Cat Family

Those little guys are still learning from mama, and respectfully, a couple deer a week is probably not happening, regardless of any lions size and age, its pretty rare to find a couple a week lion kills scattered around the mountains. The real culprit if your numbers are dropping are probably coyotes. Lion populations rise and fall with prey populations. Healthy deer herds=healthy lion pops. declining deer herds=declining lion pops. Harley Shaw's book, "soul among lions" goes into depth on studies done on this in AZ/NM and Id. its a good read and pretty darn educational if anyone is interested in the facts, or as close as facts can get with these elusive predators.
 
A mountain lion requires 8 to 10 pounds of meat per day to survive. Its diet consists of deer, elk, porcupines, small mammals, livestock, and pets. Generally a lion prefers deer. Experts tell us a lion kills one deer every 9 to 14 days. (Information compiled from U.S. Department of Agriculture, Wildlife Services, San Antonio, Texas, and Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks, Helena, Montana) And in some areas, it has been found that a lion kills as many as two deer per week, especially in hot weather. Why? First, a lion tends to leave a carcass once it has begun to spoil. Second, scavengers (vultures, crows, ravens, magpies, coyotes, skunks, etc.) find the carcass the lion has killed and hidden. They consume it before the lion returns to feed on the remains. Wildlife Services Specialists find that success in capturing problem lions is much greater within two days of the actual kill than thereafter. (U. S. Department of Agriculture, Wildlife Services, Reno, Nevada)

ABUNDANT WILDLIFE SOCIETY OF NORTH AMERICA
P. O. Box 2
Beresford, SD 57004
(605) 751-0979
http://www.aws.vcn.com/mountain_lion_fact_sheet.html
 
Those little guys are still learning from mama, and respectfully, a couple deer a week is probably not happening, regardless of any lions size and age, its pretty rare to find a couple a week lion kills scattered around the mountains. The real culprit if your numbers are dropping are probably coyotes. Lion populations rise and fall with prey populations. Healthy deer herds=healthy lion pops. declining deer herds=declining lion pops. Harley Shaw's book, "soul among lions" goes into depth on studies done on this in AZ/NM and Id. its a good read and pretty darn educational if anyone is interested in the facts, or as close as facts can get with these elusive predators.

You'll find a very low percentage of the kills, the way lions drag stuff and hide kills we find a very low percentage of kills. A female with kittens is a killing machine, two deer a week is not at all unreasonable.
I followed three young cats that were siblings that were still hanging out together for seven days straight, the carnage was impressive over the full length of a mountain valley. A couple deer one of which was a nice mule deer buck, a porky pine, a cow elk, a coyote and bald eagle. They also visited several old kills, some of which were just a few bones and they spent a lot of time out in the sagebrush and checked out the ranch dogs at one point. I treed them within a mile of where I started following them, their mother had at least three sets of triplets that she raised to adults, she was an amazing lion and lived 9 yrs and killed a pile of deer and elk, one 5x5 bull didn't even move in his bed when she hit him and was one of the most amazing things to read the story of in the snow!!!
 
Always enjoy your pictures CallMaker we ran ran hounds over most of NE WA, and cougar enjoy venison. They will eat any age group with equal enthusiasm. Your point about scavengers eating a pretty good portion their kills is right on. In this country if you follow a big cat track very far in the snow there is almost always a bobcat shadowing it, summer and fall black bear help themselves.
 
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