Winter Solstice

This is the final part of the three part series from a Winter Solstice set near Bon Tempe Lake in the Mt. Tam watershed.

The closers shall be the spirit animal of this half of CTC, the gray fox.
Very common to the Northern California camera trapper, these guys are usually the first to the scene, eager to sniff and rub any foul scent concoction laid down by naturalist/fauna.

This set had foxes coming in for a drink

Foxes screaming

Foxes leaping, running and knocking the camera 'round

One thing that would be neat to capture is their true leaping and climbing ability. Gray foxes have been observed to jump 4 feet high from a standing position, and have been seen denning 30 feet high high in trees. 

Perhaps a goal for this season of trapping !

Trail of the (bobbed) Tail

The bobcats of Mt. Tam have never been shy to CTC and the Winter Solstice set found one of their favorite paths.

They visited the area 8 times and from them, I'm thinking we have two individuals.

First on the scene stops and listens.

Then lots of walking the trail... away from our eye on the creek.

Finally, one walks toward us… !

A closing treat that I had missed upon first couple viewings of the videos: A bobcat walking the trail, followed by a trotting fox seconds later.

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.

Fox Frenzy / IN SEARCH OF

JK recently posted about finally joining the Aplodontia Club, and with some sweet captures, if I might add. For myself, I have fruitlessly been knocking on the door of the Marin Cougar Club -- and I am not talking about the wine bars of San Anselmo (I have already been).

One would think that it would not be a ridiculous task, but here I am again, with only bobcat and fox images. And the foxes are aplenty.

These shots are from the JENGA location in Mt. Tam Watershed, except I moved the camera to the other side of the trail fork with a ~45 degree angle rather than the 90 degree side view.

First!

Peeling out / Digging?

Coming in for a closer inspection.

Even closer.

Now a duo.

Closer look at this crew

Fox images totalled 40 out of 103 captures, with 14 unique visits over 38 days.


A few other non-Mountain Lions dropped by:

focused Bobcat

Almost sweet shot of Steller's Jay

Raccoon Fam

Western Gray creating  / accessing seed cache.

As much as it pains me, I might have to move from this location unless signs of the Shadow Cat become apparent.



Next post, I will be in my own backyard across in the East Bay for the first time with camera trap !
Will the foxes follow me?

Friday Coyote Blogging

Nose to the ground. Mt. Tam Watershed

JENGA

The scene when I went to check the camera

Rewind two weeks. The previous days of summer had seen camera trap sets that produced stirring images of blades of grass and posing hikers, but no critters.

I had been walking back from another epic failure when I noticed  an IMMENSE  pile of scat in the middle of the fire road/trail. Now this was a truly epic shitpile. Upon closer examination it appeared that each layer was from a different animal, and they delicately left their mark in a version of the classic game, Jenga.

I tucked the location away in the old memory (as well as GPS) and returned a week later with full supplies.

The Jenga game was still on as I searched the area around the trail. To one side was a gap among the bay trees, with a game trail shrouded in poison oak. I leapt down and discovered that the brush quickly cleared and a wide avenue lay before.

I ran from possible set location to set location like an uncaged border collie, finally settling on side view of the avenue, where it forked into a seasonal creek.

Two weeks later, we had a loser in the Jenga game and a few sweet images to get off the summer snide.

 

More to come from the exciting location...

Howl Hill

Howl Hill.
Where one lets the landscape echo the primal yelp that resides within us all...

And a decent place to set a camera trap

We ascended through a patch of Doug Fir to a relatively barren, stony hilltop. The homebrew cam was locked around one particularly large boulder alongside a deer trail.
Pointing east.
I figured that this was the kids' set, so it was important to see why aiming in that direction was potentially (likely) a bad idea and I let it be.

The first results:

Fence Lizard heats up

LLAMA ATTACK*

Retrieving our first round of shots, we then reviewed the photos as a class. Were there any problems? Several students quickly pointed out the rock was in the shot and the object of focus by the camera. One student mentioned that the image was a bit bright, but others thought that it was not a big problem. We agreed to adjust the camera so that the rock was out of the shot. 

VELVETY!

1st turkey on camera trap. Worth something, I guess

Again, we reviewed the shots in the classroom and the question was presented: were there any problems with our set? A few more spoke up about the sun, which pleased me.

School was winding down at this point and for the next round, I was going to go out by myself. I switched out the homebrew for a new Bushie w/audio and flipped it 180 degrees.

My goodness.

Ten days later on the trap, we finally got a feline.

Not the Puma variety, but still very cool.
I'll be continuing to manage some cameras with Felidae over the summer and then when September comes around, the students of my new 8th grade classroom will be reintroduced to the wild...


*not a llama, obviously. durr

Felidae Adventures: Training Days

This spring, my 6th / 7th grade class met up with the Felidae Fund for the start of what is hopefully a long-running relationship with my classes.

First, the Felidae team came into the classroom to present a Mountain Lion power point lecture. It was pretty much the presentation that they give out on the road to adult audiences and a credit must go to them for putting together a presentation that could hold the attention of an audience spectrum ranging from highly educated adults to early teens with learning difficulties.

The class was completely transfixed by the photos and information and could not wait for their second visit into the classroom: a lab activity demonstrating the effect of development on Mountain Lion populations, and then in turn, deer populations.

After the lab came the waiting game -- when would we be able to go out into the field and hopefully find one of these majestic creatures with camera traps?

Several rounds of practice sets around campus and Lucas Valley familiarized the students for many aspects of the camera trapping experience: looking for signs of animal presence, angles to use to best capture the animal's path and what to use in the environment for camera placement.

The time came in mid-May for the big league call-up, with us meeting the Felidae crew at the Mt. Tam watershed. The goal was to set up at least three cameras in two separate pre-planned locations. On the hike to location one, a dry gully, we observed fresh bobcat scat. With the fortuitous poop discovery, we merrily continued to the gully and set up two cameras, one video, one still.

preparing camera uno

The gully sets produced many deer shots over a seven week period, along with the occasional raccoon. Nothing spectacular, or exhibiting interesting behavior, so I am not going to post them.

Upon completing camera setup, we marched up what was to be known as Howl Hill...

 

 

 

 

 

 

What dangers would we encounter?

Would an animal other than a deer wander past our camera?

These questions and more answered in the next post !

Fox Frenzy

60% of the time, it works every time

This set continues the exploration of the Mt. Tam Watershed, along a small tributary stream of Lagunitas Creek. I joined up with teaching cohort and fellow camera trapper, Ryan, on a glorious Sunday morning.

Three cams were placed -- one by myself and two by Ryan (guest post in the near future?) and were in operation for about 20 days.

While JK is scoring Bobcat tail on his cam all over Younger Lagoon, the Gray Fox continues to be my carnivore du jour.

Day 5 visit

 

Day 15 visit

 

                         Breeding Pair ?

 

A Grey Squirrel was the only other species to visit

Now, scents such as the top-pictured Fox Frenzy, are something of late that I have tried to use sparingly in my sets. 

This was not one of those sets. 

In this small clearing I found fox scat (near moss, left center picture) and dabbed some scent on a large rock (bottom right) and then again near the scat.

A curiosity runs through me. Is that a breeding pair? If so, will they be denning nearby?