One spot in the forest

One spot in the forest sees lots of visitors. It's an intersection of two animal trails that parallel a babbling brook.

Back on the 4th of July, the mother mountain lion came through and checked the pee mail.

Then there was a lull for a few weeks before a mother deer and a fawn arrived.

The mother deer hurried on while her fawn lagged at that dangerous spot. The fawn took off soon after this photo, running after the mother deer.

The fawn was back again two days later.

Less than 10 minutes after the fawn was there, the mother mountain lion arrived. I think that fawn was very lucky not to lose her life that evening.

The mother mountain lion decided to leave some pee mail.

Then, just two days later, another predator, a black bear, arrived to sniff the pee mail.

The bear didn't stay long. She bounded down toward the small stream.
I must say that the fawn has not appeared on the camera again since the mountain lion and bear came past it. I'm hoping that the mother smartly decided to move her youngster someplace safer.

The final visitor was the silly human who likes to monitor all this wildlife activity!

I've had a camera in this spot for a few years, and it rarely fails to amaze me how many animals visit it and sniff almost the exact spot where my front wheel was in this photo.

A Water Hole in Summertime

Shyla and I tend to stay in the bright open areas of the forest and meadows during our outings.

At the same time, there's a wilder part of the forest where the animals are carrying out their daily routines. I've learned that water holes are active places in the forest, especially in the summer.

If I were to place a trail camera on any random tree in the forest, I could go a whole year without getting a photo of a single animal. In contrast, if I find the places that attract animals like water holes and bear marking trees, my trail cameras see far more activity.

I mentioned earlier this summer that I'd found a new water hole. It seems to attract all sorts of wildlife. In the video that I'm about to show you, it attracted Tiny, our huge black bear, and it also attracted a mountain lion. I believe the mountain lion is a female who might have kittens in the area. She's been appearing on my cameras far more frequently than most mountain lions, suggesting that young kittens are stashed somewhere nearby.

You can watch the video here or at Youtube.

I think it's interesting that bears love to soak in the water while the mountain lion seemed only interested in drinking (and possibly waiting to see if any prey came to the water hole). I wonder what a coyote would do? I am quite certain that dogs would splash around and get soaked in it!

Summer Saturday!!!

Today is a glorious summer day - with sunshine and flowers.

My trail camera showed some of our young wildlife moving around. The next photo is the yearling moose calf who has acted as if he's been confused for the past few weeks. I could put together an entire video showing his travels. He keeps walking east for miles and miles. Then, for some reason, he makes a U-turn and comes right back to where his mom raised him last winter.

I will make that video sometime soon. It's so cool to have this guy in our forest. He's been staying well hidden from people. And, when I've glimpsed him, he quickly runs into the cover of the forest. He should move on at some point - finding his own territory. However, I'm starting to wonder if all the attractive moose territory near us is already taken by other moose.

Here was another young animal who came out of hiding the other day. Look how small that fawn is.

The fawn sniffed around the area, probably smelling some other animals, like moose and mountain lions, for the first time in his short life.

I adore this time of year - seeing the young animals who are so cute, and enjoying Nature's beauty which almost overwhelms me.

Happy Summer Saturday!

April Winter and a Mountain Lion

We are still in the grips of winter weather here in the mountains. 

Today, I used every trick I've learned over the years to lift my spirits. Playing with Shyla is a big one.

Although she hasn't returned to a normal diet yet after her "dietary indiscretion" last week, we feel that she's almost all better.

While we were out in the foggy, gray, and intermittently snowy day, I noticed an amazing little plant that somehow has survived this weather and has popped up through its own hole in the snowpack. That made me smile too!

Last, but certainly not least, seeing the photos of the mountain lion who killed and ate a deer right behind our house thrilled me.

You might remember that I just recently realized that the cameras near our house had captured the first photos ever of a mountain lion right by our house. I expected that the same lion had killed the doe on Friday night. I was wrong.

You can see that Friday night's mountain lion wore a GPS collar while the lion who came through our land on 4/13 did not have a collar.

The most recent mountain lion had eaten most of the meat from a small doe on Friday night. On Saturday night (when these photos were taken), her stomach still bulged. However, I also wondered if she's pregnant. This may be the mother mountain lion who separated from her kitten a few months ago and has probably mated since then.

I'll share more photos of the events at the deer carcass in the future. My trail cameras took thousands of photos so I need to sift through them before telling the rest of the story. The mountain lion has abandoned the carcass so the feline story has probably ended.

In the meantime, Shyla and I will keep on playing and training to keep the winter blues away.

Spring - Rocky Mountain Style

On the first day of spring, Shyla and I started with playing in the snow. I asked her to "bring" the toys, and she was temporarily confused about how to "bring" two toys. She decided to make two trips. Smart dog!

Then we visited a trail camera that has been "snowed in" for 6 weeks. I found two fun photos on it. Look in between the trees at the flying deer. What an athlete.

And then, a couple of days later, a coyote passed the camera. He sure looks young and cute to me.

