Hot winds

Houndstooth asked whether my wildlife cameras had picked up any odd behavior by animals in the recent fires. In fact, I've seen almost no unusual behavior. The one incident of odd behavior happened at almost exactly the time that the helicopters started flying very low over our forest due to a wildfire last Friday.

Usually, when I capture deer on my cameras, they move slowly and deliberately, sniffing and foraging, like the young buck below.
The deer usually examine any other animal's scent post. However, last Friday afternoon with helicopters thumping in the air, two deer rapidly ran past a bobcat scent post and a bear tree without a glance. First, a small deer moved through my camera's field rapidly.
Just behind the young one, a thin and shedding adult deer appeared. She paused more a moment and then began to flee.
That was the only odd wildlife incident that I observed. Besides that, the animals seemed to go about their normal routines. As I thought about it, I realized that smoke in the air isn't unusual around here. Wild animals smell smoke from campfires, intentional slash fires, and chimneys. Usually, nothing bad happens after the smoke so why would they panic about it?

This morning, K and I zipped out of our clearing into a hot and windy day for our mountain bike day. My back had a zinging pain so we took it easy. The stunning autumn beauty kept the pain from making me melancholy.
Wailing winds, like the hot winds we're having today, spook K so it was hard to get any photos where she didn't look upset. However, during a lull in the wind, she looked distinguished for an instant.
I led her down off the peak and out of the wind for a moment, and she looked relieved.
When K was a puppy, she'd actually refuse to go far from our house when the wind howled. She's matured since then but still shows discomfort in the wind. Notice her tongue flick here - according to dog behaviorists, that means that she's nervous.
At the end of my ride, I checked a wildlife camera that had another coyote visit. Yesterday morning, a coyote with a luxurious coat looked alertly toward my camera with his tawny fur glowing in the sunshine and a bucolic scene of yellow aspens behind him.
Then, his posture changed dramatically. He appeared to be scared by something on trail a hundred yards away. Look how similar his body language is to a scared dog's posture. After thinking about it, I realized that it was probably me passing on the trail that scared him.
He fled out of view.
Then, he reappeared at a point where he could catch scent from the nearby trail (far left near middle of photo). I bet he got a snootful of my sunscreen!
It's odd to be able to see how I spooked a wild animal while innocently pedaling along with no dogs by my side. We humans have far more impact than we know.

It was another day, like so many recently, filled with tensions about wildfires as hot winds swept through our forests. Small fires kept breaking out and being doused by firefighters before they took off. Please do rain or snow dances for us!

A bobcat: my symbol of resilience

On Friday, I learned about the panic that strikes when a wildfire ignites nearby. Fortunately, we'd practiced packing for an evacuation about 10 days ago for another fire. However, we had no practice for how it feels when helicopters are buzzing just above your rooftop and the phone is ringing with a computerized voice telling you that you must leave immediately due to an approaching wildfire. Then, your phone starts ringing incessantly with people worried about you or neighbors who need help or want to help you. In the midst of the mayhem, I kept expecting to see fire in the treetops coming toward us, but fortunately, it never happened.

The helicopters were so close because they were filling with water from a pond a stone's throw from our house. The red helicopter is barely visible behind the middle pine tree.
Then, they zoomed toward the flames.
What I didn't expect, but should have, was how agitated the dogs became. Due to my naivete, I made a serious mistake, accidentally allowing R to slip past me and out the door. Because he and I were both so panicked, he wouldn't come to me despite his normally rock solid recall. After a few minutes that are comical only in retrospect, I corralled him. In the future, the dogs will be securely tucked away, with their leashes and seatbelt harnesses on, while we get ready to flee.

In the end, our mandatory evacuation order was rescinded. Comically, we received notification that we could return to our houses via reverse-911 to our houses... where we weren't supposed to be. By this morning, I could smile over that irony.

We were very lucky. The fire "crowned" almost immediately. If there'd been a breeze, it would have blown up like our recent fire. We were also lucky that the Type 1 Hot Shot crews with their air support were already in the area due to our recent fires. Otherwise, the story could be very different today.

Yesterday, we visited finger of a reservoir where dogs can swim. Don't worry, I took K's muzzle off to let her retrieve sticks from the water. I think that we were drawn to water because it is the opposite of fire!
Because one of the things that I fear most is losing our forest to a fire, I saw it through new eyes this morning, again giving thanks, as K and I rode into its depths.
K and I raced into the aspen groves with joy that they're still here!
We climbed up high, to see that a smoke haze still hangs over recent fire sites. But, the brilliant autumn colors almost completely distracted us from that part of the view!
K posed for me, looking quizzical. I wondered what she was pondering. Perhaps she was puzzling over the crazy fire drill of two days earlier and why I'm so completely depleted of energy these days.
I discovered that overnight, we'd had two visitors next to our house. At least one coyote trotted past the house.
And, my symbol of feistiness, the bobcat paid us a visit! I was surprised that he used the same trail as a coyote within about 22 minutes of the coyote. I've read that bobcats avoid coyotes because they can be killed by the canines. However, with the eyes of my wildlife cameras, I've also learned that the wildlife information that I read is not necessarily true.
May he bring all of us good luck and resilient spirits.

