A Confident Girl

Yesterday evening at just about sunset, a front of storm clouds suddenly took over our world, after a day of blue skies and warm air. It seemed sure to bring huge storms but it didn't.

Very oddly, for Colorado, we awakened to an overcast day, and it looked sure to storm this morning. I brought rain gear when Shyla and I headed out for a ride. 

During our ride, I usually try to get a photo to fit the "cue" from a Flickr dog photo group that I participate in. Today's cue was "Look Out!". In the past, when I've tried to get photos of Shyla looking at me, she's spent the whole time swiveling her eyes around, trying to keep watch on the world 360° around us. Our trainer calls it "hypervigilance", a common behavior in dogs with a tendency to be fearful.

So, I reasoned - if I asked Shyla to look at me, I'd surely end up with a photo that fit "Look Out!" as she tried to watch out for danger behind her while lying in an exposed spot. 

I was wrong. My sweet girl settled in and looked at me with confidence. It made me smile that I was so wrong about how to get my "Look Out!" photo.

So, we went on our way, with me pedaling and Shyla running to an incredible patch of Columbines. Just after we arrived, something in the aspen grove caught Shyla's attention, and she looked surprised! I think it qualifies as a "Look Out!" photo.

I never found out what had caught her attention so totally. As quickly as she'd been surprised, she settled down again. We had a peaceful ride back home, where I left her so I could go on a solo ride.

During my solo ride, I checked trail cameras, wanting to see what had happened over the holiday weekend. In general, I see that the animals hunker down, staying far away from any human scent, when the holiday hordes descend upon the forests. This past weekend was no exception, although two bears, Milton Jr. and Cinnamom, showed up for my trail cameras.

The photo of Cinnamom was a relief to me. I hadn't seen any sign of her recently. Knowing that she has a "strike" against her (as shown by her ear tags), I always worry that she's going to get hungry and get herself killed by going near humans (bears are euthanized when they get their second strike).

We've had a lull in ripening of the usual natural bear foods so I've been expecting that bears will start visiting homes, which really raises my worries about Cinnamom. But, from this photo, I know that she was fine as of a few days ago!

Cinnamom was sniffing a bear tree that was very popular with the bears last summer but less popular this summer. She's big for a female bear but you can see that she was standing on her tip toes to sniff as high as possible where big male bears can mark.


I'm looking forward to a season of bear cubs next summer. Cinnamom will probably have cubs, as will Mabel (our black bear mom from last summer), and Socks (Cinnamom's daughter who is about 4 years old and was consorting with Tiny during mating season). If all three sows have cubs, there will be lots and lots of fun cub cavorting to capture with my trail cameras!

A Lion Walked Nearby

It's summertime, and the living is easy. One of our favorite summertime things to do is spontaneous picnic dinners up on Hug Hill. Yesterday, all the rumbles of thunder ended before our normally late dinnertime, and so we did a quick hike to eat while watching the sunset from Hug Hill. It was warm and relaxing.

By the time we headed down the mountain, hiking on a main trail, it was dusk. One eerie thing is that, due to my trail cameras, I can find out when we've been very close to a mountain lion. Last evening, we were definitely close to one. I bet he spied on us either during dinner or as we hiked down.

This was fairly close to the trail that we hiked down, and the lion is coming from the direction of where we ate dinner.

He was a sinewy looking feline. He left a territorial scrape mark just outside the view of my trail camera.

To be honest, we had no idea he was nearby, and our leashed dogs gave us no signals that they smelled him. That's how he wants it - he wants to invisibly move through the landscape of our increasingly populated world. He let us pass in peace last evening, as mountain lions almost always do.

This morning, Shyla and I were back on Hug Hill, playing games. Her enthusiasm makes me smile!

But, for us, it was hot. It's now 80° in the shade, which is very rare up here in the mountains. I cut Shyla's morning run short so she wouldn't overheat. She looked ready to snooze as soon as we got close to the house.

Yes, that's Shyla's antler that she found a few weeks ago. She sends a huge "thanks" to the Runner who brought it home for her after I nearly destroyed my bad shoulder trying to carry it.

