There are 8 days left in the lion and bobcat season and I'm still hoping to get the kids out cat hunting for a couple days but I think the 2009-10 cat guiding season is over for me.  In 30 years of chasing hounds that were chasing cats, this season consistently had the worst conditions I've ever seen.  While other parts of the country have been getting hammered, it seems that it forgot to be winter here which made every hunt a struggle.  Lots of bare ground, rain, and when it wasn't raining, where you could still find snow it was often frozen up so solid that a cat wouldn't make a track all combined to make very challenging conditions for the dogs and I.  On the plus side there seemed to be quite a few lions out there this winter...the trick was getting them caught.

I took a total of 7 lion hunters this winter and we killed 5 lions.  Four of the lions were good toms and one was an adult female.  One of the successful lion hunters also took a bobcat.  The two guys that did not get lions at least had some excitement.  We did tree a small lion for one of them which he chose not to take (understandably).  We spent most of the other guy's hunt trying to catch up with a big tom whose tracks we were finding pretty consistently but that we just couldn't seem to catch in the rainy conditions.  I also had a bobcat hunter that we managed to catch a nice male for.  In a normal year I would be a little disappointed going 5 for 7 on lions but given the conditions this year it could easily have been worse.

The lion hunts for next year are going quickly, I expect to be fully booked within the next month or so.

Next up is spring bear.  It's shaping up to be a very early spring but it is northern Idaho so I wouldn't place my bet yet.  I still have several openings available for the first 2 weeks of May.

The lack of winter that caused me so many lion hunting headaches this year was good news for the deer.  Normally at this time of year they're compressed into the low elevations which increases predation, stress, and disease and decreases the availability of food, but this year they are spread all over the place enjoying the good life.  We should have another good deer season this fall and I do still have quite a few openings there.

The moose tag application is coming up and I'll be sending out my annual email to those of you that have expressed interest regarding that.  If you would like to receive that and have not yet asked me to be on that list please let me know and I'll get you added.

I just got the website updated with pictures from the 2009-10 cat season.  There are pictures of all of the cats we took this winter on the first page of the Mountain Lion/Bobcat photo gallery.

I hope you're all having a great winter thumping coyotes, hunting sheds, pulling fish through the ice or just chasin' mama around the house and trying to stay warm!  Thanks for reading and if you ever have any questions just let me know.