Legalizing the use of dogs for cougars in Oregon

Legalizing the use of dogs for cougars in Oregon
Photo credit to http://www.biology-blog.com/


Sometime in the 1980’s cougar hunting with dogs was banned because many anti hunters and animal rights activist voted this sport off as they said “ This sport gives the animals little chance to get away from the hunter” with this statement made there was much dispute and misunderstanding as hunters and protesters quarreled the statement. It did come to the agreement that the use of dogs made bagging of the animals possible, but it was the only way to hunt a cougar and keep the population in check because they have no predators in this area. As this was going on the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife did a population count on the cougar and found that the population in the state of Oregon was around 1,500 cougars where they would liked to have had 3,100 cougars in the state this quickly lead to the banning of using dogs in the state of Oregon.
Over the last 20 years the cougars have had no threat of any kind to their population and have exploded in population. Which in turn has caused the deer and turkey populations to drop and a extremely fast rate however the quick drop of animal populations has just been noticed in the last 4 years.
There is simple proof that cougars were the cause of the dropping effect after a survey taken proving that one cougar alone will kill 4 to 5 deer and up to 18 turkey in a week of time (5 days) this is very hard to believe however it is true. Now go figure that a deer only has one to two babies every year where a cougar has 3 to 5 offspring in one year. Thank goodness for turkey or they would quickly run our deer population dry.
The cougars have recently been seen more often by people because there are so many they are running out of territory in some places. In result we are having record high threatening cougar encounters in Oregon. Luckily there have been a high number of cats killed in the last few years without the use of dogs at a number of 250 cats which is nearly 6% of the population. This seems like allot of animals but as soon as they have offspring in one year they create those numbers and more very fast.

In recent year’s livestock has been hammered very badly from cougars who are old and cannot sustain the power to take wild deer down so they kill typically sheep, cows, horses and chickens around houses.
It’s unfortunate that dogs aren’t used because the cats are currently at the number of approximately 5,100+ cats they are currently hunted by calling them in which can be threatening to the person calling them in, but for now you can shoot 2 cougars a year for 10 dollars a tag. The problem is that not many people see a cougar in their life because they are so elusive… This is until recent years when many cats have received rabies and been found stalking children.
If dogs could be used we could take the population to the correct 3,000 cougar mark within a few years.

June 17 2008 Daily Journal

Well today I have been catching up on school doing that from 6:35 AM to 7:45 PM and I finally got out to do something fun (well... sorta) I went to a spot we had been seeing allot of deer and set my hang on treestand up. However I ran out of pegs and had to stop. Now i'm finishing the day up here on the computer.

***News for tommorow****

I'm going to give ya all a good burger recipe for venison!

Monster Idaho white tail.

Well it was the 4th morning of my hunt we headed out before it was light out and got to the hunting place just after it got light out. Then we started walking up a old logging road and we got about half a mile up it walking EXTREMELY slow so that we wouldn't scare any deer and then all the sudden BANG...BANG...BANG somebody had just shot a large caliber gun up at the top of the mountain which was about 3/4 of a mile from us. So we just decided to keep heading up the hill anyways cause there were lots and lots of tracks up there so we kept going and then we saw this deer running up on the hill and then another one but they were both does. So we watched them run along ways up the hill and then we started walking up the logging road again. Then we saw a deer about 80 yards up the road walk off the dirt road but it was another doe so we walked up the road but it was not there so we walked farther up the road when suddenly I saw something move about 120 yards in front of me. So I sat down and rested my model 700 Remington 30-06 with a 3x9 Leupold scope on it and I looked through it at a big 4x4 buck walking down the hill so I clicked the safety off. I followed it down the hill through my scope but the big 4x4 buck never stopped so I let it go. Then it walked in the brush and I got mad at myself for not taking the shot at the biggest buck I had seen for the 4 days that I was hunting. So I just sat there and pretty soon crunch...Crunch...Crunch I heard something coming down the hill and then I saw this monster 5x5 coming down the hill. So I through the rifle up on him and rested my rifle on my knee and I was watching him for a while and then he went behind some brush. Then I aimed my rifle where he would be coming out. Sure enough I see his big rack coming through the brush and there he was at 60 yards walking so I let out a little whistle and he stopped so I click the safety off put the cross hairs behind his shoulder and pulled the trigger. He did a little jump ran 18 yards and fell there. I waited about 5 minutes calm down and then started walking down the hill we got up to the 225 pound monster 5x5 buck and then we got some pictures with him and then started the gutting process. Then we heard 3 gun shots go off and now this is only about 150 yards up the hill. Then my dad and I heard something running right towards us and pretty soon this big 5x4 buck runs 14 yards right passed us and we thought that was a little weird but cool and then we heard people talking up the hill from us and then we saw a guy walking towards us. He didn't know we were there and then when he got 100 yards away he looked up and saw us and then he came down and was looking at my buck and said congratulations and then he asked if we had seen a buck come through here. So we told him that we had one run right by us and we showed him right where it had gone to and then we saw it and he shot it and dropped it within 80 yards of my buck.

