Hi, my name is CJ. I'm an old coot who has been hunting and shooting for half a century or so. I like to write and share my life experiences. One of your registrants, who I met at another web site, he may even be a moderator here, I forget, and hope he will forgive me. I'm of an age where events from years ago are sometimes clearer in my head than breakfast. Anyway, the following is a true story about one of my favorite hunting memories.
MOUNTAIN LION
Snow, rain and sleet. All mixed up. Gray. It's morning. The trail up from the river is steep. No matter. One. Two. Sometimes three steps and stop. Always up. Slow. Make yourself part of the day. Part of the mountain. No hurry. Hunting mountain lions without the aid of dogs is not supposed to be easy. The weather is helping you. You can move like a ghost if you take your time. Hours go by as you slowly climb higher and higher. Looking. Always looking. The wind swirls. Who knows where your scent is going as you change elevation, temperature and direction. No choice. Just keep moving up the mountain.
This is a typical late fall/early winter day in the three rivers country. The Lochsa and Selway Rivers come together just south and west of where you are, they merge to become the Clearwater River. The Lochsa is below you. The blazes and campsites from the old Lewis and Clark Expedition are up above you. More game uses this trail than people. Elk. Moose. Mountain goat. Black bear. And, lot's of mule deer. That's why the mountain lions are here: Food. There is also cover in these steep heavily timbered and rocky slopes. Water from the dew, streams and, if necessary, the river below. People don't travel this trail much. It's steep. Doesn't go anywhere in particular except up. Nothing special to see. There are easier ways to see mountain lions. Dogs tree them. Trick is staying with the dogs as they run the lion.
I've never hunted mountain lions with dogs. I'm not much of a horse guy and I've never really liked running behind dogs. Shooting a mountain lion, or a black bear, "treed" by dogs does not appeal to me. Some love it. The dogs. Horses. Running. I've got nothing against it. It just doesn't suit me.
I like being in the bush. Afoot. Taking my time. I also like driving old logging roads. Once, parked along the side of a dirt road in the mountains up above the south and east end of Lake Pend Oreille with my best friend, just taking a break from grouse hunting and enjoying the view, a bobcat walked up, no more than 25 paces away from the cab of his 4 X 4 truck. Sat down, apparently enjoying the same view we were. Never acknowledged us. After a few minutes, it stood up, stretched and sauntered away into the bush.
Another time, on a trail above Panther Creek, south of the Salmon River, I came up behind a lynx. It was walking ahead of me. Maybe 35 paces or so. Moving slowly. Looking around. I must have made some small sound for that lynx turned its head, looked at me and then, calmly, as though nothing was wrong, resumed its walk. After taking no more than two or three steps, something must have registered, for that lynx, this time, whipped it's head around, did a classic wide eyed double take and streaked off into the bush. I was actually laughing out loud by the time it disappeared!
In Africa, hunting with a camera, my guide hung a bait, half a warthog, in a tree on the far bank of the Meru River in the Northern Frontier District of Kenya. We were about 150 paces away from the bait and without a rifle or gun of any kind. I had a Nikon with a 400mm lens. The guide rigged a battery from one of the trucks to what, I think, was an extra headlight. Come the night, he switched the light on and off in accordance with his hunches. Once, when the light was on, I was looking at the bait: No leopard. Then, all of a sudden, how it got there I'll never know, there was a leopard! Quick as the blink of an eye. No visible effort. Just there. On the bait. Looking around. Hand holding the Nikon, tripod forgotten, I started shooting film. Blowing up the negatives gave me the best leopard pictures I've ever been able to take. Most of my leopard shots show nothing more than a blur in the grass. Guess that's why the medium to small size cats intrigue me. Nothing like walking in the bush at night. Big moon. Bright. Stars "almost" within reach. Then, glancing up into a tree, spotting a civet or genet cat, about the size of big bobcats or a small lynx, laid out on a branch just above your head. Watching you. Lions, in my experience, are easy. Lazy. Willing to pose. Not leopards, civets or genets.
Today, Africa is far away. These mountains are my reality. This weather. The snow. Rain. Sleet. What's that. The trail ahead is all torn up. Something big made those slide marks across the trail. Mule deer tracks. Wonder if a mountain lion came off that big rock and ambushed a deer? What's that down below the trail? The back of a deer? Can't see very well through this sleet. No. That's not a deer. It's the back of a mountain lion. Down on it's stomach. Feeding on a deer. How far away? No more than 25 paces or so. Center the crosshairs on the spine. Right where the neck and shoulders come together. This point of aim should work. My 270 is zeroed to put a 130 grain bullet in the 10 ring at 25 yards, 3" high at 100 yards, then back in the 10 ring at 250 yards. Squeeze the trigger. That lion doesn't know I'm here. Lot's of time. One shot. One mountain lion. Never moved. Just collapsed. If you have to die, that's a good way to go. Quick. No struggle.
This mountain lion measured 7' 2" between the pegs, tip of nose to tip of tail. Maybe a live weight of somewhere around 150 pounds. Beautiful. Perfect condition. Tawny golden coat. Big, really big, paws. My Bo Randall Model 11 knife does it's job. Within the hour, I'm hiking back down the trail with the head and hide in my pack. Heavy. Three hours, at least, of walking ahead of me. Always faster going downhill, back to camp. Lot's of thoughts. Joy. Regret. Always. Mixed thoughts. Good trip. Good hunt. Matched wits with one of the most wary of our big game animals in it's own environment. Just me and him. I was lucky. Funny thing though: The more time I spend in the bush and the harder I work while there, the luckier I seem to get.
