Cougar or yote
Hello I am a Texas deer hunter here to ask a question. On my friends property the area of the state has axis deer and whitetail and they found a young axis buck dead one morning after a snow about this time last year. The buck looked like it had been close to the fence line and attacked there. The carcass was about 70 yards from where the blood trail first started in the fence line, and there had appeared to have been a struggle. It looked like it had been dragged up the hill and was hidden by bushes. When it was found that snowy morning, a large portion of the hindquarters was missing, and also tracks around it, not coyote tracks with separation from the paw and nails, but what appeared to be feline tracks. My friend set up snares around the carcass should the animal return, but all he caught were raccoons.
This past summer, me and and another one of his friends were driving ATV's around, and we took different paths to get to a wheat field. When we finally met up, he had a worried look on his face and said that when he was going down the dirt path, a large cat (larger than a coyote) with no spots ran across the road from the hill to his left and disappeared into the forest.
Since then we have not noticed any remains, but still remain worried, because about 6 or 7 years ago, he shot at a mountain lion from about 400 yards while deer hunting and missed. We do not want to use dogs to track it, but I was wanting to know if 1) This seems to have been killed by a lion. and 2) If it is possible to bait the lion with meat or calls while hunting from a blind overlooking a large stretch of land on the ranch.