A lion I named El Diablo

[Radar]

In January 2015, I went on my first Mountain Lion hunt near Glenwood NM. My guide was a full time rancher and part time lion hunter. This hunt was a 5 day hunt on horseback. The weather did not cooperate and we had no snow, so we dry land hunted. We covered vast amounts of land on horseback hoping the dogs would hit a hot track. The terrain was very rugged and we spent atleast 4 hours a day in the saddle and the rest of the time was leading horses out some tough spots. Temperatures never got above 50 degrees the whole time. A picture of my ride sweating after coming up out of a canyon. It was 38 degrees that day.

[Radar]

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[Radar]

I seen some of the purtiest country ever and enjoyed the hunt. Unfortunately a lion was not to be seen and I come home empty handed. I paid the man for the hunt and tipped him 10 percent. On my way back home, I spent a lot of time thinking about the hunt and I knew that sometime I would come back.

[Ironman]

Heck yeah! Another Radar adventure. IM IN!

[Ironman]

Uh oh! I may have spoken too soon.

Is that the end?

[Radar]

In January 2017, I met my new guide in Capitan NM. Dan is a full time guide and at one time he was a professional snow boarder. He had a bad pile up in a competition and got busted up real bad. After months of recovery, he was able to walk again but one leg is somewhat shorter than the other and he wears a thicker sole boot on that leg to keep him walking straight. I will also say that boy is tougher than hammered hell. He became a full time guide and works for several outfitters. After we met, a plan was laid out. Once again the weather was not cooperating but snow was due in a few days.

[Radar]

If y'all dont know, a lion hunt is much easier when there is fresh snow. Tracks are easier to find and once tracks are found the dogs are released to chase the lion till it tires and goes up a tree.

We hunted hard for three days, hiking and driving in the mountains near Carrizozo and White Oak. There is an old mine in those mountains and a lot of mine roads and fire roads.

On the second to the last day the snow began to fall. Dan cut the hunt off early that day. He said he would pick me up at midnight and we would start diving those old roads looking for tracks.

[Ironman]

I'm listening.

[Radar]

Now Dan drove a 90's model half ton 4wd Dodge pick up and he had a home made dog box that took up the whole bed. I reckon it could hold 10 or 12 dogs and had storage in the top of it for his hunting tack. It was the typical hunting guide truck, the floor board was ankle deep with trash of all sorts and smelled like a jar of catfish bait.

Anyway, about 4 in the morning we found a set of lion tracks going across the road. Dan stopped the truck and grabbed his flashlight and told me to sit there. He never took a gun just the flashlight and I watched him disappear in the dark. After about twenty minutes I started to get worried and thought maybe the fool had got ate or something.
He popped back up and said "I got good and bad news, there is four lions down in that valley. Two are young ones and two adults." I asked what was bad and he said that the lions had been chasing elk and there was tracks everywhere and his dogs would not be able to sort it out.

[125Dad]

And then...

[Drycreek3189]

In for the outcome Cuz.......

[Radar]

Dan decided to drive the roads around the valley and see if we could find some tracks leading out of it. About 10 that morning we found a set of adult lion tracks coming out of the valley.

All the dogs had GPS tracking collars and each collar was numbered. The collars also have a sensor on them to tell you if the dogs are treed.

Dan turned the 7 dogs loose and kept two pups in the box. They hit the track and took off, after 15 minutes the dogs started running the track hard and they was a bawling and boo hooing. We sat and waited for about an hour and I asked Dan how far away the dogs was and he said two miles. He said that we needed to get up in the truck and head out. So we traveled the roads trying to stay close to the dogs.

[JES]

You are a hell of a story teller, really enjoyed your King Ranch hunt.

[Radar]

Well the dadgum GPS unit was not getting a good signal all the time and Dan would roll his winder down and stick his arm out the window looking for signal. I asked him again how far the dogs was and he said 9 miles. The dogs had been running that lion for over two hours now.

[Radar]

That Dodge truck started going faster and I knew something was up. He looked at his GPS and said "They treed and we got to go." I looked over at Dan and he had a death grip on the steering wheel. He was leaning forward and gassing that truck.

I bet we was going 30 mph on an old fire road that he said was short cut. All of the sudden the road was getting rougher and had ruts in it. We was going purty fast when we hit that wash out. I am fairly certain we was in air for a second because the truck got quiet and the trash in floor board was floating in air.