Our Lodge gives you all the comforts of home. Mountain lion are extremely elusive animals seldom seen in the wild and require the aid of well trained hunting hounds to acquire this magnificent trophy. Sawtooth Wilderness Outfitters has the exclusive commercial hunting rights for an area of over 350 square miles for mountain lion hunting in central Idaho.Deadline Outfitters offers fully outfitted Mountain Lion Hunts:But now, with a system that allows any out-of-state hunter to buy a lion tag, lion hunters are pouring into northwest Montana. The situation is causing regional.Mountain lion hunts are almost exclusively done with the use of a pack of hounds. These hunts can be very physical, from getting up early to ride in trucks, ATVвЂ™s, snowmobiles, horses or mules while looking for a fresh track, to following the chase, and then finally hiking to where the mountain lion is treed can take a toll on you.While most people are wrapping up their hunting season, we are gearing up for some of our most exciting and favorite hunts of the year. Hunting mountain lions allows you to extend your hunting season and experience an exciting adrenaline-packed adventure.Mountain lions may only be hunted by North Dakota residents.

We run these big cats during the winter months when snow is plentiful allowing us to easily cut their tracks.We hunt out of 4 wheel drive vehicles,В off snowmobiles and out of a track machine allowing us to cover more ground. Once a tom track is located, the chase is on in hopes of treeing him with the aid of our experienced well-trained hounds, for whom we have the utmost respect and love.We work with our hounds year round keeping them in great shape and ready to go. On your hunt, you will soon learn these dogs live for the chase of hunting big cats. Mature toms are wary, extremely cagey, and can make for a very challenging hunt. The mountains and plains of western Wyoming are famous for producing trophy-class toms and are home to one of the greatest.

That's three times higher than the numbers reported by Washington or Idaho. Cougar advocates, on the other hand, say that Oregon is over-hunting cougars, which research suggests can lead to an increase in problem encounters.But before you can figure out if OregonвЂ™s cougars are being over-hunted or under-hunted, you need to know how many cougars there are in the state.The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife estimates there are about 6,600 cougars here, and possibly as many as 7,600. Groups of Oregonians, particularly hound hunters, say that Oregon's cougar population is growing out of control. Problem encounters with cougars have increased in Oregon's Willamette Valley.A fatal cougar attack has reignited debates over hound hunting and cougar management in Oregon. Hunting starts in December and runs through March providing weather and conditions are favorable.Our season opensВ Dec. 1stВ and extends through the end of March.With the abundance of deer in unit 54 mountain lions are in good supply.

Derek Broman says ODFW controlled for overestimation and stands by their data.It's not unusual for cougar surveys to arrive at different conclusions, said David Stoner, a cougar biologist at Utah State University. He said WashingtonвЂ™s cougar-density numbers are consistent with what other studies вЂ” except OregonвЂ™s вЂ” report.Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife's surveys found adult densities twice that, depending on the ecosystem.Related: Cougar Hunting Debates Find New Life After Oregon Hiker's Death'I've not seen such high densities anywhere in the world,' said Rob Wielgus, former director of the Large Carnivore Conservation Lab at Washington State University, commenting on a controversial density surveyВ conducted by Oregon.Beausoleil has spoken to ODFW about the stateвЂ™s population estimates before and has criticized the design of OregonвЂ™s studies, which he saysВ will naturally overestimate regional populations. Across those areas, the state has documented consistent findings: Roughly two cougars for every 100 square kilometers, said Rich Beausoleil, the bear and cougar specialist at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. A brochure specifies that the population includes all age classes, but never offers adult numbers.Even if you exclude kittens and juvenile cougars from population estimates, Oregon still reports some of the highest densities of adult cougars in the country.WashingtonвЂ™s research into cougar densities dates back nearly two decades and includes seven study areas. But there's no mention of that on the department's cougar webpage, and you have to look deep into the cougar management plan find adult cat estimates. вЂњThey donвЂ™t include babies for other ephemeral species, like ducks or deer.вЂќ And only adult animals can be hunted.Derek Broman, ODFW's state carnivore biologist, said whenever he gives a presentation he makes it clear that all ages are included in official population estimates.

