Deer predation

[oldgutpile]

I have some land along the Battle River, where I have been finding multiple kill sights of the local deer herd. Large patches of hide and hair, and then just random leg bones through-out all the gullies. It wasnt until yesterday that I actually found full spinal columns, one with and one without the skull attached.
I have found way more legs than just off of two deer, and they are mixed. some are mulie, others whitetail, both young deer and fully matured.
Saturday, we actually found a chunk of mule deer skin about the size of a beaver pelt that had been pulled off in one piece. It was still dripping wet. Also found a beaver tail that had not even fully dried on the meat/tail bone end.
Last year we had multiple trail cameras out in the area and have pictures of both wolf and cougar travelling through. The usual number of coyote sightings, but I didn't think they could be this hard on a deer herd.
What are some of the things i should be looking for to determine what kind of predator is causing all the grief? Anyone come across confirmed kills from the different predators to tell me what I should be looking for as far as what is knocking off the deer herd?

[trapperdodge]

I wouldn't rule out CWD as being a contributing factor.. I'm finding multiple deer carcasses along the river bottoms.

[Homesteader]

I bet cats. They eat a deer a week and in cold weather kill often as they can’t eat frozen animals. Tracks would be your best bet. I have seen several cat kills with skull still attached to the spine.

[marky_mark]

I would bet cougar

[Smoky buck]

If you have pics of cougar, wolf, and coyote they are all going to play a roll because they all eat deer. Simply put it sounds like you have a fairly high predator population overall

Cougar are definitely hard on deer but if they have wolves or even a good size pack of coyotes running them off their kills they need to hunt more to make up for it.

Just my thoughts

[marky_mark]

I would bet cougar

[tikka250]

Though there is very likely cats around that would really put a hurt on deer don't dispute coyotes. One area near me winters a pile of deer as well as coyotes. A friend of the landowner put out a green fees bale and trail cam to see what kind of deer were in there and got multiple pictures of coyotes predating on the deer coming to feed. While hunting coyotes in there I have yet to find scat that doesn't isn't full of deer hair.

[Big Grey Wolf]

Cougar tend to peel hide off a deer like a apple before they eat them, so suspect cat if big chunks of hide.

[buckman]

Cougars are probably the main culprit on the decimation of our mountain mule deer.
One cat takes about 1 deer per week,simple math tells the story.

They are increasing their range along with the other predators. Expect more bone piles anywhere they have enough cover.

[oldgutpile]

Originally Posted by tikka250

Though there is very likely cats around that would really put a hurt on deer don't dispute coyotes. One area near me winters a pile of deer as well as coyotes. A friend of the landowner put out a green fees bale and trail cam to see what kind of deer were in there and got multiple pictures of coyotes predating on the deer coming to feed. While hunting coyotes in there I have yet to find scat that doesn't isn't full of deer hair.

We had a large herd of around 80 elk feeding off an oat field, so the neighbor put out a number of green feed bales out to help them through the cold snap.
I asked him to set one out in one of my coulees, and that is when I first noticed the kill sites. Probably three different kills within 300 yards of the bale. I recognized afterwards that I was just creating a bait site for the predators.

[oldgutpile]

Originally Posted by Big Grey Wolf

Cougar tend to peel hide off a deer like a apple before they eat them, so suspect cat if big chunks of hide.

With the amount of kills in the last month, I am worried I have a family of cats or a wolf den on site. We haven't had any snow to see tracks for a month or more. I suspect the wolf tracks would be more visible than cougar to find out the culprit?

The other member's note about CWD wasn't something I had thought on, but shouldn't that be more on the older animals? I am finding MORE fawn/yearling legs, but enough mature legs where CWD might be a culprit as well.