California Deer bumped by mountain lion

[blacktailcentral]

Hello fellow roksliders, i have game cameras out year round and had a few bucks consistently hitting a camera every 2-3 days...... then a mountain lion cruised through and its been 13 days since i have seen a deer. How long would you guess till the deer are back or are they bumped out of this general area?

 

[JFK]

Hard to really say, but if that lion is there they will probably steer clear of that area. But then again, if the lion pushes the deer out he’s going to have to move out as well to hunt, and you may see those bucks come back in. No hard and fast rules when it comes to animal movement.

 

[blacktailcentral]

Hard to really say, but if that lion is there they will probably steer clear of that area. But then again, if the lion pushes the deer out he’s going to have to move out as well to hunt, and you may see those bucks come back in. No hard and fast rules when it comes to animal movement.

This general area seems to have lions cruise through about every 3 months, but it seems the deer come back due to it having good habitat.

 

[MTtrout]

I’m not convinced that a lion passing through would alternate the deers behavior that much. Especially if there was no negative confrontation. Guessing they at smell lions often and are well aware of their presence. Once hunting in UT on opening morning rifle we heard a lion and coyote going at it in the dark. Saw fresh lion scratching on trees and found a canyon that we dubbed slaughter gulch due to all the lion deer kills. My dad and I got lucky enough to see the lion a few days after opener about 20 yards from us. It was following us! With that said we still saw lots of does and killed bucks in the same area that week. No doubt the presence of a top predator alters ungulate behavior but to me 2 weeks makes me think they may have just moved to a different summer range.

 

[blacktailcentral]

I’m not convinced that a lion passing through would alternate the deers behavior that much. Especially if there was no negative confrontation. Guessing they at smell lions often and are well aware of their presence. Once hunting in UT on opening morning rifle we heard a lion and coyote going at it in the dark. Saw fresh lion scratching on trees and found a canyon that we dubbed slaughter gulch due to all the lion deer kills. My dad and I got lucky enough to see the lion a few days after opener about 20 yards from us. It was following us! With that said we still saw lots of does and killed bucks in the same area that week. No doubt the presence of a top predator alters ungulate behavior but to me 2 weeks makes me think they may have just moved to a different summer range.

This is in a blacktail zone in california so the summer range and winter range do not really differ. Most of the blacktails ive seen live in about a 1-2 mile radius except when its rutting time. Generally for a zone it starts in September

 

[MTtrout]

The way I used summer range is misleading. I should have said just a different area where they are currently hanging out. Nonetheless I hope they show up again.

 

[blacktailcentral]

The way I used summer range is misleading. I should have said just a different area where they are currently hanging out. Nonetheless I hope they show up again.

Me too! Ive got about 15 days since january developing this spot, cutting trail, and packing in water

 

[Bugger]

That lion is long forgotten by them. They probably just switched up their food or started liking a different trail. Get on the glass or put up some more cams, you’ll find em.