A few years ago I was hunting javalina outside of Tombstone, AZ. I was hunting a creek bottom and came across a trail with some hot sign on it, so I followed it out of the bottoms. I followed the sign to the top of a small mesa and saw the tracks disperse where the animals got off the trail and just foraged all over the mesa. The sign didn't look as good up there as it had in the creek bottom so I cut around the base of the mesa for any other trails I could set up on, without any luck. I finally got back to the trail I had come out on and backtracked my sign back into the creek bottom. About 15 feet into the tree line I saw rather large paw prints on top of my footprints. I backtracked myself for a good mile or so and the cougar had been following right in my footprints at least that long. I say 'at least that long' because I didn't follow any further- I beat feet to my truck, drove to Safeway and bought a cougar tag. I didn't plan on hunting mountain lions, but if I saw one following me, it was damn sure going to die. And yes, I always carry an N-frame .357 when I'm out hunting.
I wound up shooting a nice sow a few days later, not far from the trail to the little mesa. I never saw another paw print for the rest of my trip.
Topic: Strange or Unexplained (Read 12435 times)
