A Mountain Lion Walked Here

Our glorious world - some trees are in all their autumn glory while others are still green.

On a different note about the beauty of our world, I found an interesting series of photos from two trail cameras very close to each other more than a week ago.

First, a big bull elk passed a camera in the wee hours of September 20th.

A little while later, a mountain lion passed the same camera, looking like he was tracking something.

Then, about 12 hours later, the mountain lion passed another trail camera about an eighth of a mile away. I wonder if he killed something in the area, and that's why he stayed nearby for those 12 hours.

Here's a second photo as the lion moved rapidly past the camera. It illustrates the raw power that this lion possesses.

I'm pretty sure that he was a male, because he left "scrapes" in the ground all around the area, a territorial marking behavior.

I haven't gone back to the area yet because I wanted to give him time, just in case he had a deer or elk carcass cached in that area. Winter is coming. The lion needs to fatten up without my interference.

The mountains that Shyla and I visited the other day were very wintery today! Winter is creeping down the mountains toward us...

Cats and Happy Friday

Wintertime is always a slow time for my trail cameras. This year has been particularly tough - perhaps because the drought has changed everyone's movement patterns in the forest - both human and wildlife. However, I have captured enough cat photos to keep me amused.

I love the "low view" of a mountain lion that I captured in late January.

I'm guessing that, if a person ever got this particular view of a mountain lion, they might not live to tell about it.

Less than 24 hours later, a similar looking cat showed up a few miles away at a site that is usually choked with a few feet of snow by this point in winter. What a weird year we're having. I can still ride my bike where these lions are pictured, and the cats are still hunting there. Usually, this slope is devoid of life, aside from rabbits and squirrels, at this time of year.

Then, just the other night, I captured a photo of a mountain lion quite near our house. Lions mark this spot a couple of times per year so I keep one of my oldest cams there to document their behavior. This big male left a deep scrape with his hind paws, a huge pair of furrows in the pine needle covered forest floor.

Last, but certainly not least, the bobcats have been around our area extensively. This evening, as the dogs and I finished our walk, we somehow surprised a bobcat who was on our front walk despite the loud jingling of the dogs' bells. At first, I didn't think that the bobcat was going to flee but, when he spotted the two Labs, he bounded up the driveway. Here, I captured a photo of a bobcat, perhaps the same one who we saw tonight, in a nearby forest clearing.

I'll share some more cat photos soon... And, I'm counting down the days until the bears wake up. The bears are my favorite animals in our forest, and I love the season when I can capture their photos in the forest!

In the meantime, Shyla wishes you a Happy Friday!

Nurse Shyla and Cats, Cats, Cats

We are down for the count here - the flu has taken hold of all humans. It's a terrible bug but we've learned that Shyla is a nurse at heart. She is alert to anyone who is coughing too hard or is having a terrible moment, and she rushes to that person's side, full of concern and kisses. Nurse Shyla...

Of course, dogs need exercise even when the humans are sick. Since I am less severely sick than the Runner, I took each of them for a romp.

And, they both took full advantage of it, getting out all that excess energy. Thank goodness that they can't catch this bug from us!

On this quiet day, I want to share a series of photos from one camera that has become the "cat camera" since the bears seem to have gone to sleep. On 12/1, the female who I believe has a kitten or two stashed nearby visited the spot.

She does not leave "scrapes" on the ground, huge obvious furrows that male mountain lions leave obsessively by kicking back with each hind paw. Moreover, I again thought that I saw enlarged teats in one of the many photos of her visit.

A graceful tail...

And, one more sniff before departing...

Less than a week later, the male mountain lion who I captured photos of more than a mile away appeared at the same site. Unfortunately, he never took exactly the same posture as the female so it's tough to compare their sizes. However, he left "scrapes" every quarter mile or so. They were big and deep scrapes that I couldn't miss.

Then, a few nights later, we got a treat. Here is our mother bobcat who we've followed since summer. This audacious cat urinated in the same spot as the mountain lions who are many times her size had been sniffing.

Her kitten was slightly behind but appeared soon, catching mom's attention.

The kitten sniffed the spot that has caught the interest of many cats but didn't mark it.

With mom ahead again, the kitten stopped to look at the camera before disappearing into the night following his mother.