Although it doesn't look much like spring outside yet, we have daffodils in our kitchen to put us in the spring state of mind.

Happy Spring to all my northern hemisphere friends!

Halloween in the Mountains

Halloween is a quiet holiday around here. We never get trick-or-treaters at our house - our road is too rural for kids to walk (or even ride in a car) from house to house. So, we didn't buy any candy (for the first time) this year. That probably means that we'll actually get trick-or-treaters!

Halloween is always in the midst of the hunting seasons here. While I love having the beautiful elk around, there's a tension in the air until the hunting seasons end. Then, we heave a sigh of relief, put away all the orange gear, and feel more relaxed when we're in the forest.

We were shocked last night when two deer didn't run from us during our evening hike (they usually flee from us during hunting season). Perhaps they know that they are in a relatively safe place. Based on size, we thought that this one was born last spring. Her spotted coat has given way to a winter coat.

And, this one was probably her mother. Mom looks pretty tough. I'm not sure I'd want to mess with her. I hope she and her daughter stay hidden for the next few weeks.

Shyla has become quite good about leaving alone the deer and elk who we see during our mountain bike rides. I can call her away from them in a few steps. Dead stuff seems to fascinate her more than running wildlife.

Today, Shyla's main nod to Halloween was a funny face she made this morning - her dracula face!

And a trick - so that she could earn a treat!

Shyla doesn't like costumes. Moreover, people (especially children) wearing costumes scare her so we stay away from town on this holiday. And, while she'll tolerate me putting a hat or other costume on her - she never looks happy about it so I've stopped doing it.

But R was glad to wear an orange hat in celebration of Halloween! What a dude.

For us, Halloween is usually the true beginning of winter. The time changes back to standard time so our "evening" hikes become "afternoon" hikes. And, usually the snow starts flying regularly soon after this holiday. The Divide sure looked wintery today!

Happy Halloween!

An autumn-winter morning

Today, we finally made it out for actual sunrise, and the light was beautiful. The winter is the season when our small slice of the world gets a direct view of the actual sunrise - and I love it.

A thin layer of clouds sat to our east, dimming the sunrise light just slightly and making the forest look even more peaceful than usual.

It was a quiet morning, without anyone else around, even though it is the first day of rifle season for large game around here. Shyla reflected my watchfulness.

Both Shyla and I were clad in blaze orange, and my eyes and ears were alert for hunters. I simply worry about being in the wrong place at the wrong time when people are roaming the forest with powerful weapons. I thought that today might be tense because we've had hunters cruising the road near our house all week, looking for the biggest deer and elk. I'm glad that my prediction was wrong.

Just the other night, a beautiful buck was mesmerized by a trail camera that is very far from any road. He is wearing a big rack! I'm not sure how to count points, but he has either 4 or 5 per side!

He moved in closer to examine the soft red glow of the infrared flash, and then he vanished.

He must have lived a lot of years to get such magnificent antlers. I hope he knows to lay low for the next few weeks so he survives to pass along his genes to another generation.

Happy Saturday. Be safe.

Mountain lion flurry

We've had a flurry of mountain lion activity lately. I believe that the mountain lions are focused on our area due to the elk herd that recently arrived. I checked one of my trail cameras and departed...

About an hour later, a lion came through, pausing to look over his shoulder in front of the trail camera.

Then, he sniffed the base of a bear tree.

More sniffing. I liked this photo because of the elegance of his long flowing tail.

After thoroughly sniffing the area, the mountain lion wriggled on his back. I hadn't ever visualized mountain lions being so goofy until recently.

He continued his antics for almost a minute, and then stood up and shook, as shown in the next photo, just before departing.

In the following 10 days, many visitors marked the same spot, include coyotes and bobcats. Then, another mountain lion arrived. I'm calling both lions "he" because it's nearly impossible to definitively tell the difference between males and females from photos. However, I suspect that the first mountain lion was either a young adult or a female, based size and coloring, and that this second mountain lion was a male.

He turned and sniffed the area where the other mountain lion had wriggled.

And then he dove into the scent.

Finally, he rubbed the side of his face on a rock near that spot, before he too departed.

I'm not sure what I'm seeing here... but, as I said, I wonder if there's a female "in season" in our area, leading to far more marking behavior than I've seen in the past.

I also noticed that there were numerous "scrapes", where the lion had kicked back with his two hind paws and then urinated, in the area of my cameras after the second lion's visit but not after the first one's visit. That strengthened my guess that the second one was a male because they "scrape" far more extensively than females.

Mountain lions can have kittens all year long, and many do have them in the winter. So, it wouldn't be too surprising if a female were in heat now.

After all this big cat activity, I'm trying to be extra aware of my surroundings when I'm out in the woods. Today, a deer watched me and Shyla walk through the forest shortly after sunrise.

It was Shyla who alerted to me to the doe's presence when her nose started sniffing and then she looked intently at the deer. Believe it or not, she didn't even think about chasing the deer.

What a good girl!