More of the Redwoods: 'Possum style

More from the winter season in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Such a California setting, right?

This time our culprit is not a critter we should find in California. The Virginia Opossum, Didelphis virginiana, was introduced to California in the late 19th Century. It was first introduced to Los Angeles in 1890 and then near San Jose in 1910. Opossums were brought to California as a cheap fur-bearing mammal, but also as a food item. The California opossums may have originally hailed from South Carolina, rather than Virginia.

Sexy Opossum or Sexiest Opossum?

Almost cuddly

Why go around a log when you can just lumber over it? And look at that nice tail!

With a purpose

Does anyone know if that pink ear pattern can be used to identify individuals? Unfortunately during the first visit we get a good look at its left ear and in the second visit its right ear, so comparison is a moot point on these images, but my guess is that it is the same guy or gal.

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Opossum introduction information from: The Opossum: It's Amazing Story By William J. Krause and Winifred A. Krause, Dept. of Pathology and Anatomical Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri; pages. 23-24 (.pdf link)

Be Above It

The bird's eye view has been a set angle used before by CTC with relative success and failure.

While exploring a section of the Mt. Tam Watershed, I found a nice location, but due to large width of tree trunks and with other possibilities being to obvious for hikers to mess with, the bird's eye seemed to be the best option.

Plus I like climbing trees.

cautious bobcat

gray fox, as always

would be thief

Thankfully, they could not further mess with the camera and it was still present and working when I arrived to collect the data.

Weeks later, while in Oakland's Knowland Park, the view must have stuck in my mind, for I had a chaparral cam up far higher than the usual on-the-ground action.

it's a... gray fox

brush rabbit munching on monkey-flower

brush rabbit in glorious color

The angle certainly can provide an interesting viewpoint and occasionally insights into behavior or identification for markings, but it can't be recommended for frequent use. Ideal situations for deployment is something I will be exploring in future sets.

Squirrel Heaven

OK, time for an actual camera trapping post. It's been a while. Hopefully a few of you still check in on the blog.

These are some images from a set way back in Fall of 2012 and January of 2013. Yeah ... its been a while. When I first went through these images I did not ID all of the squirrels correctly. I wasn't paying enough attention and let that be a lesson to all of you out there. You might have something more interesting than you think you do.

In these two sets I got three different species of squirrel. The native Western Gray Squirrel, Sciurus griseus, and two invaders from the other side of the Rockies, the Eastern Gray (Sciurus carolinensis) and Fox (Sciurus niger) squirrels. At first I dismissed the Westerns as Easterns because of the bit of brown on the shoulders. It fooled me and Randomtruth, pointed out the error in my ways.

Fox Squirrel posing

Fox Squirrel exploring

Western Gray Squirrel found a nut

Western Gray Squirrel hiding its nut

And now for something completely different ... more squirrels at an earlier set.

Western Gray

Eastern Gray with nut

Eastern Gray hiding its nut

Western Gray found the Eastern's nut? Nom Nom Nom

Maybe there is another one down there

About face

"Where the hell did my nut go? That damn local better not have stolen it!"

"Guess I'll just have to drink my sorrows away"

Glug, Glug, Glug

So thanks again to RT for point out that "There's more to your squirrels"

And two (Fox and Western) new species on camera trap for me, just by looking at my images with a better eye.

Spring Break!

After a brief spurt of activity we had gone back into hibernation.

Here are some wanders from early last month to hopefully stir the posting juices...


A glorious perk often mentioned as part of the life of a teacher is the scheduled breaks.

It is indeed a treat, my friends, and after an intense few months in the classroom, it was a true joy to get back out in the world.

First stop, Santa Cruz, for a long overdue meeting of the Camera Trapping Campus minds. A visit was made to the Santa Cruz Mountains... and several brewing establishments.

northern alligator lizard

western skink

western toad

western toad

ca tarantula

stoned bee

some kind of dusky-wing????

Next up: Petaluma.
The place of origin for both of your CTC authors. While visiting the family, I made a stop to Shollenberger Park for a little birding. Shollenberger was my training site as a high school trackie and could be noted as having a significant role in the development of my appreciation of nature.
Nothing too wild on the feathered spectrum that day: terns, stilts and avocets aplenty, but it was the start of what seems to be the trend of my spring -- nearly stepping on kingsnakes

1 of 6 CA Kings I have come across in the last two months. It had a buddy about 25 feet down the trail.
I have almost stepped on two more of these guys while running recently. A very snake-y spring...

and a Swallow Scream

Let these images be our incantations to raise a wild summer of outdoor rambles...

Happy DNA Day

Today is DNA day. The anniversary of the publishing of the structure of DNA by Watson & Crick (& Wilkins & Franklin).

I celebrated by giving a guest lecture (the professor was out at a study section) in the upper division Genetics BIOL105 course here at UCSC. Enrollment is about 300 students, but being an 8AM class there was probably around 100 students who actually showed up. 100 was certainly less intimidating than 300 for my first large lecture ever. We covered some good ole' classical genetics: linkage, map units and three-point crosses.

Followed that up at the bench with some genomic DNA isolations. So yeah, not too many a day goes by that I am not celebrating DNA by working with it. The joys of working on a thesis whose main topic is DNA Structure and Organization.

Its before noon still, so the shot of rye to the godfathers (and very important godmother) of the field will have to wait a bit ... but not too long.