This male was 142#. Called up from a deep canyon, not too far from the Rio Grand, with FoxPro. Shot at about 175 yds with 55 gr Sierra game king handloads in a 223/12 Valmet combo at about 5PM. He ran about 25 yds and collapsed. For a varmit hunter this was definitely a "once in a lifetime" hunt.
Jeromy of Wild Side Outfitters did a great job of making this hunt possible.

Nice kitty kat! Congratulations!!

Nice cat! Good shooting!

great job! good looking cat! very cool firearm as well.

Congrats


How in the hell can you only have 5 post when you registered on 09/20/08

JK

Hi P&Y,
Have been killing hogs from Jan to Sep & taking one or two guided varmint trips per year.
All, very enjoyable, but not necessarily very notable. Thus, I much enjoy following other posters. I guess I qualify as a "lurker", as I sign on 4 or 5 days a week.
The mountain lion is my most exciting hunt ever, thus the effort to share.

awesome!

Very nice!

Congrats! Sounds like a great hunt!

Not taking away from the hunter but I wish they were off limits..... cool critters and not enough of them around anymore

Track Quack,
Suggest you google ScientificAmerican.com for cougar information regarding current populations and expansion of cougar territory.
A mature cat will make approximately one large kill per week, depending on weather, spoilage, etc.
This means 50 deer, 50 mature goats, or more, immature goats.
Ranching Agribusiness exists on a very thin margin, that depends on all sources of income to stay alive.
Deer, aoudad, javalina, quail, as well as domestic livestock are important parts of this business. This particular ranch suffers heavy predation from cougars on domestic and wildlife. The cougar is considered a game
animal in states with huntable populations. But, in TX are just a varmint, due to large populations and their damage to the wildlife.
Your post will be interpreted by the "antis" as a hunter has killed a scarce animal. The posting of the slightest inaccurate info, or negative opinion harms all hunters whether they hunt ducks or deer or other game.
It is great to post opinion, but basing opinion on inaccurate facts, in todays world harms all hunters. The animal was taken "fair chase", I am proud of the hunt, as it was a "once in a lifetime" hunt for an "old Fart"
like me.

Well said. On our deer lease, if you see a yote or lion, you best be shooting, otherwise, if the LO finds out about it, you will suffer his wrath, including getting kicked off. .

some folks have a life

Bucket list.

Excellent!

Were you targeting a lion? What fox pro was sound?

Lion was target, Lion in heat was sound.

Of course, those kills are spread over 20-60 square miles for females and often over 100 square miles for males.

We have a LOT of deer.

Mountain lions also eat a lot of rodents, rabbits, beaver, porcupine, feral cats, feral dogs etc.

They are game and readily considered a problem animal by ranchers. You won't get any argument from me on that, but I think we often blow out of proportion how detrimental we think they are to the deer. Deer and mountain lions lived without human intervention for many thousands of years and both survived just fine, LOL. Mountain lions are not doing much to limit our deer population, not compared to poachers and roadkills.

Very cool kill Wallyfish.
I do not know if you followed FJGs thread, but did you keep any meat?

Congrats Wallyfish on the mountain lion. Keep posting

I’m suprised none of our caliber experts on here have chimed in with all of their brilliant knowledge.

Congrats!

Plenty of them around. Every county in Texas has had reports of Lion sightings. I know 5 different folks that have seen or killed them in our area.

WELL SAID AND CONGRAD`S TO YOU OLD FART SIR

NICE!


I'll be hunting with Jeremy this winter! Had a ball with him last year!

Wallyfish,

I couldn't disagree with you more, just because a few areas have populations of lions doesn't mean the species is thriving. Because we don't agree doesn't mean I am a threat or I will cause harm to hunting ........ it just means we don't agree. I didn't suggest you have no idea what you are talking about, or give you statistics which are generally based on an individual point of view.

I am glad that you are proud of the hunt you have every right to be, just like i have a right not to like it. Doesn't make me better than you or vice versa. Hope you have a good one.

I am 65 years old and the lion population is higher today than at any time in my life. I hunt lions with hounds in NM, AZ and West Texas. I feel the reason for the increase in population is due primarily to the fact that there are less folks depending on livestock to make a living and therefore less effort for predator control.
As many of you know, I hunt quite a bit in the Navajo Reservation. Last week, I was visiting with one of the locals that is also a guide for mule deer. He said that the first lion track that he ever saw in the Rez was in 1998 and today, they have played a primary role in reducing the mule deer population by over 50%.
Adios,
Gary

Congrats!

Im glad you got him, one less I have a chance of meeting down a dark sendero.

Congrats!

There are more lions in Texas than ever. One particular ranch I've hunted for 25 yrs and never seen a lion, only the occasional tracks. Within the last 2 years 3 have been spotted near my favorite deer blind. I think one of the main reasons there are more lions now is because many of us work hard to better our deer herds. We produce more water sources, corn & protein feeders everywhere etc...we are bettering one of their main food sources. Not just deer, but pigs as well. It only makes sense. I grew up hunting in S Texas and we never used corn feeders, never saw one. Much less protein feeders. The old timers always said yes there are mountain lions out there but you'll never see them. Now we're seeing them.

I think the same.

Had one overlook my daughter & I once from the canopy of a huge Oak tree. Made the hair stand up on my neck. Could not leave fast enough. First thing I did was interrupt his fresh kill.......second, We parked the ATV’s under the tree he was in.

Wishing they were off limits is an emotional response not based on anything other than they are cute.

The species is thriving and if there is a ban on hunting them they start to lose their fear of man which is one of the reasons there has been a spike in lion attacks in recent years. Most of us who have posted on this thread believe you and Reloder 28 don’t know what you are talking about. You could have let Wallyfish enjoy the moment instead of posting something that was negative.

