Birdwatching gone wrong

[cow pollinater]

I was out trying to gather bulls( I found the one I was missing about a hundred yards from the corrals after three hours of looking for him :roll: ) and I kept hearing a strange call that was really LOUD. It just kept on going and was coming from a ridge-line that is a shear rock cliff on one side that sticks up about five hundred feet from the floor of the canyon.
Everywhere I went I could hear that call and after a while I kind of had where it was coming from fixed . It was driving me nuts figuring out what kind of bird it was. I knew I'd heard it somewhere before but just couldn't recall when or where .
Finally curiosity got the better of me and I rode up the ridge to get a look at this bird. I could hear it down off the side of the cliff but still ahead of me until I came to a rock about the size of a house. From one side of that rock I could hear it to my left and from the other I could hear it from my right.
There was nowhere to tie up so I kept leaning over the edge horseback trying to see and did that for about ten minutes. Then the wind shifted... All of a sudden both dogs had the hair on their necks standing up and were very focused on whatever it was as was my gelding, who normally doesn't give a shyt about much of anything. When Butch opened up with his baying I saw the tip of a looong tail going over the rocks about thirty feet below me. LION!
We went back to looking for the bull and I started doubting what I had seen. The call started up again after a while and I could still hear it all the way back over a ridge and about a half mile away.
As soon as I got home I turned on the Foxpro and played the "mountain lion whistle" and there is no more doubt in my mind.
I've seen two before but both times were just brief glances by accident. This one was pretty neat.

 

[skyhightree1]

Glad it went the other way those things don't play around.

 

[branguscowgirl]

CP I will have to look up that "mountain lion whistle." I may have heard it before, I don't know. :shock: But we had a lot of big cats pass through my Oregon ranch. Saw them a lot. Also saw what they would do to the deer, stacking them up under leaves.
You better be careful with your bird watching! :lol:

 

[slick4591]

We're getting quite a few sightings of big cats here lately.

 

[HDRider]

Glad you're not cat shyt cooling off in the dark.

 

[Kingfisher]

Cool! So what's the cat up to when it's calling like that?

 

[highgrit]

SSS. I want to get one for the wall. Shot 2 young males in Mexico deer hunting once. And couldn't bring them back in the states.

 

[cow pollinater]

Cool! So what's the cat up to when it's calling like that?

I don't know. I think I have heard it before in the past but the only reason that it sounded familiar this time around was that I had heard it on the Foxpro when I was playing with sounds. I do know that they are highly territorial so I would think that it's either a warning or a locator call.
My concern now is calving in August. Bears got three that I know of last year and I'm still short five head. This cat could do that... I'll leave it at that. :mrgreen:

 

[Deepsouth]

CP, I know that cat can cause you a lot of problems but that's a cool encounter. I was watching a nature show on mountain lions and they had one on there doing that chirping. I don't remember what for sure but it was either a mating call or a mother calling cubs.

 

[Nesikep]

we've seen a couple around here... they get the wild indian horses once in a while... haven't cause us any trouble but we'll knock them off if we see one... especially at this time of year