IN THE TRACKS OF COUGARS

Ray Clements took this cougar Jan. 7 north of the Fox Hill landfill. The cougar may have been the one that killed a shitzu dog near La Grande on Jan. 2. (Photo/MINDY CLEMENTS).

Dick Mason

The Observer

kiing, snowmobiling and snowboarding.

The first snow of the season brings such activities to mind for many people who enjoy winter outdoor activities.

But not for Ray Clements of La Grande. His winter avocation is out of the ordinary.

Snow transforms Clements into a ghost buster.

Clements is the the rare person in Oregon who successfully hunts cougars, an animal some call ghost cats because of their elusive nature.

Each year hunters take at least 500 cougars in Oregon, but almost all are incidental kills — mountain lions harvested by hunters who are after other big game animals.

Clements is the exception. He hunts only for cougars throughout the winter. He starts as soon as he can track them after the first snowfall. His is no easy task since hunters have not been allowed to use dogs to track cougars in Oregon since late 1994.

Clements started hunting cougars about 11 years ago. He called in a cougar that year but wasn't able to take it. Still his interest was piqued.

"I was hooked after the first time,'' Clements said.

Today Clements calls and tracks cougars. He reads their tracks as if they were pages of a thriller. This skill allowed Clements to pen what may have been the final chapter of a story that recently tugged the hearts of dog lovers throughout the Grande Ronde Valley. It involved a shitzu killed by a cougar at 2:30 a.m. Jan. 2 at the home of Mark and Sarah Tsiatsos on Black Hawk Trail Lane north of La Grande.

Five days later Clements started searching for the cougar. He spotted a fresh track in less than two hours.

"I knew it was fresh because it had quit snowing 30 minutes ago and there were no snowflakes in the track,'' Clements said.

Forty-five minutes later he had killed the mountain lion, firing at it from a distance of 50 yards after it walked into an opening in a brushy area. The cougar was three-quarters of a mile north of the Fox Hill landfill.

The stomach contents of the cougar, an 81-pound female, indicate that it may have been the one that killed the dog, according to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

This cougar is the second Clements has taken. The first was killed Dec. 5, 1998, in the Catherine Creek Unit. It was one for the record book. The cougar's head was scored at 14 13/16, which ranked 53rd on the state all-time list according to the 2002 edition of the "Record Book for Oregon's Big Game."

Clements' goal is to take a third cougar.

"After that I will still hunt (for cougars) but not quite as hard.''

Despite his recent success Clements admits that cougar hunting is frustrating.

"It is not real productive,'' he said. "I feel like I'm spinning my wheels sometimes.''

Clements does most of his hunting on his all-terrain vehicle. He rides through an area looking for cougar tracks. More often than not he finds cougar tracks in the snow.

"If I go out 10 times in the hills and mountains around this valley I will find tracks eight times,'' Clements said.

Clements is finding more tracks than he used to. This is particularly true near the Grande Ronde River and in the Starkey area.

"I've seen more cougar tracks there than I've ever seen.''

He emphasized, though, that cougars can be found in all portions of the hills and mountains around the Grande Ronde Valley.

But the odds of finding cougar tracks are best in areas where there are deer and elk since those animals are a top food source, Clements said.

When looking for cougars, Clements said to look for tracks without claw marks. Ordinarily none are present because cougars retract their claws when walking, although claw marks are sometimes found on hillsides because the cats will use their claws to get traction when climbing.

Cougar tracks are always in a straight line. This is in stark contrast to coyote tracks which zig zag.

An intriguing feature of cougar tracks is that they seem to show a two-legged animal — a cougar's back foot lands exactly in the print of the front foot.

Clements is amazed at how elusive cougars can be even when their tracks indicate they are nearby. He recalled that once he spotted cougar tracks and followed them around in what turned out to be almost a figure eight. Ten minutes later he came back around and found that the cougar had just walked over its own tracks.

Clements regularly calls cougars, imitating things such as a fawn in distress. He knows of people who have accidentally drawn in cougars behind them when calling for other animals such as turkeys. He is always leery when calling.

"I watch my back. It's an eerie feeling.''