the 2 1/2-month-old kittens.

He says they're too young to survive on their own in the wild so they'll be kept until a zoo or other facility can take them.

The 3-year-old mother lion was shot yesterday in the southern Black Hills and is the 11th female killed in a hunting season that began Nov. 1.