BigGameHoundsmen.com

Yesterday morning we headed out to spot where we hadn't been for a little while, but the last time we were there we caught a real nice tom that we tagged. In the bottom of one of the canyons there was a fresh scratch, so we figured we'd go see if another tom had moved in and used the same area. We rode up and over the first ridge down into the scratch canyon, unfortunately cattle have been using the bottom quite a bit so the old scratch was gone and no sign of a new one... so we moved on... About 1/2 mile up the wash the dogs got pretty excited and were really grinding out a fairly cold track... they ran up and down the wash a couple of times trying to figure out where the lion had gone out...finally they went up and out and up through a nasty draw. The rock ledges were very steep with a mixture of prickly pear, shin dagger and ocotillo...they worked it pretty slow for about an hour, until they were able to get down into a deep cut where the sand and brush turned to nice dark dirt. Watching the dogs on the GPS from about 400yds away, it was pretty obvious that this female and her 6-8 month old kitten had layed up down in there for the night and got outta there when they heard the dogs coming... I would guess that the lion and her kitten had about a 10 minute headstart. The kitten bayed up on some rocks, then made it's way down through a crack where 6 of the dogs ran it up a tree. 3 of the other dogs were hot on the momma's trail, but she definitely gave them a run for their money in a huge boulder pile, jumping from rock to rock, the dogs finally were able to wind her and zeroed in... She jumped and ran a few different times, rolling around with the dogs a couple of times before she was able to get up and out of reach.... And that's where we left her....
The picture of the kitten in the tree is from the top of the rock bluff where it originally bayed up... i didn't get any pictures when I went down to the tree because I was too busy leashing up dogs that were pretty fired up, and that by itself is a rodeo. The picture of the female on the rock is where we left her... the dogs were hesitant to get much closer, but I'm sure if we wouldn't have got out of there when we did it could have been bad. Great day of training for some pups that are showing promise.

Enjoy...

This is the smaller cat after it went down the crack and ended up in the dead tree...
from left to right:
Dozer, Hondo (Mike Leonard's dog), Irene (behind the tree barely visible) Jessie (redbone), Siren (in the tree)



This is the edge of one of the washes that they worked the track through...

Goose, Siren, Cash, Jessie....



This is the female, and this is where we left her.



This is Cedar, Cash, and Sticker....

Well now...Great dog work, great pics and a great story!

Did you say Hondo? and Siren? in the same pack?........that's gonna get interesting?

liontracker wrote:Did you say Hondo? and Siren? in the same pack?........that's gonna get interesting?

Hondo is one of Mike Leonard's dogs. We're just running him on some dry ground tracks for Mike until the snow in his neck of the woods thins out...

I'm not sure what you mean by interesting....

Right on!

Yes Chasintail and I are friends and he has been kind enough to let that thin haired dog spend a little time with him in warmer country. LOL! In reality Hondo is just puppy but if he hangs around that bunch very long he might even learn a thing or two. Just hope them lion dogs don't get sick and tired of looking at that over grown beagle. LOL!


Great story, and very good photos Tyler keep up the good work/hope to be down there to hunt with you and share a fire soon.

ChasinTail wrote:I'm not sure what you mean by interesting....

Mike Leonard wrote:In reality Hondo is just puppy but if he hangs around that bunch very long he might even learn a thing or two.

Mike said it best. Should work out good.

.........

Love that last one!
Nice job

Mike Leonard wrote:Right on! Just hope them lion dogs don't get sick and tired of looking at that over grown beagle. LOL!

HAHA!! The first hunt we took Hondo on after I got him from Mike, we were hunting pretty close to a military base, and about 2 hours in and 10 miles of trailing a good track, I get a call from Mike Leonard saying that somebody called him and said they have his dog and he's all tore up...she said this big beagle wandered up to the guard shack, what should we do with it? Well, Hondo is a walker... and he got in a bit of a scuffle with one of the other dogs in the dog box that morning, and had a small (maybe 1/2 inch) cut on the side of his face! Some people are so dumb! Beagle... HAHAH!!! Biggest damn beagle I've ever seen...

Awesome pics and great dog work nice job.

Now there some rough terrain. What do you guys do when there backup like that on clif??
I would think if you poped him the dogs or a dog might jump off after him...
Do you just try and pull them off and hope that sucker don't jump on you??

radar,

I would imagine that if you had dogs that have never been in bluffs or rock piles that might be a concern. These dogs have hunted their whole lives in this type of terrain, and although they get pretty excited, and it definitely gets western a lot of the time, they are pretty smart. We have had a few instances where they got wrapped up with a nasty tom up on a bluff and end up in a ball of fur falling off a cliff. One thing about hunting in this country, as i'm sure it is the same anywhere you hunt with hounds... you better be prepared to pay the vet bill.....

10-4

Right on! Great story!

Nice pics and nice looking dogs.

Awesome pics and story. Thanks for sharing.