Bill Moebis knew something was amiss when the bawling of a cow interrupted him while he was working on his barn.
It was too late in the evening for Moebis to properly investigate but he had a nagging feeling one of his calves was in trouble.
Two mornings later his suspicions were confirmed when he discovered the body of his 220-pound purebred bull calf in a coulee half a kilometre from his house.
From a distance it looked as if the animal had simply fallen over, but a closer inspection revealed a more sinister cause of death.
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“I’ve seen lots of animals ate up by coyotes. It wasn’t at all like that,” said Moebis, who farms near Demaine, Sask.
He knew at first glance his bull was the victim of a rare cougar attack, a hunch later confirmed by a Saskatchewan Environment official.
“It was laying there … with this big square hole in its abdomen. It looked like it had been cut with a knife.”
Aside from a few entrails piled on the ground next to the carcass, there were few outward signs of the attack. The bull’s heart, lungs and liver were gone, a portion of its exposed hip had been gnawed away and the skin flap where the incision had been made was devoured, hair and all.
“I’ve never seen anything that neat,” said Moebis.
Two neighbours living about 30 kilometres away reported similar attacks on their herds.
“I think that cat likes killing cattle now. He’s going to do it again for sure, so he’s got to be looked after,” said Moebis.
Mike Gallop, director of Saskatchewan Environment’s livestock predation program, said his department has received three reports of cougar attacks in the Lake Diefenbaker area in the past few weeks.
Of the two that warranted investigation, only Moebis’s case was deemed to be a cougar attack. The other, near Main Centre, Sask., was viewed as the work of coyotes.
Gallop said once a cougar kill is confirmed, other livestock owners in the area attribute other animal deaths to cat attacks, which he said is usually irrational. Cougars do roam southern Saskatchewan, but their numbers are small.
“There may not be 100 people in the province that have ever actually seen a cougar.”
Cougar attacks on livestock, al-though unusual, are more common in areas west of the Alberta foothills. They are almost unheard of in Saskatchewan.
Coyotes are responsible for 95 percent of the livestock kills blamed on predators in Saskatchewan.
“(Coyotes) kill in so many ways that sometimes their kills can look like other animals,” said Gallop.
But he agreed with Moebis that a cougar is prowling the Lake Diefenbaker area.
“We are taking the stance that a cougar is out there that has killed at least one animal. If it has killed one, there’s sure no reason to think it wouldn’t go after others.”
He said the likelihood of catching the culprit is slim, especially when farmers won’t allow trappers to set snares on their pastures.
“To be very honest, trying to catch a cougar is like trying to catch smoke,” said Gallop.
Gallop said livestock owners are generally unaware that they are allowed to kill a cougar if they spot one prowling on their land.
Their only responsibility is to submit the carcass to Saskatchewan Environment.
