BEAR...
- Thread starter GC
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Big Flounder
New member
Pretty cool experience. That was there in Missouri?
GC
Well-known member
Yeah, it was neat. This is my second one. The first actually responded to my calling while I was coyote hunting. This one the wife and I walked up on while trying to determine if we are going to have acorns this year. Recent storms blows mast out of the trees and we were slipping along a ridgetop looking for acorns. That makes a difference on where we hunt come bow season. We got to watch the bear for probably five minutes. He actually bedded down in front of us for several minutes. The knats and bugs were really bad and after a few minutes he got up and meandered down the point toward the shady creek bottom below. He knew we were there but was very uninterested in us.
We hunt in the elk restoration area. We have critters. MDC recently announced that within a few years we will have a lottery draw hunt for both bear and elk in the Ozarks. Our elk herd is doing pretty well after a slow start. Five elk have been killed by mountain lions. I like elk and bears, not so crazy about the lions that are recolonized. Also not happy with the wild hogs. We have a lot of hogs. We encounter hogs routinely. As crazy as it is, three wolves have been killed in Missouri in recent times. DNA traces them back to the upper midwest wolf populations. A young bull moose wandered into Missouri and hung around a farmers feedlot and cows for a month several years back! Had to have come from Minnesota or some dang place up north. Anyway, on this day we also saw a broken legged deer and a bobcat. And darned few acorns.
We hunt in the elk restoration area. We have critters. MDC recently announced that within a few years we will have a lottery draw hunt for both bear and elk in the Ozarks. Our elk herd is doing pretty well after a slow start. Five elk have been killed by mountain lions. I like elk and bears, not so crazy about the lions that are recolonized. Also not happy with the wild hogs. We have a lot of hogs. We encounter hogs routinely. As crazy as it is, three wolves have been killed in Missouri in recent times. DNA traces them back to the upper midwest wolf populations. A young bull moose wandered into Missouri and hung around a farmers feedlot and cows for a month several years back! Had to have come from Minnesota or some dang place up north. Anyway, on this day we also saw a broken legged deer and a bobcat. And darned few acorns.
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GC
Well-known member
No sir, lions are repopulating on their own. Since 1994 there have been 74 confirmed lion sightings in Missouri. MDC requires actual proof in the way of a picture, video, ect. to verify a big cat sighting. There are lots of reports made without real substantial proof and MDC won't count those as actual confirmed sightings. You can bet when MDC says there was a lion sighting, there was actually a lion there. The video below is a 135 pound cat accidentally live trapped by a guy trapping wild hogs. MDC released that lion about a mile as the crow flies from my favorite hunting spot. Makes those long walks out in the dark just a bit more special lol. Lions are currently protected but no effort is made to manage or increase their population. MDC has stated that lions are an undesirable species for our state and they will not make any effort to manage them. In other words, lions are on their own. I guess if they make it here MDC is "ok" with that... but not really. Several lions have been killed "in self defense" of course and no charges were filed on the shooters. Video of Missouri big cat. ..
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OSYPp20SHQg
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OSYPp20SHQg
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Hellgate
Member
So many states now are outlawing hunting the cats with hounds (which is the ONLY EFFECTIVE way to successfully hunt them) that the populations have grown way beyond prior populations before the restrictions took place. Due to population pressures (too many cats for the given area) they are spreading out and wandering in all directions. A big cat can eat a deer a week. That's 50 deer per year if that is what they go for.
derbyacresbob
Well-known member
Originally Posted By: HellgateSo many states now are outlawing hunting the cats with hounds (which is the ONLY EFFECTIVE way to successfully hunt them) that the populations have grown way beyond prior populations before the restrictions took place. Due to population pressures (too many cats for the given area) they are spreading out and wandering in all directions. A big cat can eat a deer a week. That's 50 deer per year if that is what they go for.
If you have to many bears the lions may have to kill two deer a week or more because the bears are taking over the lion kills.