Update

Just a quick update. We're OK, at home, and the fire is "fully contained". My adrenaline levels are still through the roof. Thanks to all of you. Have a peaceful weekend.

Another fire

I uploaded my photos for a post when our world turned upside down. A friend arrived at the door in great distress, and then a reverse 911 phone call arrived telling us to evacuate.

We had a fire drill of major proportions with helitankers buzzing seemingly 100' from our house. They were taking water from a pond about a quarter mile away.

We found out what was important to us, and it's all in a van and 4Runner now. Then, we received another reverse 911 saying that our mandatory evacuation was rescinded. We're hearing that the fire is not growing anymore. Please keep your paws crossed for me and my neighbors.

Maybe you can figure out from the photos that I had pretty good day before all hell broke loose. Signing off for now.

Good news and a coyote brigade

Good news - R's ultrasound showed that he has "gorgeous" internal organs with no signs of disease. Personally, it would never occur to me to call a kidney "gorgeous" but I was happy to hear the word! That finding rules out several possible causes of his crazy drinking. Two possibilities remain: diabetes insipidis and an obsessive-compulsive drive to drink. We all think that the latter will be the final diagnosis but we need to rule out diabetes insipidis since that requires treatment. So, he'll probably have one more round of tests to make sure that his kidneys are capable of doing their job.

Amazingly, R needed no sedation for his ultrasound. The ultrasound vet said that R reminded her of Marley from "Marley and Me". I beg to differ! Although both R and Marley have/had a voracious appetite for crazy behavior, R is reasonably well trained!

This morning, the day broke cold (a few degrees over freezing) and crystal clear. K and I mountain biked together, and I gave her some extensive, but closely supervised, muzzle breaks. She galloped enthusiastically through an aspen grove.
As we'd ridden through the forest, the air had warmed by at least 20°F, and I savored the kiss of the autumn sun on my face, knowing that the snow could fly soon. K seemed to love it too!
Some flowers still bloomed, including a favorite bright aster with a skipper drinking nectar from it. His long proboscis reached into the heart of the flower. Pollen dusted his legs like gold powder.
Just as we arrived home, I stopped in my tracks simply astounded by the golden beauty that we were immersed in.
In the middle of the golden world shown above, my narrow trail coursed through the shoulder-high grass and aspen trees. To answer the questions posed by several of you, when I mountain bike, I follow established trails that are used by hikers, bikers, runners, horse-back riders, and wild animals. The more worn paths are ones that are older and/or used more frequently. In contrast, when I hike, I tend to wander away from these human trails and explore faint animal trails. Sometimes, it's even hard to discern where these trails are - I'm following vague signs of a trodden path. If I took a photo, an animal path would certainly not look obvious.

Today, I checked a wildlife camera, and I discovered that a brigade of coyotes had visited it. This site is very close (within 50 yards) to the bear marking tree and the bobcat scent post that I've shown you footage from recently. I think that I've stumbled upon an extremely active communication center for our wild animals.



One after another, the coyotes each marked a scraped up animal bed. Three of the four slightly raised one hind leg as they urinated. I'm guessing that more dominant coyotes, male or female, raise a leg when marking but I am not certain. I'm going to research coyote marking behavior more when I have time.

And, finally, sunset. It's such a tranquil and gorgeous time at the end of a day.

Gorgeous ride

We awakened to smoke in the air, bring that edge of worry back. However, I couldn't see a fire anyplace nor could I find any news of a growing fire.
Colorado's Smoky Mountains...
K and I mountain biked this morning. She's growing happier each day despite the muzzle. I give her occasional muzzle breaks during each ride, like this one for a recall. From out of the darkness...
... and into the light.
We rode through aspen groves where every light ray glowed yellow and green in the sun's illumination.
And, my K posed for me with mountains and yellow leaves behind her.
A hillside of aspen trees had grown noticeably more yellow overnight.
In the midst of autumn colors, flowers still bloomed. A ubiquitous yellow flower...
And lupines...
It was a glorious ride because our world is beautiful beyond words.

When I returned, R made me giggle, yet again. He wriggled on his back while loudly snorting.
Then, he noticed he camera and gave it the eye and a snarly smile!
Tomorrow, R will be having an abdominal ultrasound. Do you think that he'll lie still on his back without sedation? Methinks not. He's having this ultrasound to start figuring out why he has a serious drinking problem. He's slurped tremendous quantities of water for his whole adult life but his drinking has recently skyrocketed to new heights. His initial tests showed that his urine was so dilute that we needed to start investigating the cause of his wildly obsessive drinking. The ultrasound is one step.