That huge and heavy elk antler was what revealed that my shoulder has become quite unstable since my surgery in February. I'm now doing an intensive shoulder strengthening program that is already helping. When my shoulder "pops out of joint", it is downright excruciating. I have to use my other hand to gently manipulate my bad shoulder until it pops back into joint. Thank goodness that it's happened only twice since my PT started my new strengthening program. I am really lucky to have a Physical Therapist who knew exactly what to do when the instability reared its ugly head!

Shyla says "mine, mine, mine"!

Happy Summertime to you!

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.

Bearly Summer

Today was another glorious day in our mountains. Shyla and I played in the sun to start the day. The highest mountains behind Shyla had a dusting of fresh snow this morning.

Shyla suddenly seemed to notice the Wall Flower that has been blooming on Hug Hill for a few days. She stopped to sniff it.

After our mountain bike ride, I headed out to check some trail cameras. First, I have to tell you that I've figured out that the male bear who has been marking trees in our area this summer is not "Milton". Milton was a big dominant bear with a white blaze on his chest who got injured last spring (2013). I captured video of him marking a tree in mid-June last year, and then I didn't see him on my trail cameras again.

I hoped he'd recover over the winter, and then, a new bear showed up this spring with a white blaze on his chest. I was too quick to declare that "Milton had returned". After comparing video of the original Milton and the new bear marking the same tree, it is obvious to me that the new bear is much smaller and younger than Milton was.

We'll probably never know what happened to Milton. My guess is that he either died or claimed a new, less-competitive, territory. I hope it was the latter.

Here is the video comparison that convinced me. I've decided to call the new bear "Milton Junior", but I'll probably shorten it to "Junior" to avoid confusion. You can watch this video here or at Youtube.

Over the past few weeks, Junior has been in a tree-marking duel with our biggest male named "Tiny". They've marked one tree many many times. I made a video of their most notable visits to the tree. You can watch it here or at Youtube. It's fun to see that, in one of Tiny's visits, he sniffed the camera (and my scent) before marking the tree. I'm sure my scent is becoming familiar to him.

It's a fun time of year, as I watch the bears do their yearly ritual. I have the feeling that mating season is winding down because some bears are starting to venture closer to residences (including our land) looking for food. I think their normal food for this time year, ant pupae, has been slow to develop due to the cool spring. I hope that none of them gets in trouble with humans during this lull until their natural foods are ready to be eaten.

Happy spring and almost-summer!

Fog, Lions, Mice, and Bats

It was a foggy "pea soup" morning, a fairly rare condition around here. Shyla and I headed out into the fog for our mountain bike ride. Soon, we stopped for a quick game of fetch. I threw the toy very gingerly for her, remembering what happened to my spine during our last game of fetch.

One of you asked if there was something special about purple toys for Shyla. The only special thing is that they are bright and cheery. I tend to grab bright toys to take on our ride when the world looks drab to me.

At this time of year, "drab" is about the last adjective that I use after I'm actually out in the world. Yes, it was foggy but the wildflowers shined like flaming torches. And, Shyla loved the cool air so she was feeling rambunctious.

Even when the fog really descended onto us, the yellow flowers still glowed.

As we rode, I had this niggling feeling that a mountain lion had been nearby recently. I probably caught a glimpse of a lion scrape or scat but didn't fully realize it. In addition, the mountain lion activity around here has been extraordinary all spring. I have been capturing as many mountain lion photos as bear photos this spring, which is not normal.

So, after I left Shyla at home to relax, I checked a couple of trail cameras. My niggling intuition had been right. This is in the heart of our little trail system.

The trail camera is pointed at a spot where I found a mountain lion scrape a couple of years ago. It's at an intersection of two animal trails. This mountain lion was intensely interested in the scent at that spot.

He looks so strong and agile.

And then, he rolled over the spot.

I've never read about mountain lions displaying this rolling behavior but I see it fairly frequently in the lions around here. It tends to be the smaller, perhaps younger, lions who do it. The big dominant male lions tend to scrape with their hind paws rather than roll.

Here are a few other mountain lion photos that I haven't shown you yet. The first two are from last Saturday. This lion spotted the camera's soft red glow right away.