Good thing he had a fresh kill or you might of been his lunch

Excellent kill Sir. As far as people who are against killing cats, it depends on the location. Plenty of ranches in south and west have excessive numbers of them. Over here in Etx we wouldnt shoot one for anything, they are too few and far between

Well done, nice cat

Well done sir on a fine cat, 142 is large for a Texas Tom. Like the choice of firearm also for calling critters, ready for a close shot or extended distance.

Congrats on a fine cat.

To the nay sayers on killing cats. I agree with the others that say it is a more emotional thing than a sound game management practice. Some states like California have protected their Mt Lion population for long enough there has been no sport hunting for them and any cat there alive's lifetime. They have state parks off limits due to the Mt Lion population and history of problem cats in them. With the urban sprawl and the cats healthy population there, the last figure I saw is the state kills over 100 problem Mt Lions a year.

Regarding big cats being scarce, this is the third one i have heard of being killed in Texas in as many weeks.

Compared to more than 800,000 White-tailed deer killed by hunters in Texas last year.

https://tpwd.texas.gov/publications/pwdpubs/media/pwd_rp_w7000_0718b.pdf

As long as the population is okay, no reason not to keep the numbers in control. I agree on the benefits of hunting. Black bears are the same thing, if not hunted they lose all fear of man and end up in settled areas.

That's incredible. Can't imagine the rush of calling one of those in. Congrats!

Amen to you Sir. I'm in the old fart club too. We don't kneed help beating ourselves up. Nice cat sir.

Do you live in a city? If not, are you a livestock raiser? Not hammering you and I understand where you are coming from. However, to take predators off the hit list who are not endangered isn't a good idea.

Good job, Wallyfish. Thanks for posting.

Nice. I have heard of people eating them. Not sure if I would want to eat one or not.

Congrats

That’s a great hunt for sure. Big kitty is on my bucket list. Congratulations on a very nice cat sir. Thanks for sharing the photos and info.

As many have pointed out the lion population is on the increase, we get one here every few years. As I was saying to a friend this weekend, "you can't go a quarter mile here in Texas without seeing a blind and a feeder. With the increased food source comes increased populations of those that use it and those that feed on those that use it. Whitetails are at an all time high in this area and the big cats utilize that resource well. i see the lion population doing nothing but increasing. I might add that these as you call them "cool critters" can devastate a mans livelihood in short order. There's a reason they are shot on sight and it's not because they're cute and cool, it's because they are deadly and can take down animals much larger than most men.

Very Nice!

By almost a million tag holders... so lions kill more deer per lion then deer per hunter.

Several south and western counties with high lion populations

That’s great , I’d love to get one someday . Glad you enjoyed it

Simply stating that lion populations are on the rise gives you justification to shoot them for a selfie or to put a mount in their game room... I am not sure of what your argument is here? It is ok to continue to shoot them on the spot with unregulated means because doing so isn't curbing the population already? If you want to shoot a lion since it is a rare thing, a challenge, and you feel accomplished just say so. Don't kid yourself and say you did it for "conservation" or to save the poor farmer trying to scrape out a living.

Who's livelihood are they devastating? Don't just say a rancher unless you have an example of a problem mountain lion in Texas.

Frustrating to me that a bunch of hunters simply don't care about a balanced ecosystem and keeping the wild wild. Using myth and irrational fear that a lion can kill big animals therefore we need to shoot them on the spot is sad. You are significantly more likely to be killed by a deer in a vehicle collision annually in Texas than ever attacked by a lion in your lifetime.

To the claim that there are more corn feeders, therefore more deer, therefore more lions. I don't disagree with the logic but the problem for lions hasn't been a lack of food it is getting hit crossing roads and being shot/trapped.

To someone else's question, yes I live in a city, just like 88% of Texans...... I can't wait to see where your lack of common sense takes this argument.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO5PnHnErGs&t=455s

https://www.wideopenspaces.com/list-of-fatal-mountain-lion-attacks-in-north-america/

Well done Wally.

If the population's healthy, it's legal and you want to, you should shoot whatever you like. If you're going to attack people for hunting legally, you should just become an anti-hunter. Fighting amongst ourselves is a waste. It's just like that guy trying to make alligator gar a game fish. He says he's concerned about their conservation (despite all scientific data suggesting their population is robust and healthy) but in reality he's either trying to force his opinion on the rest of the state or (more likely) trying to create a monopoly for himself. If he were truly concerned, he'd be suggesting TPWD do a study on the alligator gar mortality rate of line-caught fish.

OP, congrats on the lion.

I would like to see the studies showing lions are on the increase in order to know what the data really are. I am not even sure what that means in the grand scheme. That is academic, however. Hunting mountain lions is legal. Period.

If you don't want to hunt legal game, TQ, that is on you. I don't hunt deer or fowl.

Congratulations! Nice rifle too by the way. I hope to get a cougar one day.




I 100% agree with you. I balked when i saw the naysayers posting in this thread. This is the Texas Hunting Forum, not the Texas PETA Forum, and as far as I can tell conservation is the #1 goal of almost everyone on this forum.

Mountain lions need to be hunted. Apex predators, probably need to be carefully controlled, moreso than everything else.

Anybody that is gonna openly shame a man publicly for legally and ethically taking game ought to be banned from the forum. I swear! Texas HUNTING Forum! And content thereof removed. Shameful than anybody would post something to detract from this man's once in a lifetime trophy, harvested legally and ethically!

Trolls gonna troll...

Congratulations on a once in a lifetime kill.

Congratulations.