Wild Cats in the Forest

Shyla and I have settled into our winter schedule, riding together at sunrise, with some breaks for play in the midst of our ride.

Then, I leave Shyla at home while I go ride solo, often riding to faraway trail cameras to check them. This year has been extraordinary because I've been able to ride trails that are usually swamped with several feet of snow at this time of year.

In the photo below, I rode past one of my trail cameras on a trail that I've *never* been able to ride in January or February in past years. It's a place that gets almost no sun all winter long so the snow usually piles up over the winter months. My huge tires leave behind a 5" wide packed trail that the animals like to use for easier walking than in unpacked snow.

Yesterday, Taryn asked what I wear and carry on such cold and snowy rides. You can see in the photo above that I'm bundled up. I have a stocking cap, a neck gaiter, three layers on my upper body, two layers on my legs, winter cycling boots with chemical toe warmers, mittens, pogies (big mittens that go over my handlebars), and chemical hand warmers. I have tools for fixing my bike in the under-the-saddle wedge pack on my bike. I have a down sweater in a frame pack that is in the "triangle" of my bike, and I have high energy food and an emergency beacon in yet another pack attached to the front of my bike. My camera is in my backpack.

That is tons more stuff than I carry for a summer ride but I must be prepared for getting stuck somewhere due to a mechanical problem or an injury. Hypothermia or frostbite could become problems very rapidly. That's why I have so much stuff with me, including the satellite-based emergency communicator.

Here is the same spot as I rode and made a nice tire tack a few days later. After some fresh snow had fallen, a bobcat walked carefully in my tire track.

A week after that, a collared mountain lion passed the same camera. Notice how she is walking as if she's on a balance beam, to keep her huge paws in the 5" wide packed trail left by my bike tires.

The wild cats (and I) are the only animals continuing to use this path during the winter. Even the cats don't use it very much - these two cats each used my tire tracks for about a half mile before heading toward less snowy locales. Starting around April, many bears will parade past this camera after they leave their dens. An important bear-marking tree, a pine sapling, is just behind the mountain lion in the photo above.

It's starting to feel like spring will be here before we know it. Every year, I look forward to my first photos of bears (and often their tiny cubs) and, around the same time, seeing the colors of the first wildflowers in the forest.

But, for the sake of Mother Nature, we need to get a lot of snow before true springtime arrives. Shyla loves the snow so she's looking forward to it!

See Beautiful

It's "See Beautiful" Friday, hosted by our friend Sugar, and I am struggling with writing a post. It can be hard to find the beauty in life when you have a migraine. But, as I stop and think about it, I am so grateful to be living the mountain life, observing the wildlife and playing in the forest with my dogs. This life makes me happy, even during the tough times.

Today, before the migraine set in, I rode my snow bike to visit a black bear trail. I know from past years that the big male black bears usually pass through this area when they're ready to find a den.

Here's a big male bear sniffing a bear tree on his way to slopes that hold lots of dens.

He decided to rub his enormous butt against the tree to mark it. I'm guessing he didn't have the energy to do a full bipedal marking on that -11°F morning.

My camera, which another animal had earlier knocked askew, captured his image a little further along the path. Look at how frosty he is!

Thank goodness for his very thick layer of fat and luxurious coat.

It makes me smile that we live in a place where such wild animals can flourish. They amaze me with their ability to survive the tough conditions here. I think that the wildlife, particularly the bears and mountain lions, are the most beautiful wild inhabitants of our forests.

Another beautiful part of my life is this girl, Shyla. After some struggles with her teenaged boundary-testing this summer and autumn, we've found an equilibrium that I think we're both happy with. I feel as if we've become even closer since going through that phase together.

By the end of K's life, I'd forgotten how a bond between a human and a dog grows with each year and each shared adventure. I've been reminded of that by my life with Shyla.

We are growing together and having so much fun in our mountain world.

Our bond is beautiful to me. I feel like I have another heart dog (and I know how lucky I am to feel that way). Shyla is very different from K but she's the dog for me in this phase of my life.

Summertime and a Wildlife Mystery

The idyllic spring-summertime is continuing here, with enough rain that the fire danger isn't even an issue yet and the wildflowers are lasting a long time.