Another mountain lion, taken in this same country, under similar conditions, was smaller. This one surprised me. He was behind some boulders. Stuck his head up. I saw him out of the corner of my right eye. Close. Maybe 15 paces. No time to waste before he drops back down behind the rocks or leaps out into the bush along the steep ravine below us. I swung my 270 and the shot seemed to come of it's own accord. I don't remember seeing a sight picture. The 130 grain bullet entered his left ear hole.
Two shots. Two mountain lions. That's enough. I'll probably never shoot another one. They are so beautiful to see. So hard to hunt. Most are killed by accident. Shot by hunters who are, in truth, hunting something else. Nothing against them. But, when you hunt and take a mountain lion, on purpose, somehow, that's special. Means something. My best mountain lion is mounted in an "alert" pose. No teeth showing. No snarl. I like looking at that mount. I see dignity there. A big game animal that has earned my respect. When I think about it, that's a good way to die. In the bush. Quick. Clean. No lingering sickness or pain. If left alone, you contribute back into the food chain. That seems fair. Somehow appropriate. Giving back something for what you have taken. Ah well, time will tell. We are all going to die. Doing so with dignity in a good spot has always appealed to me.
Over the years I've owned, as of today, 158 guns: 75 rifles, 64 handguns and 19 shotguns. I sometimes wonder if I should have put at least some of the money and time spent acquiring all those guns to better use. Big game hunts cost money and fewer guns "might" have translated into more hunts. I've used, for example, 20 different rifles in 11 different calibers to take 45, as of today, big game animals. Two more have been taken with handguns. That was fun and I learned something about calibers and bullets along the way: Bullet placement is everything.
A bullet that expands well in heart/lung tissue (I like Sierra bullets) gives you the biggest target to shoot at on a big game animal and spoils the least edible meat. A bullet that will break the bones of the hip, shoulder or central nervous system (I like Nosler Partition bullets) are also good, but offer, somewhat, harder shots to make, depending on the angle between you and the animal you are shooting at: The key is selecting the proper bullet for the shot intended and knowing the anatomy of the animal you are hunting.
When I hunt big game, I try to use bullets that are up to the task at hand and group well. I have gone so far as to set up a target (distance and size depends on what and where you are hunting), shoot just one shot into it with the same bullet/load that I'll be hunting with, clean my rifle and then put everything away. I'll repeat this process for 5 days. At the end, I have a target with a 5 shot group in it from a cold and clean barrel. That is important, the first shot out of your rifle may be the best one you are going to get and you need to know exactly where that bullet is going to hit. Some rifles shoot to a different point of impact out of a fouled (previous shot or shots fired through it) barrel. If a rifle will not shoot minute of angle groups (a 1" group with at least 3 shots at 100 yards, 2" group at 200 yards, 3" at 300, etc and etc) in my hands, I sell or trade it away.
My favorite 270 is a 1959 Model 70 Winchester Featherweight action with a cut down 22" Winchester factory barrel. It has a Belgian walnut stock with a Jack O'Connor, a boyhood hero who, later in life, became my friend, style of fleur-de-lis checkering. Al Biesen, another boyhood hero who, also, later in life, became my friend, put this rifle together in 1966. I've spent a lot of time in both the O'Connor and Biesen homes. I miss Jack. On his last birthday, 2003, I took Al and one of his sons to lunch. Al has another son, Roger, who works along side him and also makes guns. Plus his granddaughter, Rogers daughter, who, besides being a busy mom, engraves guns. Three generations of Biesen's, all in the business of making guns better. Al, for example, was a competitive shooter and has a big box full of medals to prove it. He got the trigger exactly right on my 270. It breaks at 3 pounds of pull with zero creep. This is one of those "dreams sometimes do come true" rifles. And not just in terms of who inspired it and who built it, for this rifle:
1) Shoots a 130 grain Sierra boat tail bullet (the BT enhances ballistic coefficient) at 2994 feet per second on my chronograph and delivers 2590 foot pounds of energy, using the formula fps X fps X bullet weight divided by 450,000 = fpe.
2) Shoots a 130 grain Nosler Partition bullet at 3005 fps with 2609 fpe.
3) Over the years it consistently shoots half minute of angle, or better, groups.
4) It's best 3 shot group, at 100 yards, is 5/16 of an inch measuring from the centers of the two bullet holes, of the three fired, farthest apart.
5) And, it shoots several different brands of 130 grain bullets to the same point of impact.
Anyway, again, when I hunt big game, I want accuracy and dependable shot placement more than I want fps or fpe. We can do something to overcome a lack of velocity or energy by simply knowing our rifle, the ammunition we are using and then keeping our shots within an effective killing range. How high or low we aim is of no consequence so long as we know how to use our sights to consistently get appropriate bullet placement results.
How many more hunts could I have afforded to go on if I had elected to own, let's say, half a dozen guns instead of 158? Hmmmmmmm. No regrets. Just putting this thought out there in the hope that some of you younger shooters, who like to hunt, can reflect on it PRIOR TO rather than AFTER HAVING spent, what you may someday come to think of, as too much time and money on guns and not enough time and money on hunting.
Life is full of choices. That's part of what makes it interesting: So, have fun, you are never going to get any younger.
CJ
August 03