Thank you for reading this article about my first buck I hope you enjoyed it!

John Murphy

The thoughts from a Hunter on Anti Hunters.

The Hunter’s do help
I’ve heard people saying that hunters are cruel, and not only calling us cruel they also go against what we do, and in fact they think that we hunt to be cruel and inhumane. This is in fact a lie and the folks who run against us are called PETA members. I’m against animal cruelty but hunting is fast killing and a necessity to the populations of America, one man told me that he wishes he could kill me simply because I was turkey hunting. Now this is sick… I really don’t see how anyone can even think of killing another human being who hasn’t done anything to another person or committed a major crime.
Why is it that these PETA members are against hunters, butcher farms, dairy farms and much more, now I don’t understand how they can have these beliefs and still live in the planet Earth?
Here is a simple example of how it works.
A hunter or average person will hunt or buy their own meat where PETA protest this act; now PETA is all for vegetarians but you must understand vegetarians still kill animals; for example when you buy vegetables you are supporting international farmers who kill the bugs (still living creatures) with chemicals before harvest of the crops, and as the vegetables are being driven across states there will be many birds, bugs and occasional deer hit on the road by the people hauling the substances. Not to mention that I have farmers call me all the time during elk season trying to have us come out and fill our tag(s) on elk eating their crops. The point is that there is no doubt we all kill animals and it can’t be helped. It’s a part of life and has always been that way.
The newest activity PETA protests against is: wearing shoes and belts along with owning wallets. The reason they protest this is because leather is made of animal hide, and fact is if you are buying a rubber shoe from Nike or Reebok you are still supporting the same company which produces leather equipment. There is also nothing wrong with using leather because this just shows that the animals butchered in the United States are fully used and not wasted in anyway which is another thing hunters are against.
One thing PETA members recently succeeded in doing was bringing wolves back to the USA which was a bad idea. They believed the decrease of deer populations in many states is due to people, but recent studies have proven the decrease in deer and elk population is due to the overpopulation of cougars which is a separate issue because you can’t hunt them with dogs (the only way) which is a banned method because they didn’t think animals had enough of a chance, and this creates perfect cougar hunting grounds. A cougar will kill 5 deer a week and a hunter kills one deer a year in the west. The cougars are highly populated in the west and are killing all of our other animals. Now that wolves have been introduced to the United States especially in Idaho and Montana along with other states in the Northwest and Midwest; have practically eliminated elk in areas that used to be highly populated.
Now myself along with many other fishermen and hunters support PETA in some ways as far as animal cruelty where animals are locked up and starved to death or put to death in extremely inhumane ways but as long as the United States butchering corps. Keep using electric rods which are efficient and humane there is nothing wrong with eating meat from commercial farms nor is there anything wrong with killing and eating your own stock or wild game.
We hunter’s put the most funds of all citizens in the USA towards wild animal habitat and preservation. We support the Oregon Dept. of Fish and Wildlife for preserving healthy habitats for the animals to reproduce and forage in. the Dept. of Fish and Wildlife put limits on all game animals to; They allow a certain amount of animals to be shot which won’t eradicate the population nor will the population explode, and instead we keep the population in check. Also the animals won’t overpopulate and get diseases or run out of forage. And we also try to specialize in taking the very old animals which will fill the freezers yet they would die within 2 years from starvation and old age which is a very hard slow death to an animal. And at that age they don’t reproduce so they are just eating the healthy animal’s food.


