Well the day started a little colder than I am used to.
-31 degrees according to the F150, holy smokes.
We had been down hunting for lions two other times and had yet to find a track. When we arrived in my unit we found that there was about 9' of snow ontop of the pass. As we sailed down the canyon we were not really looking for tracks, no critters would hang out in this much snow right? Wrong!
Sure enough, a good sized lion track trudging through about 6 feet of powder. We made a game plan and decided to wait for about an hour so the temps would increase. We waited and when we were tired of sitting in the truck we decided to put out on it. The track paralled the road for about 100 yards before turning uphill to the south. Thats where we dropped in. There was a small creek at the bottom of the canyon the lion was in and we let the dogs go there. We had made it about 50 yards down the trail and could see one of the dogs up ahead of us about 100 yds. She looked as if she was coming back to us. We waited and saw that she was actually circling the bottom of a very large pine tree. Then we could see the other dogs barking up the same tree. I thought to myself "there is no way that cat is already treed". Sure enough the cat was up the tree not 150 yards from where we let the dogs go.
I looked it over and decided that I would be very happy taking this lion. I had a narrow window to shoot through, but I felt good about taking the shot. Here is the view I had of my shooting lane.
The tree that he was in was HUGE. My rangefinder said 17 yards. It doesn't sound like a very hard shot. Well 51 feet strait up at an angle like this was pretty tricky.
I let fly and my arrow met its mark. If you look close you can see the arrow coming strait down out of his chest.
I am way stoked about this tom. He ended up being right at 7'
A very large thanks to my dad, Randy, Brad, and shedseeker for making this happen for me. It will be a hefty taxidermy bill, but an experience I'll never forget!
}}-SLIVER-->
-31 degrees according to the F150, holy smokes.
We had been down hunting for lions two other times and had yet to find a track. When we arrived in my unit we found that there was about 9' of snow ontop of the pass. As we sailed down the canyon we were not really looking for tracks, no critters would hang out in this much snow right? Wrong!
Sure enough, a good sized lion track trudging through about 6 feet of powder. We made a game plan and decided to wait for about an hour so the temps would increase. We waited and when we were tired of sitting in the truck we decided to put out on it. The track paralled the road for about 100 yards before turning uphill to the south. Thats where we dropped in. There was a small creek at the bottom of the canyon the lion was in and we let the dogs go there. We had made it about 50 yards down the trail and could see one of the dogs up ahead of us about 100 yds. She looked as if she was coming back to us. We waited and saw that she was actually circling the bottom of a very large pine tree. Then we could see the other dogs barking up the same tree. I thought to myself "there is no way that cat is already treed". Sure enough the cat was up the tree not 150 yards from where we let the dogs go.
I looked it over and decided that I would be very happy taking this lion. I had a narrow window to shoot through, but I felt good about taking the shot. Here is the view I had of my shooting lane.
The tree that he was in was HUGE. My rangefinder said 17 yards. It doesn't sound like a very hard shot. Well 51 feet strait up at an angle like this was pretty tricky.
I let fly and my arrow met its mark. If you look close you can see the arrow coming strait down out of his chest.
I am way stoked about this tom. He ended up being right at 7'
A very large thanks to my dad, Randy, Brad, and shedseeker for making this happen for me. It will be a hefty taxidermy bill, but an experience I'll never forget!
}}-SLIVER-->