New ones are emerging too. This trail will be "Columbine Alley" a little later in the summer but you can see one tall Columbine just above Shyla's head.

The meadow areas remain speckled with yellow, as the Golden Banner wildflowers have gone wild this year.

Shyla decided that she needed to go incognito so that the crazy photographer wouldn't recognize her...

Meanwhile, I've still been struggling with the dang migraines and an unstable shoulder. But, I don't want to miss even a single day when Mother Nature is glowing with beauty like this.

I've also been puzzling out some wildlife situations that my trail cameras have revealed. One situation involves that mountain lion photo that I showed you the other day. It actually involved at least two mountain lions.

Early one morning, I captured a photo of a collared mountain lion in typical territory for these felines. She was alone. I'm assuming this lion was a female because she wasn't leaving scrapes and she's not big or muscular as an adult male lion.

Then, about a mile away, I captured a photo of another collared mountain lion, who I presumed was the same one as from earlier that morning.

This lion was fascinated with the area near a bear-marking tree.

I really hate seeing all the gear attached to these collared lions. I can only imagine that it hinders them.

After rolling around, she departed to the left in the photo.

That night (14 hours later), at the same site, a collared mountain lion appeared again. This makes sense... The above mountain lion could have been going to a nearby "day bed" to sleep for the day. And then, after dark, she could have been heading out to go hunting.

Here's the part that confused me. Another lion was right on the collared lion's heels. This lion was soaked from the rain earlier in the evening, unlike the collared lion. And, he appeared to be smaller - possibly an older kitten. But, if he was the collared lion's kitten, why was he soaked while she wasn't?

This new lion became interested in the scent where the collared lion had rolled earlier that morning.

 Then, he appeared to hurry to catch up with the other lion.

He even "bounded" out of the picture. I've never seen an adult lion use any gait except for a saunter (i.e., an assertive walk). The "bound" really made me think he was young.

I'd be interested to hear any thoughts you might have on this sequence of trail camera photos. I'm so curious to figure out what was going on.

A Spring Day in the Rockies

The Runner is back in action so Shyla and I are on our own for our morning mountain bike rides again. I think we're both recovering from the frenzied energy of our rides with R. Shyla let out an uncharacteristically huge yawn near the start of our ride. I yawned right back at her.

But then she seemed to perk up, scanning the world around us. 

We've had so many mountain lions passing through near our house that I am watching even more closely than usual to see where she focuses her attention.

I didn't check any trail cameras today so I don't know if the big mountain lion who I showed you yesterday is still around. This was the last sighting, two nights ago.

I'm usually nothing but happy about having these felines around but I'm wary right now with the sheer number of photos that I've been getting of them. When I have a free hour or so, I'll work on the mountain lion action video that I'm making from them.

Early in our ride, Shyla and I headed up to Hug Hill, a place that was inaccessible by bike due to deep snow until fairly recently. She stood in her favorite spot and showed off her increasingly sleek form. She needed to lose a few pounds, and I think she's getting close to our vet's goal weight. Our vet is a stickler about weight because being thin is easier on the joints of a very active dog and because of all the other health benefits, including increased lifespan.

The Easter Daisies are starting to bloom up on Hug Hill, a little late for the holiday but gorgeous nonetheless.

It was another happy spring day in the Rocky Mountains...

See Beautiful: Our Wildlife

Today is "See Beautiful" Friday. As I am trying to recover from surgery, I've been sedentary compared to my usual lifestyle. Since my surgery, Shyla and I have taken an easy hike each morning. It's disconcerting to feel how incredibly fatigued my body is... but I managed to make it to one of my trail cameras yesterday.

From the trail camera, I was absolutely delighted to see that a tenacious bobcat had visited a spot that I've been monitoring for about four years. This bobcat defines "beautiful" for me.

The wildlife that inhabit our area are one of the most beautiful aspects of it. I took the next photo with a handheld camera about a year ago. I felt so lucky to see such a gloriously beautiful coyote bathed in warm sunlight. I had a very long lens so I was a good distance from him.