As you can see we don’t try to create pain in this old world we try to help it, and preserve some of this world for the animals. We do take a little from this world by killing one or two deer every year. But all we are doing is keeping the population in check and keep eating healthy wild game. Thanks for reading my observational journal!
Morgan Murphy

Well it's a long story but, I didn't get a turkey cause they outsmarted me so I

decided it would be a good time to take the bowfishing kit out for the first time. I

was able to get John and Patrick to come. So we stopped about 1/2 a mile off
Well it's a long story but, I didn't get a turkey cause they outsmarted me so I

decided it would be a good time to take the bowfishing kit out for the first time. I

was able to get John and Patrick to come. So we stopped about 1/2 a mile off

from the ponds and hiked in.

When we got to the ponds John and Pat were catching bluegills right and left.

I knew my success wouldn't be that great but I made a goal to myself to shoot

at least one good sized bluegill. I knocked my arrow and shot at the first small

bluegill. Missed and I think that happened about 27 to 35 times before finding a

bluegill that looked like a monster! I drew and guessed where I should aim... He

was facing me but going lower to where he almost disappeared and I figured "it's

now or never" so I released the arrow and the string moved about 2 feet in the

water I knew something good happened! I pulled the line up and the biggest

bluegill I have ever seen was on my arrow and boy was I glad. I had finally

succeeded in sticking a fish with my bow and taking a waste-fish out of the pond

to!
from the ponds and hiked in.

When we got to the ponds John and Pat were catching bluegills right and left.

I knew my success wouldn't be that great but I made a goal to myself to shoot

at least one good sized bluegill. I knocked my arrow and shot at the first small

bluegill. Missed and I think that happened about 27 to 35 times before finding a

bluegill that looked like a monster! I drew and guessed where I should aim... He

was facing me but going lower to where he almost disappeared and I figured "it's

now or never" so I released the arrow and the string moved about 2 feet in the

water I knew something good happened! I pulled the line up and the biggest

bluegill I have ever seen was on my arrow and boy was I glad. I had finally

succeeded in sticking a fish with my bow and taking a waste-fish out of the pond

to!

Look at images here:
http://www.tripleactionoutdoors.com/morgan-murphy-bowfishing-bluegill.html

Evening Expiration.

April 26 2008 It was about 4:00 p.m. when Patrick, Morgan and I decided to try a evening turkey hunt. so we got a ride down to they ol' hunting ranch and split up, Morgan went to his ground blind and I went in mine that was about 150 yards from Morgan’s blind, Patrick was video taping me so we just waited for a while never calling and we waited for about 2 hours. Then I heard what sounded like a strutting tom so I turned around and saw a nice tom working his way up the hill following a hen... (notice on the video he comes to the Flambeau decoy) and went up right where the hen did so I looked through my Nikon pro-staff range finder and it read 30 yards so I drew back my 61 pound Martin Cheetah bow and put the 30 yard pin right on his wing bone and released the arrow with a smoke broad-heads on the end of it and it hit a branch in front of the turkey and deflected my arrow a little bit and the arrow was a little farther back than I had hoped so we went up looked at where I had shot him at and tried to find my arrow but it was gone so we decided to head down were we last saw the bird and started looking for him and then Morgan called saying he found my bird. But it somehow had enough energy to take off again! And so he told Patrick and I to go over to where he was and so we did and he showed us the direction of where it went and we started walking through the woods and we soon came to a little meadow and I was just going into it and I see this turkey start running so I drew back cause I new it was my bird so he stopped at about 55 yards and I put another shot in him and that was the end of that hunt.He weighed 18 lbs 7.5 inch beard ¾ inch spurs.
I told Pat that there was a tom behind us and we got situated for the shot just incase we got one so we were waiting for a while and watching him and he goes up the hill out of sight and so I thought we had lost him but then I seen the hen that he was following him. Come up onto the old logging road at about 43 yards and it just kept walking towards us and then went up the hill at about 30 yards and passed on by. Then I was looking for the tom just incase he was still following the hen and sure enough around this little bush, which was on a logging road comes the tom in full strut and now he is at about 80 yards. Coming our way and so we watched him until he got to about 40 yards.
(notice on the video he comes to the Flambeau decoy) and went up right where the hen did so I looked through my Nikon pro-staff range finder and it read 30 yards so I drew back my 61 pound Martin Cheetah bow and put the 30 yard pin right on his wing bone and released the arrow with a smoke broad-heads on the end of it and it hit a branch in front of the turkey and deflected my arrow a little bit and the arrow was a little farther back than I had hoped so we went up looked at where I had shot him at and tried to find my arrow but it was gone so we decided to head down were we last saw the bird and started looking for him and then Morgan called saying he found my bird. But it somehow had enough energy to take off again! And so he told Patrick and I to go over to where he was and so we did and he showed us the direction of where it went and we started walking through the woods and we soon came to a little meadow and I was just going into it and I see this turkey start running so I drew back cause I new it was my bird so he stopped at about 55 yards and I put another shot in him and that was the end of that hunt.He weighed 18 lbs 7.5 inch beard ¾ inch spurs.

