156 Hunting the Grisly 



tainly at times during the breeding season 

 fight desperately among themselves. Con- 

 gars are very solitary beasts; it is rare to see 

 more than one at a time, and then only a 

 mother and young, or a mated male and fe- 

 male. While she has kittens, the mother is 

 doubly destructive to game. The young be- 

 gin to kill for themselves very early. The 

 first fall, after they are born, they attack large 

 game, and from ignorance are bolder in mak- 

 ing their attacks than their parents; but they 

 are clumsy and often let the prey escape. 

 Like all cats, cougars are comparatively easy 

 to trap, much more so than beasts of the dog 

 kind, such as the fox and wolf. 



They are silent animals; but old hunters 

 say that at mating time the males call loudly, 

 while the females have a very distinct answer. 

 They are also sometimes noisy at other seasons. 

 I am not stire that I ever heard one; but one 

 night, while camped in a heavily timbered 

 coulie near Kildeer Mountains, where, as 

 their footprints showed, the beasts were plen- 

 tiful, I twice heard a loud, wailing scream 

 ringing through the impenetrable gloom 

 which shrouded the hills around us. My 

 companion, an old plainsman, said that this 

 was the cry of the cougar prowling for its 



