The cougar challenge

[Wolf66]

I've been working my way through the challenges in single player and I've made it up to the cougar challenge on the hunting path.
So, the game recommends that you hunt cougars with poison arrows and that's what I've been using to hunt the beasts. This latest hunt got up to point blank range and i only had time to get a shot in center of mass before it would have mauled me. The animal weakly tried to get away but fell quickly after. The cat was laying there, suffering from the poison, and I did what any merciful hunter should and ended the beast's misery with my knife.
However, that was registered as a knife kill and didn't count towards the challenge.
Was I supposed to let the poor animal suffer until the poison finally took it like a sadist?
I'm only on chapter 4, I can't hunt south of Blackwater. The only viable hunting spot I've found is west of Strawberry and I now have to wait 3 in game days to hunt another dangerous wild cat. Supposedly there's a second hunting spot around van horn but I've never found a cougar there.
Would the game have registered that as a bow kill if I'd let it suffer, or do I have to head-shot every cougar for the challenge?

[JuiceWSA]

Poison Arrows?

Cruel and unnecessary.

This spot and regular arrows - will provide all the Cougars you need - one right after the other:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2674035840

Get some Predator Bait - regular or Potent.
Have PLENTY of Cover Scent - start at Reed - apply cover scent.
Drop bait in Red Circle.
Retreat to Rock.
Kill Cougar with regular arrow - headshot.
Skin Cougar.
Go back to Reed.
Save.
Load.
Apply Cover Scent.
Drop bait in red circle...
you see where this is going...
you can stop when you get 5.

Note:
If you see campfire smoke - go kill the Murfrees - Cougar won't spawn in the presence of Murfrees.

;)

Using Arrows you may not scare off a potential Moose in the Blue Circle when you get your Cougars. You sure wouldn't want to mess that up. I've seen more Moose at Wal-Mart than I have in this game (Moose don't shop at Wal-Mart).

[Wolf66]

Thank you, i will try this at some point. But right now I need to spend a bit of time away from RDR2

[firestorm]

Use regular arrows as Juice said, also that area he provided is a cougar hot spot..
You can walk any of those paths and sometimes get many cougars in a single session..
Granted, they may not all be 3* animals, but they don't need to be for that challenge..

[JuiceWSA]

Originally posted by firestorm:

Use regular arrows as Juice said, also that area he provided is a cougar hot spot..
You can walk any of those paths and sometimes get many cougars in a single session..
Granted, they may not all be 3* animals, but they don't need to be for that challenge..

Once you knock the first one down - the rest will be 3*. By going back to Reed all spawns in the kill area reset. I save/load there at Reed and have been eaten there at Reed. If you haven't seen one when you load in at Reed, a pred bait in the circle will spawn another one in. He'll walk right up to the carcass of his former self and sniff the bait - just in time for an arrow to the head... I've had 5 Cougar carcassses in that circle - along with a Black Bear and a Wolf sometimes.

The Roanoke Ridge Cougar is too annoying for his own good...lol

Incidentally - ever seen a Cougar and a Black Bear have an argument? Well, if you do don't let it happen if you need perfect pelts 'cause that argument does neither of them any good.

Note:
A regular arrow will take a Black Bear.
A regular arrow will NOT take a Grizzly - it only makes it madder.
Improved gets the job done.

I did kill a Grizz with a regular arrow once. It was 1*, bleeding and it's eyeball about 4 inches from the arrowhead when I let it go... I didn't have much choice at that time. When it hit the ground I was standing ON IT.

My horse looked at me and said:
"Man, you are one lucky sumbeoch"....lol