One Week of White-Tails

_____One Week of Whitetail_____

My brother (John) and I were sitting at home on a November of 2007 and thinking about how unfortunate we were because we bow hunted all season long for 2 months and didn’t even get to draw our bows back on a deer, we both knew it was because we had black tail deer which were harder to hunt than white tail deer farther east than Oregon. We then got to thinking that it would cost a little bit of money but we could go visit our cousins in Idaho because their season went until December of 2007, we soon gathered up our savings and were going over to Idaho. Even our dad wanted to go and watch us and our mom and sister were going to visit our Aunt while Uncle John and our cousins Brandon and Derek brought us hunting to their spots and they would be hunting too!
Within 10 hours of driving we were at their house, we greeted each other and ate dinner. Our cousins were filled with anxiety for the next day we were going to a place called Mika’s bay in Idaho, and boy that night was the longest of all! We passed the time by watching white-tail deer tips and tactics. By midnight we fell asleep and soon woke up for the morning. We got some pancakes for breakfast thanks to our mom and Aunt Donna, and then started up the truck and headed off for what we did not know would be the start of 60 consecutive hours of cold hard Idaho white tail hunting.
On the way to the hunting spot we went over the general rules “boys don’t shoot at ANYTHING unless you are 100% SURE OF YOUR TARGET, make sure to take your time and make an ethical shot (we already knew all this but it’s more comforting to be sure), (Uncle John) you guys know that here in Idaho you can shoot does or bucks (male or female deer) you can also use your bows or guns here you are not limited to one or the other.
The trucked stop to the side of an old dirt road surrounded by hundreds of miles that were public land we could hunt on. We hoped out of the truck and opened the bed of the truck I grabbed my unique 30-06 and then we were off little John (my brother) was going with dad and Derek, while Uncle John, Brandon and I were going in our own separate group.
Soon we spotted a buck but he ran through a meadow where we were unable to get a shot. We then walked up a trail closed to all motorized vehicles figuring no lazy rifle hunter’s would go up there and road hunt illegally. A half hour later of hiking up the trail we topped the mountain this was about 2.5 miles from the truck and 3 miles of hiking. I got off the trail with Brandon and we crawled through the brush peering our heads from the brush, every 30 paces to see if any deer were eating in the grass, I peeked up and saw a doe she was taking a bight of buck brush. I really didn’t want to take a doe because it was the first day and we already saw so many deer, it then got our scent and ran to the edge of a 300 ft drop to a lake, I put my crosshairs on it but never shot partially because I wanted to see what it would do at the drop off, soon it jumped off the cliff and took twenty foot jumps downhill it went all the way down the nearly vertical cliff never stopping and made it to the bottom, and I then turn my head and looked at my cousin satisfied with all the excitement we saw throughout the morning. We walked down the trail a bit more but never saw another deer. However we did see some elk and moose droppings.
Little John called up and said he called in a 5x5 buck to twenty yards! But when he tried to raise the rifle it ran off and spooked. He then said we were to meet him at the truck and to move to a new spot. We hunted the rest of the day seeing no more deer and retired to the lodge.
The next morning I hunted out of a ground blind while sitting there I realized it was really cold! I was shivering badly due to the cold weather -1 degrees, I had my bow today and it soon got light out, after about an hour of waiting I heard trotting to the front of me so I raised my bow and drew it back… A doe and her old yearling came running out of the brush, I grunted to stop them and sure enough they stopped, and I settled my pin on the old does shoulder but she then started running again. I was unfortunate and missed that awesome opportunity so I waited, I soon heard a buck grunt so I made a grunt with my voice and sure enough he wasn’t 8 yards away this monster buck was walking around, I drew my bow and had it on his shoulders, but the buck was through too much brush for a bow. So he walked off unharmed, the rest of the day there was nothing at all, so I headed back to the house. That afternoon I hunted in our Uncles treestand but saw nothing.
This following morning I went back to the blind, unfortunately there was nothing at all in the woods. Until I heard a loud crack in the brush then another and another soon there was an old cow elk with her yearling, it was elk season and I could have easily shot her at 40 yards but I had no tag, and the sad thing is that she was to die soon anyway because her leg was broken and twisted completely around to the point that she couldn’t hardly walk. She should have been shot so she didn’t have to live like that but I was not going to do anything illegal, and so I let her walk off which ended that morning. The same evening I went out and sat by an old cedar tree alone enjoying the chipmunks and birds heading to their beds, and watching the sunset over the snowy mountains, I then heard crashing through the brush coming right towards me. This was scary because I knew there were a few grizzly bears around and packs of wolves, I had nothing but a bow so I crept against a tree and drew my bow back and what tops the hill is a 1200 pound bull elk that walks and stops broadside at 20 yards he was a 4x4 and it was elk season, however I had no elk tag and this was so unfortunate because I could shoot out to 50 yards. He stood there and harems of cows were with him. I the bull looked right into my eyes and stared a hair rising stare then snorted steam from his huge wet nose. He then trotted down the hill with his harem. This day was ended for hunting so Uncle John and Aunt Donna brought the whole crew of us up the mountain to show us around, we ended up finding a cow moose and got 15 yards from her. We took allot of photos but then soon headed back to the lodge.
This was the second to last day of hunting and none of us got a deer, we headed out to the place we went the first day, but this time in a new spot. Uncle John Brandon and I headed to a big field. We saw lots of deer but never could pull the trigger L, we hunted the whole day and I was getting worried I wouldn’t shoot anything. So I was back with the old 30-06.
We got word little John shot a doe and he needed help dragging it out of the ditch, Brandon and Uncle John along with myself were laughing hysterically because John was bragging that there was no way he would shoot a doe. We reached the trail and started walking down it... Soon we met little John and dad and they brought us to where the deer was and NO it was no little doe it was a friggin HUGE 5x5 buck that john shot. We all had fun taking care of the deer and could only hope that tomorrow (the last day) I would get a deer.

