MOUNTAIN LION LADY: Chapter 11 (first half)

Geraldine, Cleopatra and Gray Eyes

Geraldine

We arrived back in Canon City to four days of poor tracking conditions. Each morning we went out looking for tracks in the spotty conditions. Finding nothing or only very old tracks we turned to more mundane activities in the afternoon. I did laundry. Chuck got his brakes fixed. Finally we got a day with about two inches of snow and headed out full of optimism! In the afternoon we found some tracks made the night before. The hounds took off with enthusiasm but their baying stopped abruptly at the bottom of the hill and they milled around trying to find the continuing track. The sun had already started melting the snow on the south slope and the enticing odor of cat evaporated with the snow. After two more days of poor tracking with a couple of abortive starts Gray and I drove back to Fort Collins and Chuck to his home. Alas, maybe our luck had changed for the worse!

A week later we arrived back in Canon City but the conditions were still pretty poor: warm afternoons with spotty snow. Our pattern of hunting was one or two of us accompanied by a hound would walk a promising area while the third person drove the truck around to meet the walkers at the end of the ridge or draw. The first day back we had no luck whatsoever. The second day we found two sets of  pretty good medium-sized tracks and spent all day on them going through an area with evidence of a herd of elk and lots of deer. Unfortunately we ended up with nothing.

The third day, ah, that was different! We drove up what was called the Willow Creek-Locke Mountain road which was near the area we had found the tracks the day before. We found nothing on the way up but as we were driving back we found two sets of fresh tracks that had crossed the road after we had driven up it! Our quarry of yesterday, but this time fresh! The hounds raced right up the bare south side of the hill, down the snowy north side and up the next ridge. They treed a medium-sized lion in pretty short order. I darted her in the flank and she immediately bailed out. With the spotty conditions we had trouble following her with the hounds on leashes so against my better judgement Chuck turned Pup loose on her trail. He with his other two leashed hounds, Gray and I charged after them both. I heard Pup bark "treed" close by and reached Pup just as she was starting to chew on the comatose lion. 

We had thought we were following two young lions that were travelling together after they had become independent from their mother. Lions usually stay with their mother for a year and a half to two years learning how to hunt. Like mothers everywhere her patience only lasts so long and at some point she gets grumpy and drives them off. While following the tracks it looked as if one lion had playfully hopped up on a log then jumped down to the other side and in another place one set of tracks went around in a circle. 

It turned out the first lion we treed was an older female who was heavier than we had thought. The reason she had been able to travel as far as she had after she had been darted was because she had gotten a light dose of the drug. She was still putting up with the antics of her almost full-grown offspring.

Geraldine after we finished working on her

While Gray and I worked on her Chuck took the hounds to circle around on the north side of the hill to try to find the other lion which we assumed must be her older kitten. They had a pretty short chase and treed it in about 20 minutes just as we finished working on the cat I named Geraldine.

Chuck told me he thought the lion was a young tom from the rear view he had gotten. In mountain lions it's pretty hard to tell, particularly with their furry winter coat. 

I asked him for the charges that I had given him to hold when I was getting ready to dart Geraldine. Chuck smacked his head and said he had set them down while he was untying the hounds for the second chase but forgotten to pick them up. He and Gray traipsed back to where we had left Geraldine to look for them. I stayed and talked to the antsy lion and kept the hounds pacing around the base of the tree to keep it up there. It had turned cold so Chuck had built a small fire so I could keep warm. He returned about 45 minutes later with the charges but said he had not seen Gray. 

I went ahead and darted the lion which turned out to be a young 80-pound female. She bailed out after she was darted but soon succumbed to the drug. While I was talking to her in the tree her eyes looked like they were lined with kohl so I had decided to name the lion either Cleopatra or Tut. Cleopatra was the appropriate choice! Gray found us just as we finished processing her and we returned to the truck together. When we passed the place where we had left Geraldine we could see from the tracks that she had rolled a ways down the hill, then gotten up and run off.

We were satisfied with a good day's hunting and went back to camp for the stew that had been simmering in the crock pot. We discussed what our next move would be. The conditions continued to be poor so we decided to spend the next few days chatting with the ranchers and guide-and-outfitters in the area.

