Lion tried but deer got away

[Okanagan]

Found where a cougar had leaped from a road edge down a steep bank, trying for a deer on the slope.  The deer got away.

The setting:  logging road that no one had driven since a fresh snow.



The leap:  Pic below is jumbled with my tracks and the deer, but the closest large red circle is where the cat launched his spring.  He had sneaked the last few feet to that point on the edge of the road.  The middle circle is 20-25 feet down the slope, where his first leap landed and he bounded again.  The farthest circle from the camera is another divot in the snow where his bound landed and he leaped again, out of sight down over an even steeper pitch.



I wanted to know if he had caught the deer and had a kill he might be hanging around, so followed his bounding tracks over 100 yards down the mountainside. That is the farthest that any lion I've tracked has chased a deer.  Usually if they don't catch it they stop chasing pretty soon.  In my limited experience if a cougar doesn't make contact with a deer within three bounds, the deer gets away.

I set up and called for him in the timber to the left in the pic below.  His tracks had a couple inches of fresh snow in them, many hours old and I think he had traveled too far away to hear my call.  After missing the deer he had come back up to the road and gone uphill, so I tried to call him back down.

[nastygunz]

Dang, what is all that white stuff?

[pitw]

It's a wonderful world and you get to see a bunch of it.

Thanks for sharing.   Snow is great for seeing what transpired.

[nastygunz]

that logging road is better than 95% of the main roads in New Hampshire and Vermont

[Okanagan]

Dang, what is all that white stuff?

Powdered sugar? 

[nastygunz]

mmmmm donuts...

[FinsnFur]

You had a nice little story written right there in the snow. [emoji16]

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