The last morning I headed out with dad and we were going to hunt hard to try and get one on the last day. I hunted all day not seeing one deer. Finally we were heading back to the trail almost running because we had 20 minutes to get back to the truck to get to church on time. I suddenly halted dad and said look, there was a doe grazing in a meadow and I’m not kidding you we had 15 minutes till the hunt was over, I raised the crosshairs clicked the safety off and put the sights right in the middle of the neck it was facing me but I knew with a gun she wouldn’t go far, I aimed and pulled the trigger and bam she hit the floor like a sack of potato’s and I was happier than a kid in a candy store dad patted my on the back and I couldn’t stop thanking him, we walked up and happily along with quickly gutted the deer and brought him to the truck, I really love Idaho it’s just a bit cold… I cannot tell you how fun it is to be in the outdoors and wish you could experience the fun I’ve had!
This is the end of my story and as I finish up the story I’m eating a venison burger from that Idaho deer that was so hard earned and I would like to say that it’s often that you will not get things until you almost give up. Look at me it was the last 15 minutes and I had given up all hope I just prayed to God I might see one more deer and look what happened!
I would like to thank everyone in the story but most of all I would like to thank God for letting me have this great meat and experiences along with allowing me to do things allot of teenagers cannot.
And by the way we did make it to church managing to only be 2 minutes late.

Morgan's Buck

John's Buck