One cantankerous old rancher who wanted to kill any lion we got on his ranch told us he had put out coyote-getters, baited cyanide traps that kill coyotes, but also dogs, bears and the occasional mountain lion. This had Chuck worried so we checked with all the other ranchers in the area. No one else admitted to using the traps so we decided just to stay away from the old codger's ranch.

MOUNTAIN LION LADY: Chapter 10 (second half)

One of my heroes: Maurice Hornocker*

The first session was on the biology and life history of the mountain lion and was moderated by Maurice Hornocker. "I think we ought to recognize that we're dealing with one of the most adaptable mammals in the world. The mountain lion can live on animals the size of mice or elk." 

I'm sure you've heard the old saying "Behind every successful man is a strong woman". Almost every researcher echoed Hornockers sentiment that behind every successful lion researcher was an experienced houndsman. He started off by thanking the houndsman that had worked with him all nine years. The bulk of his introduction was a description of some of his discoveries in the time he had spent in the field. His lion population was an unhunted one but the terrain was much like our study area. 

One of the first things he noticed was that the lions depend on deer and elk only for their winter diet but their effect on their populations was negligible. Even the smaller lions tended to kill the big bulls and bucks. One radio-collared 94-lb female killed two big 6-point bull elk one winter and dragged them to hidden places where she could feed on them at her leisure. Bucks and bulls aren't as important as females in maintaining their populations since one male can cover lots of females. He found no wanton killing and wastage of the carcasses. He and his students documented cannibalism where a big male killed and ate two 50-lb kittens. The third one escaped and was killed by a hunter ten years later. They found evidence of coyote, beaver, raccoon and pack rat being eaten mostly during the summer.

Things became interesting when the discussion turned to geographical differences. In Arizona deer and elk were eaten more in the summer and cattle were also prey. There is little evidence that smaller animals are being taken maybe because they are more completely consumed. In Idaho during the summer lots of smaller animals make up the diet of most mountain lions, and even in areas where lots of cattle are grazed depredation of livestock by mountain lions isn't a problem.

The explanation by the Arizona researchers is that in their study areas cattle drop their calves year-round on a range that supports fewer cows/acre than northern states like Idaho so the cattle aren't as closely monitored. Of the cattle taken about 90% of them are under 200 pounds. "You've got a situation where extremely vulnerable animals are being dropped right in lion country day after day. These little calves are a lot easier to get than deer."

I was delighted to learn that our study record the year before of two animals caught in the about four months that we spent hunting was surpassed by the California study. They didn't capture a single lion in the first six months of hunting! The way our season was going it looked like we were going to capture more lions per day of hunting than any of the ongoing studies!

Another interesting point was the differences between a heavily hunted population and an unhunted one. "...it appears that when you have a population exploited pretty heavily it breaks down the complete social structure. Then you're going to get recovery pretty fast [if there is a nearby unhunted population]. Of course, if you kill all the resident females, then temporarily for short periods your production is certainly going to plunge. ... However, the thing you have to bear in mind is that you can't harvest all of the populations that heavily for a very long period of time, or they're all going to eventually drop. You're just not going to have those replacement animals in the form of transients." Something to keep in mind, though, is that if the resident males keep getting killed there will be more fighting for those territories.

Techniques and tranquilizer drugs were discussed then hunting regulations and harvest. In Arizona a livestock owner could kill bears and mountain lions at will by any means but was supposed to report his take. As far as the authorities were concerned every lion is a stock-killer so the rancher doesn't have to show his livestock were threatened. The Fish and Game Departments in most of the western states don't pay for depredations like Colorado does. 

Many presenters grumbled about lion depredations of livestock but the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service man said some ranchers wanted to blame every loss on lions or bears. "We've even found cases where lightening had killed sheep and were reported as lion kills."

Because of the moratorium on lion hunting in California they started radio-collaring and moving lions that posed a threat to livestock. What they discovered was that the transplanted lions usually don't come back but they also don't stay where they were put.

