There's not many reports of bear in Central Texas. I'd vote for the cougar. They follow the deer population. Most rodents work the antlers over quite a bit. Wood rats, field mice and pack rats really like to gnaw on antlers.
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What Did This...Weird!
- Thread starter CaptnC
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I wish I had paid a bit more attention to the hide.
IMO a chupracabra is more likely than a bear, but it seems the front half still had the hide on it and the back half was inside out down past the hocks.
I plan to be back up there in February and I can check the carcass better.
One last interesting note...might be a coincident, but we had a pair of 70lb sows coming to our feeder like clock work. Between 6pm and 6:30pm everyday. I wired the carcass to the tree on the Dec 22nd, we came home on the 23rd...those two hog have not been back since the 22nd. I normally have 3,000 pictures on game camera if I'm gone for a couple weeks. On Jan 5th there was less than 700 pictures on the game camera.
I of course deleted the pictures while we sat in the stand the morning I pulled the card...before I had seen the deer carcass. BUT I recall and shown the long legged blurry picture to my wife...told her "coyote".
They jog past the camera a lot during the night and it is always blurry, but thinking back...I don't recall seeing the big fluffy tail!?!?
I've only seen pictures and videos but it seems they carry their tail low near every second of the day. Rarely raising it...coincident? Maybe maybe not!
IMO a chupracabra is more likely than a bear, but it seems the front half still had the hide on it and the back half was inside out down past the hocks.
I plan to be back up there in February and I can check the carcass better.
One last interesting note...might be a coincident, but we had a pair of 70lb sows coming to our feeder like clock work. Between 6pm and 6:30pm everyday. I wired the carcass to the tree on the Dec 22nd, we came home on the 23rd...those two hog have not been back since the 22nd. I normally have 3,000 pictures on game camera if I'm gone for a couple weeks. On Jan 5th there was less than 700 pictures on the game camera.
I of course deleted the pictures while we sat in the stand the morning I pulled the card...before I had seen the deer carcass. BUT I recall and shown the long legged blurry picture to my wife...told her "coyote".
They jog past the camera a lot during the night and it is always blurry, but thinking back...I don't recall seeing the big fluffy tail!?!?
I've only seen pictures and videos but it seems they carry their tail low near every second of the day. Rarely raising it...coincident? Maybe maybe not!
SealT5
Well-Known Member
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- Jan 11, 2016
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Yup. Everything from mice to owls will devour a carcass like that. Where I hunt you literally have to leave someone with the deer or coyotes will start tearing into your kill in the amount of time it take to walk 300yds to the truck. I've shot does Early in the hunt and had to shoot coyotes in order to keep hunting. Fun stuff
bigdaddyWSM
Well-Known Member
As will porcupines.
A number of years ago in east NC I shot a deer 120 yards from the stand. I was hunting on a logging path between two thick cut overs. Deer fell just off the edge of the path where the weeds etc. were about 3 feet high and I could not see the deer from the stand. I shot this deer about an hour and a half before dark. We can kill more than one deer a day so we always stay in the stand until after dark. There are no coyotes in this area, at least we have never seen one or any sign or heard any. When I got to the deer a total of just under 1 1/2 hrs after killed half of one ham had been eaten. My buddy and I figured it had to be either a fox or bobcat. A couple years later I killed a deer from the same stand at about the same yardage but deer falls in the path where I can see it. A little while after the kill I look down there and there is a fox standing up on my deer. I know it is going to start eating so it gets a 117 gr Sierra from my 25-06. Picked it right off my deer.
When I was in college I went home with my roommate to his home for a visit over Christmas break 1978. He lived in Indiana. His dad owned a big dairy farm and there were some feral dogs that were running in a pack on his farm and had killed one of his calves and were chasing his cows. There was a very deep snow but we decided we needed to go out and see if we could kill some of those dogs. His dad got out the big tractor that sat way off the ground and could get through the snow and we all piled on. He had seen the dogs in an area that was a low usually wet area that had lots of brush etc in it. We set up a L shaped ambush around this area and he drove the tractor into part of it. Out comes a bunch of dogs running and because there was about 6 inches of fresh snow on top of a frozen layer of ice that covered the other 4 or so feet it slowed the down and gave us better shots. We are all armed with shotguns shooting like #5 and 6 shot so killing them outright was a close range situation. We get three of them outright but do get a couple running off yelping. My roommate's brother in law was with us and he had a hog farm. He tied the dogs on the tractor to get them back to his truck and he took us to his hog farm just down the road. He said watch this and took the dogs and ripped open their gut with a knife and tossed them into the hog lot. It looked like a Tarzan movie when someone was being eaten by prana. They tore those dogs apart and ate them leaving nothing but bones in short order. Blew my mind.
