bobcat state?

nightwatchman

nightwatchman

New member
ok, which of the bordering states to ohio is my best choice for bobcats.. im setting my sights on calling a bobcat this fall.. i would like to keep it close to the house so i can make it a weekend excursion and maybe do it a few times a year... i was considering kentucky,w.va., and tennessee... which of the three states gives me the best chance of calling them... if anyone has any experience with it let me know... and if you think i would be better off to go farther west just be honest with me.. i would rather spend the money and know i stand the chance of pulling it off then making 3-4 trips a year to come home empty handed...

are the populations high in these states listed? i hear guys seeing bobcats all the time bowhunting in kentucky every year and even seen a few pics of guys at the plant who have killed them..
 
KY is a good cat state. We call a couple over there every year. Most areas right here by us have good cat populations. Not like you will find out west but you can find cats close to home.

Tenn has some cats as well. LBL has good cat populations to.Its about 5 hrs from here.

KY might be your best bet. Spend a little time finding them and you can call a couple a year over there, if you just target cats.

Brent
 
yeah, we just had one hit on the road not a mile from my house... keekee i know if you've been up 141 past waterloo you would recognize the place it was hit too...as soon as i told you you would remember seeing it.. but the only key ingredient to that is.. YOU CANT SHOOT THEM IN OHIO.......................YET.......

i hope they breed like rabbits here.. i want one pretty bad...

what type of scouting is involved in locating them in an area... i know they walk on the balls of there feet and dont leave a good imprint in the dirt... but as far as scat, or scent posts.. what do you look for? i know they would prefer the brushier areas and clearcuts..
 
I nearly always find my cat territory near some source of water. Be it lake, pond, spring, creek, or river. Seek out the brushy/rock bluff type cover near a water source and that's a good place to begin looking for cats. When I say near, that may mean right along the banks (very often), or as far as a 1/2 mile or so. Here's a look to get ya primed...
307737.JPG
 
GC gives good advise! Cats like to hold around water, creeks, ponds, lakes, swamps. They also like rocky areas real well, and clear cuts. If you can find all three of these in one area you will most likely to find cats.

Tracks are not had to find in wet or loose dirt. There scat is also easy to tell when you see it.

Cats like birds and rodents, so finding good food sorse areas are a good plus as well. I found a couple freash bird kills and several sets of fresh cat tracks last weekend. Cats are hard on birds.

One way to scout is to walk the old log roads and looks for sign around rock areas, water, field edges, fence crossings are good places to check as well.

I find alot of my cat sign when scouting for coyotes. I found a few sets of fresh cat tracks here in Ohio the same weekend, I was over in KY calling. And a fresh pile of scat to. And im sure you have hunted this area over here were I seen them. Looked to be this years cats.

Another way to check a area is to make your own scent post. Find a good area and a good scent post, loosen up the dirt around the scent post and put down some cat urine. Then check it every few days for tracks and loosen the dirt back up and add more scent. This will also tell you how often the cat is in this area.

Cats tend to have small home ranges around here. And they can take there sweet time comming to the calling as well. I run my cat set ups for 30-60 min here, depending on how the stand fells to me.


Brent
 
how do the sizes of cats in this area compare to those outwest or midwest.. are they about the same size or smaller.. a good cat being what size???
 
In my area, a good cat weighs around 25 pounds. An exceptional one would weigh close to 30. Most are around 20. Around here, I hear stories every year about cats that weigh 40 to 45 pounds and this is simply BS.

In the west, cats I have had experience with, weigh about the same. Maybe on average a little heavier, but for sure a whole lot prettier.

Randy
 
Same for here. Cats run 20-30 and 30 being a BIG cat!

"In the west, cats I have had experience with, weigh about the same. Maybe on average a little heavier, but for sure a whole lot prettier."

Well said Randy!

Our average here seems to be around 20#.

Brent
 
Quote:
I nearly always find my cat territory near some source of water. Be it lake, pond, spring, creek, or river. Seek out the brushy/rock bluff type cover near a water source and that's a good place to begin looking for cats. When I say near, that may mean right along the banks (very often), or as far as a 1/2 mile or so.



VERY well said GC, right on the money as usual. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/bowingsmilie.gif I have found more cats near water than ANY other natural object... I just wrote an article on hunting bobcat in the Mid South. It focuses on the fact that most bobcats I have taken were very close to the swamp bottoms. I started thinking of the cats I have taken over the years and a large majority of them were within walking distance of water. It might be a swamp, creek, river, pond, or just a stream... no matter what it was very near water.

Our cats are in the 20 to 25lbs range, with a few hitting 30lbs (they are few and far between). The cats that people believe are 40lbs are a myth. It is usually a cat that people only see the paw print in the mud... they see that big ol' paw print and think the cat is a panther! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif
 
Little known fact.....the state of Massachusetts has fantastic Bobcat hunting. The reason is the season runs from Dec. 20th until March 8th. Also the state closes season after 50 cats are harvested. You must check them in within 4 days. Call the 800 number before you hunt though...........

No shortage of Bobcats in Massachusetts.

No we don't border Ohio, but if you venture North, bring the callin' gear /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
Well, since no one has chimed in about good ole WV...
We have a good number of bobcats here, but they are all on the Virginia side of the state. You can find some in the central part of the state but the numbers get signifigantly higher the farther east you go. Most cats I see average about 20-25#. The best areas for them seem to be in and around the National Forest areas of Pocahontas and Greenbrier Counties. Nicholas & Webster Counties too. Make the trip during the late winter before season runs out, and buy a couple days fishing license. Plenty of wonderful trout streams throuought those areas.

BANDIT
 
jj, i have a buddy at work that flyfishes around the elk and other places up there..ok i should say down there.. my bad.. there is a fly shop he loafs in up there.. im not sure the name of it but he has told me time and time again that there are bobcats in that area of west virginia.. might be something to check out.. especially if theres as much gov land as he says there is that never gets stepped on.. he said you can go deep if your willing to hike it and camp out and find some real spots for bear and bobcat...
 
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I live in Southwestern Va. Very close to WV. We have a bunch of cats. You may have read in one of the forums that in Virginia we can now use electronic calls for bobcats. Except on National Forest Land. The cool thing is that our season opens November 1 and closes February 28. So that's quite a lenghty window to back a cat. Oh yeah and the limit is 12 pear year. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif
 
i spent about 2 hours visiting with the local game warden yesterday.. i was fortunate enough to be at a buddies farm when he swung in to give him his crop damage permits for the year... we got to talking bobcats and he was nice enough to tell me that it will not be long before ohio takes them off the protected list.. i ask him how many it took to delist them and he said 6-8000 animals.. he said the same thing happened with the river otter. they wanted atleast 6000-8000animals b4 they opened the season.. i cant wait till they open it up... i will be putting some time in for sure ... we also talked about bear too and he said they had almost 60 bears in the state and some of them mating pairs... pretty good if you ask me...
 
nightwatchman, i live here in greenbrier county,wv. we do have plenty of cats. we started into calling in feb. of last year and in 2 months and about 10-15 setups we seen 5 cats and killed 4 of them. give me a shout when your comin' maybe i can show you a couple good spots.
 


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