And, he walked over to check it out before departing. This looks like a youngish lion or a female to me.

Here's another lion in the same spot in mid-May. This guy sniffed the scrape left by a previous lion, and then he scraped over top of it.

Going backward in time, this was at peak mid-morning hiking time on a beautiful sunny Saturday in May, and this mountain lion was about 30 yards from a "popular" trail (a few people per day travel on it). The lion is looking toward the human trail. I wonder if a person was on the trail?

I have even more mountain lion photos that I haven't shown you yet... but I'll stop there for today. It gives you the idea that there have been many mountain lions nearby this spring.

Just a funny little note for you - I truly don't get scared as I check these trail cameras in places that mountain lions frequent. But, the other night, a bat suddenly started flying around our bedroom, for the first time ever. I completely freaked out - I was terrified of the bat. The Runner had to try to calm me down (and get me out of the room) before he could work on getting the bat outside.

I'm similarly afraid of mice. One time, we were driving on bumpy dirt road while on vacation, and a mouse fell out from under the LabMobile's dashboard onto the floor by my feet. I screamed, and the Runner stopped the LabMobile... but the mouse had already hidden up under the dashboard again. I worried about that mouse appearing again for the rest of our vacation. I had trouble sleeping because I was watching and listening for that mouse.

So, I'm terrified of small animals in tight spaces... but I can calmly see photos of a mountain lion who was recently next to my trail camera without freaking out at all. In fact, today, I took a macro photo of a flower next to a trail camera that had mountain lion photos on its memory card.

My irrational phobias help me to understand Shyla's fears a little better. The animals that I fear are not likely to hurt me, yet I can be completely paralyzed by their presence, just like Shyla gets paralyzed with fear by things that seem innocuous to me.

Springtime and Bear Families

Since we've returned from the desert, we've been settling into spring/summer life. Our world feels as if it was transformed while we were gone. When we left, there were about 20" of heavy snow on the ground. When we returned, the snow had all melted, the aspen trees had green leaves, and many flowers were blooming!

Shyla and I can take long mountain bike rides without running into snow drifts as long as we don't go too high in the mountains.

We've been lingering atop Hug Hill on many mornings, sometimes playing fetch there. Hug Hill is a very cold place in the winter but wonderful in the summer.

The black bears became very active while we were away. I discovered that both bear families that we followed last year had broken up. The mothers have sent away their young that were born almost 1.5 years ago so that they can mate again. I felt quite sad that I hadn't captured any photos of the families early this spring before they broke up for mating season.

My first hint that the families had broken up was that Cinnamom passed one of my cameras without any cubs in tow.

As usual, she curiously sniffed my camera but left it intact.

Many hours later, a yearling cub appeared. I believe that this was Cinnamom's cinnamon colored cub from last year. She's turning blacker with time, especially her legs and back. She reminds me of Socks, a young bear who is still in the area and approaching full adulthood.

She approached the camera...

Gave it a "look"... (the trail camera switched over to nighttime mode for some reason).

And then "she" stood up in front of it. This photo is how I know that she is a female. Female cubs are allowed to stay in or close to their mother's territory for their lifetimes. In contrast, male cubs have to travel, sometimes long distances, to find a niche where they can live.

Hours later, Tiny, our biggest male bear, came along, probably following Cinnamom's trail from many hours earlier because it's mating season. Look how hulking he is compared to the yearling cub.

Back to the cub, I captured more photos of the cub a short distance away. Look at how she stands up to sniff a bear tree that has been marked by many bears over the years.

She looked a little funny as she maneuvered on her hind legs.

Then, the approach of another bear spooked her. She was gone in a flash.

This was the other bear, probably Tiny but I'm not certain. He arrived only minutes after the yearling cub departed.

Tiny has been marking that tree almost daily. Compare his size to the yearling cub's size. It's easy to see why the cub fled when she heard or smelled a full-grown bear approaching.

I love his antics to spread his scent on as much of the tree as possible. He grabs branches and rubs them on his head.

So, in every way, spring/summer is upon us. I love this time of year - it's so full of promise of an amazing few months ahead of us. But, of all the months, I love June the most because the bear activity is so intriguing.