A quick movie clip from  DJ Rankosky’s trail cam in Western Montana.  A Grizzly bear sow and cub.  

 hwqile I’m down at Tejon ranch chasing hogs, I’m gonna let my buddy from Montana, DJ Rankosky tell you all a story complete with pictures, about a couple of bull elk he has gotten to know over the years on his trail cameras:

One of the things I like to do with my trail cams is hike them into some remote basins and set them up on wallows and springs. Obviously I get some pretty neat elk pictures and bear pictures, but I am more surprised at what I don’t get. Not one picture of a lion, lynx, wolverine, or other small carnivores like weasels or martens.

Like I said, I get lots of elk, and two bulls stirred my interest in the summer of 2007, one I dubbed “toad sticker” and the other “thirds”. The “toad sticker” bull had a freakishly long left second tine, it stuck out to the side like a sword. Overall he was a nice six, long main beams but very narrow, not being 36 inches wide. “Thirds” was a nice bull, the big dog in the basin; his third tines were much longer than any other bull I had ever seen in this country. They never showed up together, but “thirds” had a little tag-along rag horn that was always with him. Both bulls played into archery season 2007, but “toad sticker” is the most interesting story.

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Well DJ Rankosky has been out to check his cameras again. Here is what is roaming the hills of NW Montana, (using a road none the less)

Big Coyote…

This one AIN”T a Coyote though…Yep that’s a wolf.

There is more than one…

The predators aren’t JUST Canines in the winter

While many Western hunters are getting cabin fever after the hunting seasons close, DJ Rankosky of  Kalispell, Montana is putting out scouting cameras in his hunting areas.

Scouting cameras have been widely adopted by Midwest Whitetail hunters, but see limited use in the West in the vast tracts of public land. When I asked DJ how and why he got started he replied:

“I hunted this brushy country since I was 12. Spent lots of time scouting, out hiking, all that. Two kids come along and that changes a guy’s priorites. They are the most important thing in my life, along with my wife of course. So I started thinking I needed something to help me scout.”

DJ’s early experiments with Game cameras were a learning experience. He finally began building his own “homebrew” cameras.

“My friend bought a Leaf River cam, we played around with it, got some pics, but it was just so slow on the trigger, and bulky. Started surfing the internet, found some homebrew websites and got hooked. I have built about 25-30 cams, I run about 13-15 during the spring and summer. It is so fun to see what is there when I am not. ”

Where DJ hunts is thick and brushy and that part of the state is not as conducive to long range glassing as other more open parts of the West.

“Northwest Montana is tough to scout anyway, you can see the sign, but just don’t see the game like in other parts of the state and country, you can be 20 yards away from an elk, and not see it! Even glassing, you get a glimpse of game but never a good look before it’s into the next patch of alder. ”

DJ has captured some unbelievable pictures from his cameras. Some of the most memorable have been of the predators that share his hunting area.

In November of 2007 he found a mule deer carcass and set up a camera, hoping to catch pictures of scavengers such as coyotes. When he downloaded the pictures he was surprised to find these BIG toothy buggers in his hunting area:

He even kept tabs on them when spring rolled around. He set up a camera on a logging deck where the grass came early (Probably to catch Deer and Elk). The family unit of Grizzlies was back.

Over the next few weeks, I’ll give you folks a taste of DJ’s remote scouting. Perhaps it will encourage folks to get out into their hunting areas and see what’s happening when they are not there….

It doesn’t happen very often, but when hunters are calling to elk, sometimes it attracts other predators.  Steve Tintzman and Barry Lemon know first hand.  While calling to a bugling bull elk, with a cow elk call, a cougar was attracted to the sound and Was stalking Tintzman.  Lemon shot it once with his traditional longbow just yards from his hunting partner.

“As it got closer and closer, I saw it much too low to the ground,” Lemon said. “Steve was behind me cow calling. When it got about 25 yards away, I saw that it was mountain lion.”

It was coming right at the camouflage-clad hunter.

“Maybe 15 yards away, it crouched down low and it was flipping its tail,” he said. “It was looking beyond me. Its eyes were glued on Steve.”

The big cat stopped, slowly turned and began walking away.

“I thought, ‘That’s a good sign,’ ” Lemon said. “I thought I’d just let it walk away.”

Suddenly, the mountain lion turned and began creeping right toward Tintzman, who had no idea the animal was anywhere near. Lemon began to inch backwards. He already had an arrow nocked in the string of his traditional longbow.

“It was crouched down low and heading right at Steve,” Lemon said. “My mind was racing. All my experience in the outdoors told me the lion could cover 15 yards to zero in a matter of seconds. It was moving fast.”

The Full Story in the Missoulan