BigGameHoundsmen.com

Just some news from the other day. Arizona Game and Fish is investigating a possible jaguar sighting just south of Tucson. A woman and her husband spotted the large cat in their backyard in Green Valley. Officials are now trying to track the animal.

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hell they oughta just leave the thing alone
i mean, look what happened to macho B...

i agree with arizonabeagle, macho b was pretty much killed by game and fish just cause they wanted some information.

The way I see it is mocho b was on his last leg and about already to die anyhow. Southern Arizona is about as far north of there habitat and about as the last place they would want to be living unless they were ready to retire. The rain forest is were they trive and live as they do. Az or other parts of the U.S. aint jaguar habitat....Terry

.25-06 wrote:The way I see it is mocho b was on his last leg and about already to die anyhow. Southern Arizona is about as far north of there habitat and about as the last place they would want to be living unless they were ready to retire. The rain forest is were they trive and live as they do. Az or other parts of the U.S. aint jaguar habitat....Terry

like pat said, macho b was practically killed by G&F just cause they wanted info..probably to make themselves look good

and sure, jaguars to thrive in wetlands and rainforests far south of arizona, that is, in theory, where you will find prime examples of the species. but just because they THRIVE down there, does not mean they cannot SURVIVE in other parts of the continent.
southern arizona and new mexico was traditionally jaguar habit, although i'm sure these areas didnt provide trophy jaguars, just as they dont provide trophy mountain lions, that does not mean it was not jaguar country.

you know pennsylvania isnt wolf country anymore, dosent mean there wasnt thousands of wolves there when william penn become proprietor of the colony.
just my 2 cents
i still say let the poor bastard be

I am no expert, but AZLONGEARS sent me to a canyon down near the boarder, and we found a track on a dirt tank that was a cat. I don't know the difference between a lion or Jaguar, but it was huge and was different that most the lion tracks I have seen. I want to believe it to be a spotted giant, but even if it wasn't, I know it could have been.

Although the death of Macho B was unfortunate, I can’t see how Arizona game and fish is responsible for his death. According to the Arizona game and fish department, Macho B was captured inadvertently on February 18, 2009. Whether or not those are the facts, time will tell. Macho B was tranquilized and fitted with a GPS tracking collar and freed. Now the same procedures and protocol are performed by game and fish departments all the time on lion study projects, so I can’t see how they could have predicted the outcome of Macho B’s kidney failure. One of the doctors that did the necropsy at the Phoenix Zoo, Dr. Rice, stated that, “Macho B likely had kidney deterioration prior to his capture.” From the knowledge that they gained from his death, Macho B is thought to have been the oldest wild Jaguar, aged at 15-16 years old. Other data taken from wild Jaguars conclude that 11 years is typically the terminal age for wild Jaguars. 1996 was a big year for a couple of houndsman, Warner Glenn and Jack Childs. Warner Glenn captured an adult male Jaguar with his trail hounds on March 7, 1996 in south western New Mexico and then on August 31, 1996 Jack Childs and two other houndsman treed another adult male Jaguar in south central Arizona. The implications of these two incidences are going to be long lasting, as the south west has always been thought to be marginal Jaguar habitat at best. I would think that any information that could be gathered on this big spotted cat, whether it comes from a GPS collared animal or some random capture of one by a houndsman, could only help us better understand the Jaguar and their habits. In my opinion, the Jaguar is here whether or not these excursions across the border from Old Mexico to the South West United States are random or not. It is unclear and sure can’t be determined by not studying them. Although the Death of Macho B was tragic, I think the risk was worth the knowledge that could have been gained.

Sourdough

I feel the jaguar and jagurundi have similar import for houndsmen in the southwestern portions of the US. They both occasionally inhabit portions of our country, not in great numbers and this is a natural limit to their range so it really can't be improved or expanded to increase their numbers. The jaguar is a big pretty spotted cat and it gets the attention but even in the past there is no evidence they inhabited our area in any larger numbers then they do now. and as it's illegal to pursue them it would only limit our better lion ares here if they did come in any greater numbers. Because they would surely occupy those areas and drive the lion numbers down. I don't really approve of the older generation guys who hunted and killed everything they could suddenly reaching that just before the rocking chair age decide that the best thing to do is shut down a certain area or species to future generations. And basically make a jaguar preserve out of millions of acres so the few occasional and transient jaguars wouldn't accidentally be trailed or bayed. Now if these guys had spent the better part of their lives working on this project and had some solid numbers showing a historic population of sufficient numbers and a growth during their project period that made it seem like it would be worthwhile and a workable program. Then I would sit down and listen to his ideas and thoughts on the subject. but when someone does a politicians flip flop slight of hand about something they've been doing for ears it does make me wonder about their motives.,

Environmental Law suits are being filed every day to tie up public ground so as to set aside some sort of recovery area for the borderland’s jaguar. Their reasoning is based only on written accounts of the jaguar from historic occurrences, not from actual hard data. The jaguar is just a tool for setting aside land. Without hard data, it will only be a matter of time before litigation weary courts set aside these areas the environmental groups claim as historic jaguar habitat. Then there is nothing left to do but be pissed off about it. No one can dispute that the jaguar has not traveled across the border into the southwest. The debate is over whether or not the southwest was and still is historic jaguar habitat or just a fringe area that the cat visits in his or her travels. I would think that everyone that has an interest in their public and private land in the southwest would welcome any hard evidence one way or the other. So any decision that is made is not based only on emotion, but true fact. We have the technology to gather sound data, it just has to be applied. Whether anyone thinks that the jaguar should be left alone, or that their presence is a random occurrence in the southwest really does not matter. The facts still remain - there is photographic evidence that they do exist in the southwest U.S. The management strategy of the jaguar on the part of the states involved and the federal government will never go away without hard evidence. Bottom line is this…it’s not going to go away, so you either need to get on board and demand hard evidence or sit back and get run over.

sourdough