If cowboys come across a cougar in open ground they invariably chase
and try to rope it--as indeed they do with any wild animal. I have known
several instances of cougars being roped in this way; in one the animal
was brought into camp alive by two strapping cowpunchers.
The cougar sometimes stalks its prey, and sometimes lies in wait for it
beside a game-trail or drinking pool--very rarely indeed does it crouch
on the limb of a tree. When excited by the presence of game it is
sometimes very bold. Willis once fired at some bighorn sheep, on a steep
mountain-side; he missed, and immediately after his shot, a cougar made
a dash into the midst of the flying band, in hopes to secure a victim.
The cougar roams over long distances, and often changes its hunting
ground, perhaps remaining in one place two or three months, until the
game is exhausted, and then shifting to another. When it does not lie in
wait it usually spends most of the night, winter and summer, in prowling
restlessly around the places where it thinks it may come across prey,
and it will patiently follow an animal's trail.
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