In California the lions are protected and we can no longer hunt bears with dogs and using leg hold traps to trap coyotes is no longer legal. So the deer numbers are dropping steadily.
If you have to many bears the lions may have to kill two deer a week or more because the bears are taking over the lion kills.
In California the lions are protected and we can no longer hunt bears with dogs and using leg hold traps to trap coyotes is no longer legal. So the deer numbers are dropping steadily.
tripod3
New member
Originally Posted By: derbyacresbobOriginally Posted By: HellgateSo many states now are outlawing hunting the cats with hounds (which is the ONLY EFFECTIVE way to successfully hunt them) that the populations have grown way beyond prior populations before the restrictions took place. Due to population pressures (too many cats for the given area) they are spreading out and wandering in all directions. A big cat can eat a deer a week. That's 50 deer per year if that is what they go for.
If you have to many bears the lions may have to kill two deer a week or more because the bears are taking over the lion kills.
In California the lions are protected and we can no longer hunt bears with dogs and using leg hold traps to trap coyotes is no longer legal. So the deer numbers are dropping steadily.
Sounds like home!
If you have to many bears the lions may have to kill two deer a week or more because the bears are taking over the lion kills.
In California the lions are protected and we can no longer hunt bears with dogs and using leg hold traps to trap coyotes is no longer legal. So the deer numbers are dropping steadily.
Sounds like home!
GC
Well-known member
Originally Posted By: HellgateSo many states now are outlawing hunting the cats with hounds (which is the ONLY EFFECTIVE way to successfully hunt them) that the populations have grown way beyond prior populations before the restrictions took place. Due to population pressures (too many cats for the given area) they are spreading out and wandering in all directions. A big cat can eat a deer a week. That's 50 deer per year if that is what they go for.
I think MDC is attributing the growing population of big cats here to fast growing populations of lions in the Dakota's and Colorado. Young lion's get pushed out of their home turf and wander river corridors into Missouri. The Ozark's have a lot of sprawling secluded rough country with a good deer herd. Also turkeys, wild hogs and now elk. Evidently lions do pretty well here if they stay off major roadways. Several have been killed by cars. A few shot by people "in fear of their life." Otherwise I guess they do ok. I have a buddy that has a nice video of a lion slipping by his treestand. This guy didn't bother to report it to MDC. "What difference would that make?", he said. I have seen a set of tracks once that I'm sure were lion prints. It didn't surprise me, I know there are a few around.
I think MDC is attributing the growing population of big cats here to fast growing populations of lions in the Dakota's and Colorado. Young lion's get pushed out of their home turf and wander river corridors into Missouri. The Ozark's have a lot of sprawling secluded rough country with a good deer herd. Also turkeys, wild hogs and now elk. Evidently lions do pretty well here if they stay off major roadways. Several have been killed by cars. A few shot by people "in fear of their life." Otherwise I guess they do ok. I have a buddy that has a nice video of a lion slipping by his treestand. This guy didn't bother to report it to MDC. "What difference would that make?", he said. I have seen a set of tracks once that I'm sure were lion prints. It didn't surprise me, I know there are a few around.
6mm06
Well-known member
Originally Posted By: GCI like elk and bears, not so crazy about the lions that are recolonized.
GC, I felt the same way when we first began to have bears here. My thoughts have changed after a few years of them over populating and now causing damage to property, and even indirectly restricting human activity in the area. I will shed some light on the problem here, first hand knowledge and hope that I don't hijack your thread with this.
In June of last year there was a bear in my storage building in the middle of the night, eating dog food. How it got the door open I don't know, but it did. Later in November my wife lost 9 of her chickens to a bear. It turned over coops, killed the chickens and made a mess of things. About a month before my encounter, a neighbor that lives about 3/4 mile from me, and bordering my Mother's property, lost his chickens to a bear, and coops ruined.
A good friend of our family who lives maybe three miles from me had her freezer opened by a bear and all the contents ruined. The freezer was on her back porch. About a month or so later the bear (or another one) came to her house and clawed up the storm door. Her grandson was home at the time and ran it off. Another guy I know showed me a video he took of a bear on his porch, trying to get into his freezer.
