Springtime romp and wildlife by our house

Our early spring is continuing, and K's energy for romping hasn't waned.

I noticed in today's photos how much K keeps her eyes on me. I often shoot "bursts" of photos when she's moving, and she frequently glances at me while she goes about her business.

Somehow, over the years, I've forged an incredible bond with K. I'm not sure if I've told you about our first meeting but K didn't like me. When we first met, she tried to hide behind a washing machine and then the dryer. When I took her to my car to head toward home from the breeder's house, she caterwauled like she was being tortured. Based on that first day, I never would have predicted the deep love that grew between us.

On this fine spring morning, K showed off as I tried new things with my camera. As some of you know, I'm relatively new to using anything but a point-and-shoot camera. Today, I wanted to play with using long shutter times and panning with K as she ran.

The outcome looks a little psychedelic, almost like abstract art. But, you can see that K stole a glance at me as she trotted by.

I tried the same thing atop Hug Hill. This time, K was focused on the ground ahead of her, which is rocky and rough on top of the hill.

When K and I are out in the forest, I see very little sign that she's sick. She still seems to have energy-to-spare, and joyfully romps. It's only at home where I am noticing that her fearfulness is growing. She fears certain spots in the house and certain sets of steps. These scary places have bothered her throughout her life, with the fear waxing and waning over time. I hope that her recent bout of fearfulness isn't a sign that her illness is progressing (it's 2 weeks until her next checkup). The good news is that these fears disappear outdoors.

K has also been very interested in the scents being left by wildlife in our house's clearing. Since mid-March, a bobcat has come through every 2-3 days. Here he is outside our bedroom window captured by a trail camera.

I was relieved to see that he continued visiting even after I found a dead bobcat in the forest about 2 weeks ago. It wasn't "our" bobcat who died but it still made me sad.

"Our" bobcat has been marking our clearing as his territory regularly. He's peeing in the photo below (he's on the far left).

A few days later, the local breeding pair of coyotes passed the same trail camera in our clearing. First, the male showed off his rapidly healing wound below his left eye. I'm guessing that he's going to be fine.

After the male trotted through and peed in the same place as the bobcat did a few days earlier, the coyote's mate arrived. Look at her rotund belly! I think that there are pups on the way!

After sniffing the tree, she marked the same place as the bobcat marked. I've been seeing this pattern for years - that coyotes and bobcats respond to each others scent markings. They seem almost competitive about territory even though they're different species. I've read that they fight if they see each other and usually the coyotes win.

As you know, the behavior of the wildlife fascinates me... and the scents they leave fascinate K! In fact, K pees over top of the bobcat and coyote scent markings, adding her 2 cents!

Another gift of a spring day here in Colorado. These are special days, and we know it.