Everyone agrees that at one point in the 1960s there were only 200 or so cougars in the state, and today there are several thousand. I could make their model show that there were only 3,000 total animals or 10,000 total animals.вЂќA tranquilized cougar is fit with a radio collar in California.Harry Morse, California Department of Fish and GameAll of this might seem like an internal debate about the best way to count cougars. They also tweak the numbers depending on food availability in the region.LaundrГ© said the growth estimate used in the study is an optimistic вЂњbest-case scenarioвЂќ one: вЂњA model is only as good as what you put into it. They estimate statewide density by mapping cougar deaths and then add expected birth rates.

'And we found that when you remove an older male, you have two or three teenage males come in to take their place. Male cougars have larger, non-overlapping territories that encompass multiple female ones.Only large, older males are capable of holding down these territories, вЂњand you donвЂ™t get to be a 10-year-old male by attacking humans or livestock or pets.вЂќBut Wielgus found that those 10-year-old males were far more likely to be killed by hunters. We found that heavy retaliatory killing or preventive killing actually causes increased problems,вЂќ he said.It works like this: Female cougars have smallish overlapping territories that seem to fluctuate with prey abundance. Some scientists found that when cougars are over-hunted, problem encounters with humans and livestock increase.Wielgus, who has left Washington for the Bend area, was one of the first to identify such a link.вЂњIn the 20 years of research I did with WDFW, we conducted the largest study of cougars ever done anywhere. Not only do these numbers tell management officials if populations are growing or shrinking, but they're also used to help set hunting quotas for each region.

For their part, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife stands by Wielgus' research and their own: Today, they manage cougars specifically to avoid the consequences of over-hunting.вЂњOur management philosophy is to manage for the social stability of the animal. One of the most recent was a massive, 30-year look at hunting and problem cougars in British Columbia. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife includes juvenile cougars in their total population estimates.A smattering of papers have attempted to debunk his cougar research, but even more, have supported it. He says he was silenced and forced out of his position at Washington State University because of his work.A 10-month-old cougar is startled by a trail camera in the California mountains.

Per the cougar management plan, the quota serves as a mortality cap, and not a target. But unlike Washington and Montana, where there are dozens of game management units used to set cougar quotas, OregonвЂ™s cats are divided into just six large regions, which makes it more difficult to track regional densities.The statewide quota for 2018 is 970 human-caused deaths вЂ” a whopping 27 percent of the stateвЂ™s estimated 3,500 adults. It's not a perfect system: Sometimes, it can take a while to close a unit, and more cougars are killed.At first glance, Oregon seems to be following WashingtonвЂ™s no-conflict guidelines: On average, OregonвЂ™s hunters take less than 14 percent of the stateвЂ™s big cats each year. When one of those units reaches that quota, it closes, and hunters can go to an adjacent unit. To avoid this, they split the state into 49 game management units, and each unit allows 12 percent to 16 percent of cougars to be taken.

If half of those were adults, then roughly one-third of adult cougars in the region were killed: Research suggests that's a number high enough to cause conflicts with humans.Overhunting cougars can have impacts on cougarsвЂ™ societies, too. ODFW estimates there were 989 cougars of all ages in Zone A in 2015. 6, its humans have killed 167 of the 180 allowed cougars.

Cougars have been found to share kills with related and non-related cats, though they rarely eat at the same time.And anecdotally, heвЂ™s seen theВ impacts of removing one large male from that society. He's found that the mountain lions within one male's territory function like a society: They interact non-aggressively and seem to frequently share food, a favor that's apparently returned in the future.вЂњYou can imagine that overhunting will have huge impacts on these social networks and organizations, on the glue that holds them together as functioning groups,вЂќ Elbroch said.A radiocollared cougar shares a kill with another cat, thought to be her cub.

Mountain Lion Hunting