A woman was bitten by a female bear in a nearby town last summer / early fall, maybe 15 miles from me.
Earlier this summer a neighbor who lives maybe 200 yards behind me was grilling out with this family one evening when a bear approached. He tried to run it off but it wouldn't leave. It ended up wrecking his grill. His father phoned the "officials", I assume Game Commission people and was told it was his son's fault, that they were feeding the bear.
On the way to church last year, I (and family) saw a dead bear lying beside the road that had evidently been struck by a vehicle. This was within city limits of a small city near me. Later, about two miles or so from that another bear was hit by a vehicle, a huge bear that officials said weighed between 600-700 pounds. Behind a medical building in the same city is a dumpster (used to be a dumpster there) that bear were getting into and carrying garbage up the hill side and making a real mess.
A guy I know who lives in a town less than 30 miles from me told me that parents were afraid to let their children out to play in the neighborhood since there were about three bears that were frequenting the area. Bear are coming into neighborhoods all around the area.
At a local train station office in that town, bears were coming down into the train yard, crossing the tracks here and there regularly, and were getting into garbage cans that were placed in a wooden-built pen that was sitting right beside the train station.
Last early fall my trail camera captured video of a female bear and three cubs. A good distance from my house, in a bordering county, I and the family saw a another female and three cubs walking across a field. They are populating like cracy and with no predators other than hunters, who take very few bear in the area.
A business owner who has a store about a mile and a half from me, had bear getting into the dumpster that is a few yards from his store. He placed an electric fence around the dumpster but the bear still got into it.
I could go on and on with stories of bear encounters that people within the local area of my house are having. I never dreamed I would ever see a bear in my yard, and certainly not in my storage building or killing my chickens. My wife goes out to the chicken lot quite a bit, and sometimes at night to check on the chickens. I now have her carrying a pistol when she goes. When the bear were first reintroduced here most people welcomed it. I thought it would be neat to have some in the mountains and national forest nearby. I never considered that the situation would become like this. Now the story that many people here have is not as welcoming.
The Game Commission has allowed the population to grow to numbers that are for all practicality, out of control. I asked for a kill permit from the Game Commission in case the bear returned and tried to get into my large chicken coop. I was denied and informed that they only issue permits if I am commercial. It's not only the bear that are out of control, but the government, ie state that is out of control as well. That's my opinion, at least. The officials will say that the freezers should be kept in the house, but what if a person's house is too small? What about grilling out? Apparently the people are at fault there too, according to officials.
I read somewhere that the Game Commission finally decided to take a certain percentage of bear out, but did a survey first to get public input. The response was that the public wanted a lesser percentage. I question that survey. I wonder how many city dwellers who don't have to deal with the bears were involved in that survey, and if the survey covered the entire state of just local.
Recently a news network in my state issue a bear warning for motorists traveling rural highways within the entire state. I heard it on the radio first hand. If I understand correctly, there are only maybe two or three counties within the state that don't have bear. That used to not be the case, with bear only found in just a few counties in a small section of the state. The population has increased to the point of becoming at least a nuisance, and at worst a threat to people.
We have a bear season here, but generally (except for early bow season), it's in December when bear are not as active and when rifle deer hunting season in my area is over. On top of that, the Game Commission appears to have dollars in their eyes and have removed the black bear from the big game stamp, and have given it a whole new stamp of it's own. For decades when a hunter purchased a big game stamp, it included bear, deer and turkey. Now it's deer and turkey. So, if a hunter wishes to hunt bear, he or she mush purchase a single stamp for that species, and of course most hunters here are deer hunters and turkey hunters, so the chance of a bear being killed in deer season incidentally to the hunt is now gone. In dollar translation, the cost of two tags is now required rather than one. In my mind, there will be fewer bear killed now than before when all three species were on the same tag, which means the problem will continue to grow.