It seems that a mother bobcat has successfully raised a kitten in our neck of the woods each of the past two summers. By spring, this young bobcat will strike out on his own to find an unoccupied territory.

I found it fascinating to see all of these cats sniffing and/or marking the same spot. The male mountain lion is a threat to all of the other cats. Moreover, any mountain lion is a threat to the bobcats, especially the kitten. Yet, the bobcats still use this territory despite the many scent marks left by the mountain lions.

Okay, Nurse Shyla says that it's time to go rest. She's the boss!

Sunrise and mountain lions

I'm trying to climb up high fast enough to see our December sunrises during Shyla's hike each morning. So far, the clouds have been the story of the sunrises...

It was amazing how fast my state of mind changed after I learned that the vets truly don't think that Shyla has bone cancer or a bone infection. All of a sudden, I was whining about an 8 week recovery. I realized that I needed an "attitude adjustment" this morning. It's something that will heal, and that is awesome news! It could have been catastrophic news.

My vet verified that the recovery process still has 8 weeks to go. To figure out how fast to increase Shyla's activity, our vet said to quantify Shyla's normal level of activity. Then, I should incrementally increase her activity (both total hiking distance and off-leash time) by 1/8 each week so that she reaches "normal" by the end of the recovery time. That makes sense to me.

Since the recovery will go on for a long time, I decided to start teaching Shyla some of the non-strenuous parts of agility before the agility course is literally hidden under the snow. The teeter-totter is quite scary for some dogs. I teach it by propping both ends of it up so that it is like a solid ramp to start with. I am teaching Shyla to walk back and forth on it so that it becomes familiar. The lower end of the ramp is only 1.5' off the ground so it's not a big jump for her.

Soon, I'll change the "props" on both ends so that the teeter-totter tips by 1" or so as Shyla goes over the fulcrum. Then, I'll gradually make the tipping action bigger and bigger. By this technique, K learned to love the teeter-totter in short order despite being a slightly fearful dog.

In other news, it turns out that the mountain lions are enjoying the early morning hours just like me and Shyla! But, they get themselves to remote terrain by the time the sun rises. A big male visited a scent post that I've been monitoring for three years continuously.

He arrived and spotted the soft red glow from the camera.

He walked over to check it out.

He turned back toward the base of the tree - which has been marked by approximately a zillion animals in three years.

He paused at the base, sniffing the scents.

Then he did something unique. He circled the tree.

Finally, he scraped the ground with his huge hind paws, and doubtless left a few drops of urine to announce that he is the undisputed King.

Then, he departed. He followed a "standard" mountain lion route. I've followed their tracks in the snow along this route on many occasions. It doesn't go on any trails. Rather, the route skirts the trails, keeping the lions out of sight of the trails. Over the course of his journey through our neck of the woods, he visited a couple of other trail cameras but I'll save those photos for another day!

A male mountain lion will be aggressive toward mountain lion kittens and even their mothers so I wonder if there was any interaction between this guy and the female who we've been following. Based on how fast he moved through the forest, I'm guessing not.

I do believe that the sudden influx of mountain lions has to do with the huge elk herd (about 150-strong) gracing our neck of the woods right now.

Lions love elk and so do I, but for different reasons!

Almost Wordless Wednesday

Veiled sunrise

Soft sunrise glow on Shyla's face

Later morning beauty

The invisible patrol - a mountain lion earlier this fall

Finding Smiles

Life is feeling a little out of control these days - kind of like this photo of Shyla streaking past me during her brief running time.

My spine has decided that it's time to remind me who is boss. It's not me. Rather, it's those fused sections of my spine and the other degenerating parts. My hands are constantly falling asleep, so intensely that they wake me up during the night. And, during the day, my right hand hurts almost all the time. It's not a problem with my hands themselves but rather a problem with the parts of my spine that carry the nerves to my hands.

I had a change in health insurance in the past year, and my new carrier doesn't believe in preventative care. Since my situation is not going to be cured by physical therapy, they won't pay for it. I've finally decided that I'll have to foot the bill. Therapy is better than surgery.

