bullwinkle
01-02-2012, 12:08 PM
Well I was wanting to get the hounds out some more so I called up my buddy Eric to see if he was interested in hunting some cougars and with little hesitation he was on his way from Edmonton.Friday morning we headed out on 2 day old snow cutting tracks,mid day we cut what I figured was a day old track,i thought I would turn out my lead dog on it to see how he'd fair out on it and if things went well I'd dump the rest of the hounds,well Pete ran that track for 9.5 km's on his own and we managed to pick him up in a good spot at dark.
Saturday morning we headed back out but with a dusting of snow overnite we decided to cut for fresh tracks.We had spent several hours cruising around when we came across an old rb cage that had been left on the side of a lease access road that seemed to have alot of activity around it,I jumped out and had a look around and there was a fresh track and bed right there!
I put the collars on the dogs and let them go one at a time and by the time I let the last hound go the first two were showing "treed" on the gps 780 meters away!
We gathered our gear and followed the trail to find a nice tom balanced on a small limb up in a lodgepole pine.We were taking pictures and Eric was getting set to shoot,when I asked him to hold off while I tied back the hounds,just then the cat got nervous and lost it's hold,fell out of the tree backwards and as it was coming down Eric released a shot.The cat hit the ground running with the hounds in tow.I instructed Eric to follow the trail as i had to go back 75 yds to gather up my backpack.I headed in towards the commotion and could Eric yelling something that sounded like the hounds were treed again,but when I got there realized that he was trying to tell me that the hounds were fighting it on the ground!The hounds had the mortally wounded cat cornered in a log jam in a small creek.As I got there I called the hounds off of it and Eric finished the cat off.
The hounds have some battle scars but nothing a ;little blue kote and penicillin won't fix.
This tom weighed in at 140 pounds.
I'll get more pictures on here later,experiencing technical difficulties!LOL!
Saturday morning we headed back out but with a dusting of snow overnite we decided to cut for fresh tracks.We had spent several hours cruising around when we came across an old rb cage that had been left on the side of a lease access road that seemed to have alot of activity around it,I jumped out and had a look around and there was a fresh track and bed right there!
I put the collars on the dogs and let them go one at a time and by the time I let the last hound go the first two were showing "treed" on the gps 780 meters away!
We gathered our gear and followed the trail to find a nice tom balanced on a small limb up in a lodgepole pine.We were taking pictures and Eric was getting set to shoot,when I asked him to hold off while I tied back the hounds,just then the cat got nervous and lost it's hold,fell out of the tree backwards and as it was coming down Eric released a shot.The cat hit the ground running with the hounds in tow.I instructed Eric to follow the trail as i had to go back 75 yds to gather up my backpack.I headed in towards the commotion and could Eric yelling something that sounded like the hounds were treed again,but when I got there realized that he was trying to tell me that the hounds were fighting it on the ground!The hounds had the mortally wounded cat cornered in a log jam in a small creek.As I got there I called the hounds off of it and Eric finished the cat off.
The hounds have some battle scars but nothing a ;little blue kote and penicillin won't fix.
This tom weighed in at 140 pounds.
I'll get more pictures on here later,experiencing technical difficulties!LOL!