Attacks on humans were then discussed. In British Columbia juvenile females were believed to be the more aggressive problem animals and they seemed to have more interactions with humans. "We have lions in subdivisions, summer home areas, etc., and they seem to be losing their fear of humans." Portent of things to come in Colorado in later years (read The Beast in the Garden by David Baron if you are interested). Other states reported occasional attacks. A later mountain lion workshops in 1991 would deal exclusively with lion-human interactions.

Mountain lion population modeling was discussed. A computer took up a whole room at the time so to many of the participants this was something new. It was stressed that the model is a tool and not the ultimate solution. "It performs no mysterious wonders, it only performs arithmetic chores."

The final topic was about the future needs of research on mountain lions. "They are many and complex. ... One need that must be identified and remembered during our deliberations is what I believe is our mutual goal, that is, the maintenance of a viable, self-sustaining lion population over the entire range for public benefits and uses that are compatible with the environment." A recommendation was made that a second workshop be held in 1978. This was the beginning of many mountain lion workshops. The twelfth one was held in 2017.


* My other hero is Knut Schmidt-Nielsen!

MOUNTAIN LION LADY: Chapter 10 (first half)

Mountain Lion Workshop

Ken, fellow grad student Steve, Gray and I piled into the Co-op Unit station wagon early on the morning of January 12. It was a good thing it was early. Monday morning traffic was starting to fill up I-25. All of a sudden the car lurched and started limping so we pulled over to the side of the road. The left rear tire had blown out! Before my father let me get my driver's license he insisted that I change a tire. I learned it wasn't difficult with the right tools but it was messy. I don't like messy! Fortunately between the three men in the car the tire was changed quickly and we were on our way again. We got to Stapleton Airport in plenty of time for our flight to Reno, Nevada.

The first evening we got settled into our hotel. I was delighted to discover that two rolls of nickels were included along with the room! I had never gambled before and looked forward to spending my nickels wisely. 

The next morning while Gray was using his roll of nickels the 46 attendees, three of whom were women, were introduced. All eleven western states (Texas isn't exactly western in location but is in attitude) except Wyoming were represented. Utah Fish and Game declined to come but someone in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service from Utah was there. Representatives from British Columbia and Saskatchewan (!?!) were also present. Most of the private, state and federal attendees had their way paid by their organizations but the three attending employees of the Idaho Fish and Game were there on their own dollar. I was thrilled to see the most famous mountain lion researcher, Maurice Hornocker, was in attendance.

We started off with a review from each state about what was happening with mountain lions. Arizona had been conducting a capture-recapture study like ours for five years. "Major prey species in the [150 square mile study] area are mule deer and cattle." Yikes! In California 12,461 lions had been bountied between 1907 and 1963. It became a big game animal in 1969 so a license was required to hunt it and in 1971 a four-year moratorium on lion hunting was established (then-governor Ronald Reagan signed the bill). Since then it has been a political hot potato but lion hunting pretty much hasn't been allowed since. California was conducting a radio-collar study of mountain lions. Colorado Fish and Game had declared the lion a big game species in 1965. Ken talked about our study in Colorado. 

Lion density in Colorado: striped area highest

The Idaho Fish and Game folks stated "Idaho does not place much emphasis on mountain lion research." I guess since Hornocker and his students had done the seminal work on mountain lions there they figured that was enough. The Montana situation was interesting. "In 1971 the status of the lion in Montana was changed from predator to a big game animal. I don't know how the legislature goofed, but they overlooked establishing a licensing system when they made the change. So we had to persevere for two years with no fee permitted to take mountain lions." Almost 2000 residents applied for the free lion-hunting permit. The number of lions killed was going up each year so the game folks were getting a bit concerned that the lion population would start declining. They were trying to find some funding for some research but money was tight.

In Nevada the mountain lion was declared a big game animal in 1965. Hunting was allowed year round but not after dark and only with a shotgun, rifle or bow and arrow. At the time of the conference it had been changed to any time of day and a hunter could also kill a lion with a pistol. They had no limits on how many could be killed. That looked like bounty hunting without the payment to me. "In fact, from 1965 to 1968 I think we were just kind of baffled since the lion became a big game animal and we knew nothing about it and didn't have much control on harvest." In 1968 they started requiring tags on the lions killed and in 1970 a limit was set at one lion per person. They started trying to learn something about the animal in 1970 and had two studies going at the time of the conference.

