In my experience, if you are trailing a lion and you happen upon a kill your day can be really good or result in a huge head ache. Let me explain....
The location around a lion kill will vary depending on terrain, weather and the animal it killed. Unless the lion is feeding when you show up it can be very confusing for hound and hunter alike. Almost all kills I have been to have a feeding area with multiple outgoing and incoming trails. Some of the complicating factors are:
- Too many tracks. Especially if it is a female with kittens as there will be more trails as she leaves to make another kill while her kittens are left to eat.
- Temprature. If it is warm the kill will spoil and the lion is likely to move on to find fresh groceries. The colder the temperature the less traffic as they tend to hold up when the temperature drops.
- Size of the kill. If the lion kills a large animal like a moose there will be more track and collateral sign (track and scent incidental to the kill. coyote, birds, etc) as a large animal will be harder for the lion to move, cover and defend.
Jake and Bud treed after sorting out a kill
How to sort it all out
If all goes well your dogs will sort out the tracks and may only do a few small loops before moving out the fresh trail. I usually let them try and if they are unsuccessful then I will step in and help. If it sounds like the dogs are doing loop after loop and keep returning to the kill then I will take the following steps:
- Wait for them and tie them back. The longer you wait the harder it will be to find the outgoing tracks as your dogs are going to pound it out.
- Take a dog and start walking a large loop around the kill. If the dog doesn't pick it up make another larger loop.
The number and distance you travel depends only on how bad you want to get this track going. Most times after about three loops your dog will pick up the trail and you can go back and turn the rest in. This has worked for me in the dirt and in poor snow condiditons. I found that I only had to do this a few time and my dogs caught on and started looping on their own.
Tom lion with a belly full of deer
Scent at a kill
Depending on the age of the kill and the amount of time the lion spent there, there could potentially be lion scent everywhere. If you cold trailed the lion to the kill and it is in a tree it can be hard for a dog to locate due to the amount of scent in the area. Once your dogs have learned this looping technique and keep returning to the last area they had scent their chances of locating the tree increase significantly as they are likely to wind it rather than trail it to the tree. It is also important to try and reduce the hunter and dog traffic in the area so the one dog can work and you should have no problem sorting it all out.
Left him to run another day!