The best outcome would be that there's nothing physiologically wrong with R. Rather, he might have "psychogenic polydipsia". In other words, he's obsessed with drinking water. We already know that he's a crazy Lab so that particular diagnosis wouldn't be a huge surprise!

I hope that you all are having a peaceful day.

On the rise

You all have sent me so many kind words, and they've helped. I also re-started some of my stronger back medicines, and they've helped too. So, I woke up this morning feeling a shade more upbeat than recent mornings. I'm sorry for the "down" days in my blog - I do my very best to keep an optimistic attitude but chronic pain breaks through and bruises my spirit every now and then.

This morning, it also helped my spirit that K is finally getting used to her muzzle and acting enthusiastic about our mountain bike rides. I never realized how much her mood affects mine. I think that I feed off her joy. I get my daily infusion during our mountain bike ride, and, when she was acting like she wasn't having fun due to her muzzle, I suffered with her. She happily led the way this morning.
We rode to one of the most expansive aspen groves that's nearby to check its colors. Yellow is overtaking green in the grove, showing visually that we are teetering on the shoulder between summer and autumn.
Each tree that I looked at closely had some yellow and some green leaves, brilliantly shining against the blue sky. Notice in the photo below that the yellow leaf has many green ones backing it up.
K and I stopped near the grove for a muzzle break and a hug. She looked happy, and it made my heart sing.
Several of you (Samantha, Nubbin' Tails, NCMountainWoman, kks, Sierra Rose) guessed correctly on the "bigfoot" photo from yesterday. It was a BEAR rubbing his/her back on the tree holding the camera! At first, I wondered if the bear marked the tree because of my newly placed camera or if I'd accidentally placed my camera on a traditional bear marking tree. I asked the experts in Minnesota whether a bear was likely to be provoked to mark a tree due to a new camera - the answer was "probably not". So, this morning, I moved the camera to a different, but nearby tree, and pointed it at the bear marking tree. We may not get any more footage this year because the bears are close to going to sleep but it's worth a try! Here's a video that shows the 2 photos per second taken by my trail camera throughout the bear marking. I believe that we're seeing the hind end of the bear (the camera was low, about 2' off the ground) with glimpses of the tail.

The bear looks gray because it was dusk and the camera's infrared "flash" makes gray-scale photos.



Today, on Facebook, the Minnesota bear researchers posted a photo of a bear doing exactly what I think that "my" bear was doing against the tree holding my camera. In the photo, the sow's cubs are at her feet.
While I was at the site of my trail camera, I closely examined the tree. I found a few black hairs caught on branch nubs - bear hair, no doubt. I also noticed that the tree's branches on one side up to about 6' high had all been broken off a long time ago. That fits with it being a long-term bear tree. Intriguingly, it's the same tree where I've captured images of bobcats scent-marking over the past week. I'm beginning to wonder if there are general scent posts in the forest where multiple species mark. This site would be one of them.

At another site, a couple of miles away, a young mule deer buck had cautiously tip-toed past a camera. This buck has velvet antlers, and has clearly had some violent encounters in his young life. Notice the scars on his chest and forelimbs.
I mentioned in a previous post that it is bear hunting season. It's also bow-hunting season for deer. Benny and Lily wondered why we don't don blaze orange. Our tradition is that we wear our orange gear, including orange dog vests, during deer and elk rifle season. That's when the woods teem with hunters, and the danger of a stray bullet is highest. I've never seen a bear hunter in our neck of the woods.

Long and winding road

Our whole pack went for a sunset hike last night, enjoying gazing at the mountains and feeling the tranquility of the forest.
This morning, I thought hard about my lingering blues and concluded the main culprit was a ratcheting up in my spine pain. Then, I had a PT appointment today, and my conclusion was bolstered by her observation of lots of inflammation around the titanium plates and rods in my lower back, placed there about 6 years ago. That's a new one for me. My fingers are crossed that it calms down all by itself and doesn't become another reason for a surgeon to work on my lower back.

This morning, K and I headed out for an easy bike ride. I had to cinch down her muzzle because she was pushing it aside with her paw to sample the local mushrooms. Now that's a resourceful dog. Shortly after I tightened it, I saw this.
Yep, she was trying her old trick of pressing her muzzle into the ground to get tasty tidbits stuck to it. I'm sure that she was disappointed to find a pine cone stuck there rather than a mushroom or scat!

K's spirits seemed much better today. I even caught her hurdling a branch!
Full of optimism, K stood tall atop a stump.
And then donned her muzzle for some more riding on the long and winding road of life.
Later in the day, I checked a wildlife camera set in a secluded forest opening.
And, I found a series of photos like this one. Extra points for anyone who can guess what animal it is! I'll tell you tomorrow.
These wildlife cameras keep me amused regardless of everything else in my life!