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The hard truth is cats like those don't have a bright future no matter what and at least the Warden was involved. They have a tough job to do and there are always so many politics in every decision they make. Then there is that little detail if they acquire bad PR with the community then the locals start implementing the "3-S rule"... Shoot, Shovel, Shut up... then before you know it all kinds of habits start forming. Although it is unfortunate that our A-1 citizens as described by Larry are the ones always associated with these kind of deeds (kind of a henchmen deed... who wants to be tainted like that anyway). But hopefully all our efforts to be good houndsmen outweigh stories like this and when we are faced with these dilemmas we can do our best to influence the situation.

B-N-Trees wrote:The hard truth is cats like those don't have a bright future no matter what and at least the Warden was involved. They have a tough job to do and there are always so many politics in every decision they make. Then there is that little detail if they acquire bad PR with the community then the locals start implementing the "3-S rule"... Shoot, Shovel, Shut up... then before you know it all kinds of habits start forming. Although it is unfortunate that our A-1 citizens as described by Larry are the ones always associated with these kind of deeds (kind of a henchmen deed... who wants to be tainted like that anyway). But hopefully all our efforts to be good houndsmen outweigh stories like this and when we are faced with these dilemmas we can do our best to influence the situation.

good post. it is pretty frustrating, especially in that neck of the woods, kill em all attitude. one can rest assured that something wasn't on the up and up, and no one involved was thinking of any way to come to a different resolution, quite the opposite I'm sure.

It sounded to me like an unfortunate situation all the way around. I don't know why you think it was not on the up and up. It must be hard to know so much and yet have so little to say, maybe you should let someone know why it was so bad or keep it to yourself .

lnkl93 wrote:It sounded to me like an unfortunate situation all the way around. I don't know why you think it was not on the up and up. It must be hard to know so much and yet have so little to say, maybe you should let someone know why it was so bad or keep it to yourself .

coincidence that you just joined and all your posts are on this topic? Maybe you know more about it than anyone?

Its too bad the female had to die. Its the middle of winter, times are tough, her kittens were definatly doomed as well. I think that if left to fend for themselves, they are the ones that end up in someones yard looking for an easy meal and giving everyone the idea that the lions are overpopulated.

I know of a female that had two kittens with her one spring. That fall the kittens were probably getting ready to go off on their own, she wound up dead for reasons that we will never know........... or I am not in posistion say what I think happened. A couple weeks after she died supposidly a 200# female mountain lion was shot by a guy after he noticed the lion perched in a tree outside in his yard. Thank god his poodle started barking and alerted him before to the lions presence before he sent his children outside to get on the school bus that morning because his children would have surely been eaten.

I seen some pictures of the lion later, I don't believe it weighed over sixty pounds, most likely a kitten from the spring before. The cat was killed around a mile from where the adult female was found dead.

Back to the subject at hand, it has been made aware to me that if a rancher is witnessing a lion attacking livestock he has all the rights in the world to shoot the lion without repercusion here in this neck of the woods anyway.

The problem I have with this situation is the presedence that was set when the quick decision to kill was made. So now a guy can go find a group of lions living near some livestock, and have the landowner call and say they were "chasing" his livestock. Then over the phone get permission to kill the lions and send a random houndsmen up to do the job.

I am not saying this is what happened, as I don't know. But, it seems kinda fishy to me. It sort of seems with any other predation, the predator actually has to kill or attack before the kill permit is issued. I mean a landowner doesn't call the FWP and say there is herd of elk walking the fenceline of his alfalfa field and this is the second time in a week they have done it, and the local warden says go ahead and shoot them.

I don't know very many areas that are overrun with cats, which by definition varies with who you are speaking with. If the lions are so detramental to the deer in this area, then I would expect to see a good increase in deer numbers in the next couple years. So now I know where i am going deer hunting for the next few seasons.