When I was in college I went home with my roommate to his home for a visit over Christmas break 1978. He lived in Indiana. His dad owned a big dairy farm and there were some feral dogs that were running in a pack on his farm and had killed one of his calves and were chasing his cows. There was a very deep snow but we decided we needed to go out and see if we could kill some of those dogs. His dad got out the big tractor that sat way off the ground and could get through the snow and we all piled on. He had seen the dogs in an area that was a low usually wet area that had lots of brush etc in it. We set up a L shaped ambush around this area and he drove the tractor into part of it. Out comes a bunch of dogs running and because there was about 6 inches of fresh snow on top of a frozen layer of ice that covered the other 4 or so feet it slowed the down and gave us better shots. We are all armed with shotguns shooting like #5 and 6 shot so killing them outright was a close range situation. We get three of them outright but do get a couple running off yelping. My roommate's brother in law was with us and he had a hog farm. He tied the dogs on the tractor to get them back to his truck and he took us to his hog farm just down the road. He said watch this and took the dogs and ripped open their gut with a knife and tossed them into the hog lot. It looked like a Tarzan movie when someone was being eaten by prana. They tore those dogs apart and ate them leaving nothing but bones in short order. Blew my mind.
Blackdirt Cowboy
Well-Known Member
I'd say you have a mountain lion or a jaguarundi. I'm in Falls County, not too far from Comanche, and I've personally seen both cats prowling our area. I thought I was crazy when I first saw them, but confirmed with the game warden that both species are in fact living here.
As to your pictures, I have a deer feeder in my back yard. Last fall I had 15-20 deer consistently coming to the feeder, then overnight, they just quit. I found out a week or two later that a neighbor a mile away caught a picture of a mountain lion on his security cameras. I theorized that the mountain lion moved in and the deer left. I wish you still had that blurry picture to confirm what you had, but my guess is a big cat.
As to your pictures, I have a deer feeder in my back yard. Last fall I had 15-20 deer consistently coming to the feeder, then overnight, they just quit. I found out a week or two later that a neighbor a mile away caught a picture of a mountain lion on his security cameras. I theorized that the mountain lion moved in and the deer left. I wish you still had that blurry picture to confirm what you had, but my guess is a big cat.
The blurry picture...I can still see it in my minds eye. It was certainly taller and slimmer than any of the coyotes I've caught on camera. It also was not moving as fast too. The coyotes are always moving very fast. This one was moving slower, but fast enough it almost made it complete across the field of view of the camera before it took the photo.
Any way I think it was a big cat that covered the deer carcass. I can't wait to go see if it has came back.
Any way I think it was a big cat that covered the deer carcass. I can't wait to go see if it has came back.
RunningBexar
Member
Seen Pack Rats and don't forget about our Fire Ant Population they'll clean meat to the bone. Them Chupacabra's are pretty nasty also 
RunningBexar
Member
Life story here... Hogs do eat meat as most people don't realize, but some time ago I lost a bet with y Father-In-law, I had just shot a big bore coon off a gut pile and brought it home to skin it out, he bet me his hogs wouldn't eat that Raccoon, guess what - they wouldn't eat it - they just pushed it down the wash out at the bottom of the pen.
Possum Cop
Well-Known Member
I put a trail camera on a deer carcass in a north Louisiana pine thicket and got a video of a boar hog burying the carcass and come back and feed on it throughout the week.
RunningBexar
Member
That's wack. They are smart, it is said they are about the same or more intelligent than dogs....
I've killed several hogs at dead cows, but never seen a dead cow buried. Not saying they wouldn't. I'm not sure if the leaves have help preserve the carcass or not, but the meat didn't smell like it was rotten. When I cut the deer head off the meat on the neck still had nice color and didn't smell too bad.
It had been there for nearly two weeks. Here in Texas it doesnt stay cold enough to keep exposed meat so the leaves might have help keeP the meat from going bad so fast.
Any way thanks for all the input on this!
It had been there for nearly two weeks. Here in Texas it doesnt stay cold enough to keep exposed meat so the leaves might have help keeP the meat from going bad so fast.
Any way thanks for all the input on this!
bigngreen
Well-Known Member
Lions like to roll the hides and pull the hair out, if you have a mother with two or three two year olds with her they'll wipe out a deer fast, especially if they can take their time and just hang out and fill up. Here our coyotes will be all over a lion kill ASAP, if the lions are local they will visit the bones and check them out for years afterwards.
