A Curious Mountain Lion

We had an exciting couple of days at a scent post in the forest nearby. The scent post is on a saddle of a ridge, and it has a huge Ponderosa Pine in the middle of it. It's been exceptionally quiet for months, and then there was suddenly a flurry of activity.

First, a very curious but seemingly timid mountain lion spent a few minutes checking out the site. He looked small from this point of view.

He sniffed around very carefully.

He paced in and out of the field of view. The he (or she - I don't know which) marked the ground behind the tree.

And then the lion walked onward. In this view, You can see that the lion was big but probably young. The bar on the inside of his/her front right limb is probably a vestige of kitten markings.

When I looked at more photos taken by that camera, I discovered that a small herd of elk had crowded into the clearing. One was a calf that must have been born very late this year because he still has spots! By this time of year, the calves' spots have usually disappeared.

I also saw that a red fox had come through the clearing. He looks tiny compared to the other animals who had been there.

I made a video of the mountain lion's almost two minutes prowling around the clearing which you can watch here or at Youtube.

Seeing that video made me smile!