As always, when life feels like it's spiraling out of control, I have a few things that I focus on that make me smile. First, my dogs... and, right now, it's mainly Shyla. I found myself pining for K today, wanting my steady friend next to me again - wanting to recapture the life that we had before K was diagnosed with cancer last Christmas Eve. But then I was reminded of how much Shyla needs me to teach her about the world right now, and it brought me back to the present. I have to remember that she's really still a puppy! We don't have the depth of bond that I had with K but we have tons of potential for one.

In these unsteady times, I also focus on riding my bike. It's still dry and warm here at home but nature has gone to sleep for the winter so the world looks drab - brown grass, no leaves, and almost no snow. Today, I looked back at some of my bike riding photos from Utah. Ah...

Finally, to find my spark of enthusiasm, I never stop searching for new places where our animals like to travel, visit, and mark. I was rewarded with a photo of what I believe is the mother mountain lion who we've been following via trail camera photos. I think that she's moved her "core" area a few miles, and I'm capturing her photo regularly in a new area.

She's an amazing specimen - a big and very strong animal. When I first started this hobby, I'd get a huge surge of adrenaline whenever I saw a lion photo on my trail camera. Now, I look around me to make sure that no one is watching me but I don't feel worried or wired. Instead, I feel honored that I managed to catch glimpse of these elusive animals' lives.

Without our passions in life, how would we get by? We're each unique in what makes us happy but I feel lucky that I've found some things that keep me smiling even when the going gets a little rough.

Silly Kitty

This type of trail camera photo is becoming commonplace. The silly mountain lion, who I think is a mother who is staying in a very small area, visited a remote camera of mine. Mountain lions stash their kittens in dens, moving them from one den to another frequently, when the kittens are young. Early in the kittens' lives, they can't move too far so the mother will frequent a small area. You might remember that we spotted enlarged teats on this lion fairly recently.

She wasted no time in started her wriggling. She is not the first to mark this spot.

After rolling and wriggling, she seemed to suddenly realize that a soft red glow was coming from my camera.

She rubbed the camera with her fur. Indeed, I could see the tawny fur on the cover.

She sniffed the spot once more, before ambling on her way.

I'm hoping to see some sign of her again soon because I believe that she may have a kitten or two traveling with her before too long. I would love to see them on camera.

Her behavior is remarkably similar to a mother bobcat's behavior - which I've seen in multiple years in the general area of this camera. With patience, my cameras eventually capture photos of the young cats. However, I've had to move several of my cameras which were in this lion's core area (this camera is outside the "core" area)... so we might miss the kittens this year. But, we can hope!

Cats at home, Cats in the forest

It's amusing sometimes that I search every square inch of the land in our forest for the perfect places to put my trail cameras, and then I get really cool photos when I just slap a camera to a tree next to my house.

Do you remember the bobcat mother and kitten who we've been following? We first saw them deep in the forest, in a secluded area with almost no human presence.

Well, they've been visiting our house recently. Here's the kitten...

Here's mom. You can clearly see the big size difference between mom and her kitten when you compare the two photos.

Here's the rabbit who hangs out near this spot, getting his photo taken every night. I'm pretty sure that he's the reason for the bobcats prowling so close to our house and vehicles.

Of course, when I scour the corners of the earth for the best place for a trail camera, I get photos like these next three. I believe that this is our mother mountain lion who is staying close to her kittens. I suspect that her kittens are stashed somewhere nearby. I chose this spot for a camera because now I know what the ground looks like after a mountain lion has marked it by rolling and wriggling on it. I spotted a trampled area that shouted "mountain lion" to me, and I captured these photos the very next night!

I'm beginning to wonder if mother mountain lions are particularly prone to this kind of rolling and wriggling behavior. I've never seen it before, not even in trail camera photos taken by others.

We just learned that Shyla does not have a fungal infection so we'll get her x-rayed after Thanksgiving to see whether the bone lesion is changing. Based on the new x-ray, we'll assess whether she needs a bone biopsy. For now, I'm taking the good news and enjoying it, even though we still don't know why she has a lump on her bone.

In the meantime, we're going to be taking a blogging break for the next little while. Life has been too hectic and nerve-wracking lately so some quiet time is just what we need.

Just in case I don't post before then, Happy Thanksgiving. I am truly thankful for the wonderful world that we live in, the gorgeous wildlife all around us, the glorious mountains, and my pack, both human and canine. Last but not least, I am thankful for the support from all of you!