Sorry for all this rambling, but I just wanted to point out, from experience, that having bear around is not always peachy keen. If your Game Commission keeps the population in check and helps local people who might experience problems, then it's probably not such a bad thing. But as in the case of my state, they have dropped the ball big time, and that's not just my opinion, but the opinions of a lot of local people here.
Here are a few photos of the smaller coops the bear demolished. Luckily it didn't get into the larger one in the foreground. It was all my wife and I could do to upright the small coop. It's heavier than it looks. The bear rolled it off the foundation to the left with ease.
My house in the foreground, and the mess the bear created.
A smaller coop and what's left of a rooster.
GC
Well-known member
Bears are about like 300+ pound raccoons, aren't they? All that you describe has been happening with increased frequency throughout the Ozark area. In fact, Saturday the wife and I stopped in a diner in town for lunch and heard one guy complaining about his shed being broken into by a bear. He has a camera on the shed and has some good pictures of his pest. Another older gentlemen piped up and told about a bear tearing up his bird feeders. One bear got into the kitchen of a rural school here during summer school. School had an intruder lock down until the bear was dealt with. I know that MDC has a trapping program for nuisance bears. Most of those pesky bears are relocated but a few repeat offenders were euthanized for their crimes. MDC says we should have both a bear and an elk season within five years.
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Pruson
New member
WOW! GC, I guess Missouri ain't what it used to be. When I was living there in the 60's we didn't have any cougars at all. Now my cousins send me articles from their local papers of Mountain Lions being killed on I-44 near Hazelgreen a few years back. And then you tell me this, Elk in Missouri.
You're right about one thing, animals do use those river corridors to travel and sometimes long distances. It happens here in Virginia, we get transient bears all the time that come down out of the mountains using the various river system we have here. I live about a mile from the Pamunkey River (on a feeder creek to it) and I get bear pictures on my trail cameras every year.
You're right about one thing, animals do use those river corridors to travel and sometimes long distances. It happens here in Virginia, we get transient bears all the time that come down out of the mountains using the various river system we have here. I live about a mile from the Pamunkey River (on a feeder creek to it) and I get bear pictures on my trail cameras every year.
GC
Well-known member
Yeah Sonny, we have critters! I could do without the hogs and lions. While bowhunting and walking out in the dark with a treestand on your back working your way along a narrow trail through an overgrown clear cut, bumping into a bunch of hogs can get a little exciting. Twice I've had a stand off with hogs in that situation. Once a big boar and once a sow with a bunch of little pigs in tow.
vanhornet
New member
About 8 or 10 years ago, I saw a BIG cat with a long tail, run in front of my vehicle, just a quarter mile from my driveway. This was in Montgomery Co., MO. I took pics of the tracks in the snow, and collected some scat, confirming my suspicions of a cougar, and saved the evidence for MDC.
I called the Missouri "Mountain Lion Hotline", and after some questioning, got the e-mail addy for the agent in charge of said program. Sent them several e-mails, with no response AT ALL from them.
At the time, MDC was denying the existence of cougar in Missouri. My question is :
Why did they have a "Mountain Lion Hotline", if none were in Missouri ???
I should have called and said I shot one, and I might have got a response !
I called the Missouri "Mountain Lion Hotline", and after some questioning, got the e-mail addy for the agent in charge of said program. Sent them several e-mails, with no response AT ALL from them.
At the time, MDC was denying the existence of cougar in Missouri. My question is :
Why did they have a "Mountain Lion Hotline", if none were in Missouri ???
I should have called and said I shot one, and I might have got a response !
vanhornet
New member
Originally Posted By: GCMountain Lion Hotline... secret codewords. If they charged you for the phone call and told you they would hook you up with a cougar, you called the wrong number. But you might be more satisfied in the end.
No, no, no ….. different number, I have that one on speed dial ! Besides, at my age, I'd rather come face to face with a real cougar !
No, no, no ….. different number, I have that one on speed dial ! Besides, at my age, I'd rather come face to face with a real cougar !