The New Mexico Fish and Game man stated the problem most of the agencies were facing: "The New Mexico State Legislature in 1971 assigned the Game Commission responsibility for management of the mountain lion and made it a game animal. When they did this, they gave us an animal about which we knew nothing, and at the time not very many other people knew much about the lion either [Hornocker had published the first article about his research in 1969]. We were subjected to pressures from certain groups to close the season and from ranchers and sportsmen to open the season." What to do? They hired a biologist and a houndsman to look for tracks and lions for two years and came up with some estimates of the population. Now they faced another problem. No reports of lion attacks had been filed since 1915 until 1974. In the past two years there were four reports of lions attacking humans. "I suspect that unless these start to die down we're going to have trouble." Yep! A brief discussion was held about lawsuits. In Colorado the state pays for livestock depredations. Many states don't.

Oregon had just started a lion study. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department explained most of their lions live along the Rio Grande. They were not considered to be either a game nor a protected species and could be killed by anyone at any time by any means. The state wasn't considering conducting any research. 

Then there was Utah. When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service man from Utah was asked about the role taken by Utah Fish and Game on lions he answered, "I sure don't know, ... A lot of permits are being sold." The Washington Game Department man prefaced his remarks: "I've been involved in a basic look at the cougar population for the last two years. I've worked alone generally, with a few local hound men in tagging and capturing animals, but we haven't gone a long way down the road. We tagged a few cougars, all of which are dead at this time." They asked the local houndsmen to not kill tagged animals, but you know how that goes! Although mandatory reporting was in place only about 45% of the dead mountain lions were reported.  How did they figure that one out? Sport hunters don't kill them to eat the meat but for trophies so they take the carcasses to taxidermists who are licensed and legally have to keep records. It's easier to find a taxidermist than an unreported mountain lion carcass by itself.

British Columbia weighed in too. They had been doing some radio-collaring but hadn't gotten very far into the study. The next two Canadian entries were interesting. "Alberta was not represented. (Mail strike likely prevented notification on time). Saskatchewan: T---- R----, Provincial Fish and Game. (T-- is in graduate school, University of Nevada Reno). I don't think we have any mountain lion in Saskatchewan."

We were off and running! I was looking forward to learning all sorts of new things about mountain lions!

MOUNTAIN LION LADY: Chapter 9 (second half)

Dixie the hound barking treed

Chuck set Pup and Dixie, a young Plott hound, loose on the track, forcefully pointing them in the right direction. Bobcat was so annoyed with his hounds he decided to let them run until the track got cold which it always does if you're going the wrong way! He took off with Chuck after his hounds. Jake was left behind. He was the old hound who was missing and eye and had a crook in his tail where a bear bit him. Chuck figured he had worked hard enough staying out all night. Jake was really bummed at the situation and started howling! Gray and I decided to keep him company for a bit and eat our lunch before following the others. 

As it turned out that was a lucky decision and Jake got to be the hero of the day! Gray had only taken a few bites of his sandwich when he looked up and said, "Here comes a hound back!"

"It's the lion!" She must have treed again and the tired hounds had overrun her just like Bobcat's had done. She was sneaking back the way she had come. As quickly as we could we turned ol' Jake loose and he took off like he was a fresh young pup. He had seen her too! Within five minutes he had her treed and knew it! Even though he was hoarse he joyfully bayed for all the other hounds to hear and they came running from far and near.

Gray and Dixie the lion

We rounded up all the hounds and leashed them before I darted her. They were quite content just to lie down and watch. It had been a full day (and night!) for all of them. She was a mature female and we gave her the red numbered tag 8. I named Dixie because Dixie hound had helped capture her. Too bad she wasn't male and I could have named her Jake! Looking back I should have named her Judy for the helter-skelter Punch-and-Judy drama she caused!

When we got back to camp there was a message from Ken. He had gotten a call in Fort Collins from the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs. A mountain lion had wandered through the zoo and killed a snowy owl during the night and they wanted us to come catch the lion. I didn't think the hounds could take another chase so soon so I called them and said we'd be there first thing in the morning.