It seems that many mountain residents love the wildlife but there is still a faction who view our relationship with wildlife as adversarial. A photo of a coyote taken in our neck of the woods can provoke a lengthy discussion with lots of comments about how dangerous coyotes have become. My opinion is that the coyotes have not become more dangerous. Rather, more people live in the coyotes' habitat so there are more sets of human eyes to glimpse coyotes. Moreover, coyotes are more accustomed to seeing us.

I wish that people could accept that we've chosen to live where lots of predators reside - so we need to take appropriate precautions rather than trying to get rid of the wildlife.

Some of you might remember that someone shot and killed a coyote on our land a few years ago. When I called the Division of Wildlife about it, I was told that the only illegal aspect of the killing was that the shooter might have trespassed on our land. I learned that coyotes are considered "varmints" who can be shot at any time of year. Personally, when I look at the photos above, I see a beautiful animal and not a varmint.

Aside from our black bears, I love getting trail camera photos of mountain lions the most. They are so beautiful, with all the power and strength contained in their amazing bodies.

I love this photo because it's a juvenile mountain lion. Notice the faded stripe inside his front right limb and notice how big his ears appear compared to his head. I suspect that he was looking for his mom in this photo. Just today, I discovered that someone had stolen this particular photo from my blog, had blacked out my copyright watermark, and was using it as an ad. At first, I was nothing but outraged. Then, I realized that it might be a sign that peoples' attitudes toward mountain lions are shifting. Perhaps more people see a beautiful animal in the photo above rather than a scary beast who must be eliminated.

I believe that the co-existence of large predators with us is a beautiful thing. I "See Beautiful" whenever I capture photos of the predators who live in our forest.

Last, but certainly not least on Valentine's Day, the Duo is beautiful to me. In the past month, as R has been recovering from his surgery, I find the two of them snuggled up together almost all the time. Sometimes, they're sharing a sun puddle, and sometimes they're simply lying snuggled together on a dog bed.

It makes my heart sing to see such a beautiful bond between them.

It's coming...

Shyla squinted into the rising sun this morning. The sun was intense but the air had a chill that is new.

Despite a heat wave in our area right now, signs of autumn are overwhelming us. When Shyla and I are on the trails for sunrise, I need a jacket for the first half hour of our ride. It's the first time that's been true since June.

And the brightest things in the forest are the few leaves that are changing color.

To add to the list of autumn signs, the wildlife are following their normal fall pattern. I think that this huge male bear who has just started appearing on my cameras might be Tiny. "Tiny" is a big bear who spends autumn, winter, and early spring locally. Then, he goes someplace else for mating season (I have no idea where). The first sighting of Tiny is a sure sign of the changing season.

I also captured footage of Tiny in the water hole where the mother bears and their cubs like to wallow. I'll share that soon.

For some reason that I don't understand, autumn is also the season when my trail cameras capture the most photos of mountain lions. Here, a mountain lion kitten arrived on the scene. You can tell that he must be kitten because of the spots remaining on his inner front leg. Those will disappear with age, as he becomes a pure tan color over his whole body. You also can tell that he was acting goofy - he wasn't simply sauntering along like adult mountain lions do.

The kitten then stood close to the camera as his mother arrived. Notice his mother's open mouth.

Believe it or not, her open mouth was the start of a yawn! Here she is in "full yawn". Perhaps they just woke up from their day of sleep and are starting their nightly hunting.

The mother, like the sensible grown-up that she is, marched onward. The kitten stuck around for a short while. Notice the antenna on his left ear installed so that our Wildlife officials can track him.

He then proceeded to rub his head all over the ground and a rock... perhaps trying to remove his ear-mounted transmitter. He's rubbing his head at the base of a bear-marking tree.

He acted like he was doing a combination of trying to rub off the transmitter and playing like a kitten.

Then, his mother must have called him, and he sprinted away to catch to her.

I feel so privileged to get a glimpse into the lives of these elusive animals.

At almost the same time, we were at a lookout point watching the sun set. The wildlife all like to use very difficult terrain where I don't walk the dogs, mainly because it's such an important area for our bears and mountain lions. So, we gazed at this view some distance from where the mountain lions were.

When I see a brilliant sunset like this, I am always reminded of the John Denver lyric "I've seen it raining fire from the sky". Colorado - my favorite place on Earth.