There are few states which allow mountain lion hunts and Montana has some great areas for hunting these cats. The state of Montana has recently converted to a draw permit system for lions for Regions 1 & 2, arguably the best regions in the state for lion hunting. If you are trophy hunting designate hunting districts 102, 103, 120 or 130 as your choice in the permit application process. If you want to go lion hunting for sure any given year, we have the exclusive permit for hunting district 132, which is still governed by a quota system. Hunters making this choice have an outstanding chance at a great cat without having to draw a special permit. This area has not hit the quota in the last few years, but we only take a few hunters each year, so book early for this one!
Hunting for mountain lions is totally different that hunting for elk, deer or bear. Your day begins when you are awakened, perhaps as early as 3:00 am, have a light breakfast and join our houndsmen who instruct you how to "cut" a track. Tracking mountain lion involves driving through a myriad of US Forest Service, and private timber company roads, using spotlights mounted to the cat truck, and trying to eyeball a track from many yards away. Once a track is found, dogs are put on it to see if it carries a scent, if so they're off and the race is on!
It can take several hours for the dogs to find and tree the cat, and then once treed, the works begins to find the dogs and treed cat in time before it escapes. If we haven't treed a cat by 2:00 pm, we typically quit for the day, as we don't want to hunt in the dark, so hunters have the rest of the afternoon to relax, tour around the area or rest up. The weather plays a key role, since if there is no snow it is virtually impossible to cut tracks.
Hunt duration is typically 7 days, but we'll extend up to 10 days if we haven't got a hunter his or her cat. While there are never guarantees in hunting, hunter success rate with us in the past has been nearly 100%. The skill of our dogs, the quality of the area we have rights to hunt, and quality and skill of the houndsmen all play a role in our success rates at Swan Mountain Outfitters. During this time of year, we can upgrade the hunt and go for Buffalo on a private ranch, and hunters can actually ski at the local resorts before or after the hunt.