The snow was spotty but we could see what happened. The mountain lion,  probably a young one looking for a place to call its own, had meandered through the outdoor exhibits. Instead of sleeping tucked up against the wall the snowy owl must have fallen asleep right next to the bars. Maybe it got hot during the night (hmm - do owls get hot flashes?). The cat had reached a paw through and killed it but couldn't figure a way to get the small carcass through the bars so finally left it and wandered around some more before leaving the area. The snow was spotty so the track scent had dissipated with the melting. The hounds couldn't find enough to trail it out of the zoo. We asked the zoo director to let us know if they had any more trouble. We didn't hear from him again that season.

It was time for a break and for the first ever mountain lion workshop. Gray and I drove home to Fort Collins after our fruitless search at Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, ate dinner at Furr's Cafeteria, packed and went to bed early. The next day was going to be a full one!

Our morning started out with a bang. Literally!

MOUNTAIN LION LADY: Chapter 9 (first half)

Best of Times

Fat Albert awake!

We were stoked! This season was going really well. We'd been in the field five days and treed a lion on three of them! That's almost as good a record as a mountain lion has on the days it hunts. 

We left camp about a half hour before dawn and met one of the outfitters we'd worked with before who was nicknamed Bobcat and his friend. Bobcat and his friend took one truck and Chuck, Gray and I took another. We split up near Long Gulch. Bobcat found a large track that wasn't very fresh and so drove up the power line road to see if they could find a fresher one, possibly where he had crossed the road further up. No such luck so they returned to the original one and turned Bobcat's hounds loose on it then radioed us. We later discovered they had missed a fresher track in a bunch of deer tracks. It would have saved us a lot of effort if they had found it. As it was they muddled around trying to get the track sorted out.

Nipple Mountain

When Gray, Chuck and I arrived we could hear the hounds trailing and decided to drive further up the road. We found what we thought was the same track as it continued north. We turned Chuck's  three hounds loose and followed them on foot. We traveled north most of the day until we were almost across from Nipple Mountain when the track turned west. Sometime during the chase Bobcat's hounds had joined Chuck's. 

Bobcat and his friend found us and we continued following the hounds until dark. It sounded like the hounds had treed the lion in some very rough country nearby but I probably wouldn't be able to see the lion well enough the dart him. We decided to leave them all doing their thing and come back in the morning. Bobcat's friend wasn't used to such exertion and was feeling nauseous so Gray and I stayed with him next to the road while Chuck and Bobcat hiked down to a nearby ranch. The rancher drove them back to their trucks then they came and got us.

The next morning we drove as close as we could to where we had heard the hounds barking "treed" and set out. We couldn't hear them yet so we climbed a high ridge hoping the sound would travel to us. It was steep and rocky but when we got to the top a faint sound could almost be imagined. We clamored over the next ridge and could definitely hear the occasional bark. It was not the constant baying of excited hounds looking the lion in the eye but it was enough for us to locate them.

Asleep

What a sight we saw! Most of the six hounds were exhausted but happy to see us. They immediately perked up and started baying albeit hoarsely again. The lion looked so peaceful sleeping in the tree. He looked big so I named him Fat Albert. We tied up the hounds then I took careful aim and darted him in the flank. What a wake up call! He snarled, checked out the scene and bailed out of the tree. We were afraid of a repeat with the faulty dart with Mickey Mouse so Chuck put Pup on a leash and started following him immediately. We didn't need to worry. Fat Albert succumbed to the drug a short distance down the hill.

Leaving the tree

Fat Albert waking up

Bobcat took his hounds back to the truck while Gray, Chuck and I processed Fat Albert. All went smoothly. When he started to rouse we left him. On the trail back we met an excited Bobcat sans hounds. In the two hours we had been working with Fat Albert another mountain lion had passed behind the truck! Bobcat had turned his revived hounds loose on the track and come to get us. 

A depressing sight met us when we arrived back at the truck. Bobcat had started his hounds off in the right direction but at some point the lion must have treed unbeknownst to the hounds. They were so excited because the track was so fresh that when they didn't find any more tracks going in the direction they were headed they turned around and followed the back track which smelled just as good. Bobcat threw his hat on the ground in disgust.

What happened next was like slapstick comedy!