Bottom line is, I hate to see lions killed that should have been protected by the quota system that is in place. I can only hope the lions were really chasing horses and really intended to kill one. We will never know this since it seems like a rush to judgement was made and they were killed before they could prove themselves legitimate hunters.

thats a very good point. the more i stew on this the more it stinks to me. does a game warden have the authority to give the permission to "kill em all" just on the word of the rancher? A rancher who undoubtedly wants to see lions decimated more than likely. Uh oh, a cow moose is tryin to bust trhough the $5000 window in my daylight basement, second time this week she's been looking at herself in the reflection, FWP gonna let me shoot her if she takes two more steps towards it on a phone call? It's my property, and it's worth alot of money? i thought they were supposed to physically determine if the animals need to be killed, oh wait, the game warden was snowed in at his house and couldn't get down his driveway, hmmm take 15 minutes and throw on a set of chains, and go do your job! It didn't snow enought to keep the lion hunters out of the mountains that morning, lame excuse. But why do that when every person involved feels that the lions are nothing but a problem, and a great opportunity to eliminate 4 more just popped up. All the lions were killed in the horse pasture according to FWP, well how big is that horse pasture, the entire ranch? How big is the ranch?

I'm not against protecting stock, but given the game wardens feelings towards lions, the hunters, and the rancher, i think all they had to do was find an excuse, and I think thats what stinks about it.

Thats exactly what I'm saying on this. I think all three parties knew one another and didn't think this would be a big deal. This is why they investigate such things, to make an educated decision about what to do. Otherwise can you imagine how many animals would get killed for the wrong reasons if all we had to do was make a phone call and exagerate a story.


I think she is trying to show them how to steal those hub caps, think we should get a hold of the warden and get them killed before they cause a problem.

I think the real question here is "How much money does the landowner make from elk and deer hunts" ?

Good question, then one must ask: How much money could he make off of Deer, Elk, and Lion hunts?

I think that there is a lot of speculation into what actually happen first the rancher called a private houndsman to catch a lion that had been to his barn, the season was open and there was a quota that was not filled. Although I disagree with the take of females with kittens and have voiced my opinion on it a number of times. No one knows the past depredation this rancher has had, he may of had a ton of depredation history and losses. Now you can think about this in a couple of ways the rancher could of called game and fish first and had them write a depredation permit based on past losses. No one should have to suffer losses when there is a real threat, and that goes with lions in town should game and fish wait for someones kid or dog gets taken? should game and fish use their depredation take as part of the quota? It sounds to me as if the ranch found a way to utilize a resources so it would not go to waste and head off a problem. Under a depredation order the same resource would have been destroyed and nothing utilized and no one would of known anything about it. It is all unfortunate. But I think there has been to many people speculating on the details. Just my thoughts.

sourdough

I hardly ever or never agree with the Fish and Game on anything they do. With no first hand knowledge of the whole episode and the limited info stated on this post I have to agree with the wardens call on this. The biggest loss in this episode was the loss of that female. Any female that can raise 3 kittens to dispersal age is the one that needs to protected. With deer populations down this female musta been a great mother, hunter, and provider. Really though with all the people calling the warden on this and the PR its getting I would guess he will make sure to really check out all the similar calls in the future. So maybe some good will come from a shitty situation.....jmo dgarrett

I do know that the quota on males in that area had already been met and had been for some time, the killing of the three males put them over quota by three.
If Montana would have a mortality quota like some of the more progressive states there would three males off next year quota already, but Montana's FWP is in the sticks and in the stone age when it come to managing the states wildlife resources.

I am not sure if the Montana houndsman would like depredation take to be part of any sport hunting quota, now you will have to look in to the number of depredation permits issued and numbers taken to see how it could impact the sport hunting quota, but I believe that it should remain a different issue. Why not put road kills in that as well you could close a lot of zones before they even opened. You can see how this issue can snow ball.

sourdough

I think Badlandcat was talking about all kills including incidental kills via hit by car, problem cat, trapping ect. How do you set a quotas when the MT Fish and Wildlife does not count these kills against what the Houndsman and the Fish and Game think are the number of lions from an area that can be harvested as over populations and still maintain the numbers of cats you want. It really doesnt make a difference what caused the lions death the population is the population.... dgarrett