Mountain lion research in the news

(Michael Macor / The Chronicle)

The feature article in last Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle was about a research project on mountain lions. The University of California study, which you may read about here is taking place in the Santa Cruz mountains.

They're using camera traps, too.

I squandered many months of my youth roaming the hills there.

I saw a lot of woodpeckers, but I never saw a mountain lion. 

On the beat

Bobcats seem to be common in Marin County's coastal scrub and forest edge where we got these photos.



Unfortunately, the cam was a wee bit slow getting this second photo as the cat continued up the trail.



This cat looks different, but the location is only about 100 yards away.

Camera trap pachouli

Recently I made some adjustable aluminum and wood camera mounts for free-standing posts.

I use these 5/8" square tube posts and the sliding mounts when trees are sparse or unsuitable for attaching the camera.



I'd been admiring my camo paint job for several days, but noticed they still smelled of paint.

This was unsatisfactory. They would be a beacon of foreign scent to critters in the woods, and I have to use them next week.

So I dried them next to the wood burning stove. That helped, but I could still smell the paint.

Well, I was shredding brush today when I got a briliant idea: I decided to make some "camera trap pachouli".

I cut a bay sapling and fed it to the shredder. Then I added the Christmas tree (Douglas fir).

I filled a couple of plastic bags with the resulting potent smelling "pachouli" and buried the oven-dried camera mounts inside.



They have 4 days to marinate; then I'll use them.

Will the pachouli mask the scent of the paint?

I don't know.

But I felt very clever doing it.

Texas ocelots caught on cam

[PHOTO: US FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE]

News flash from the Outdoor Pressroom-- ocelots in Texas.

Read the full article here.

Proof once again that trail cams are far less scary than people.

Face Book Face

Here's a real life caricature of a yearling white-tail.

It's a camera trap shot taken in West Virginia by my good friend and native Montanan Carl Hansen.

Carl's a photographer, and he used to travel with me in SE Asia.

He documented our field work with excellent photos, especially candid photos.

He took a lot of pictures of me running around with an insect net.

In my less active moments his pictures showed me looking a bit like this deer.

Being playfully inclined, I decided to photograph Carl's activities.

He was fond of wearing rather unusual field garb, and that would have sufficed.

But those pictures were already on the internet.

So I settled for taking pictures of him only when he was sleeping in broad daylight.

In truth, we all slept in broad daylight. It was hard to sleep at night in a pool of sweat under an insect net.

Yea verily we cat-napped by day. We nodded off to jet lag, trains lulled us into dreamy slumber, and heavy rice and curry lunches knocked us out.

But I staved off Morpheus longer than Carl, and got the pictures.

He never knew it till we got home and the film was developed.

Those were good times.

And we're still good friends, or he wouldn't have sent me this photo.

Carl's going to retire in just a few days.

HAPPY RETIREMENT, buddy.

Dinner in the tall grass

[The leftovers of a coot dinner, Llano Seco, Butte County]

This was NOT a case of "death in the tall grass". 

The remains were next to an access road along a dike next to a canal of flowing water.

I believe the coot was killed somewhere nearby. The predator plucked it and ate it here.

The predator is unknown.

It could have been a raccoon, possum, otter, or mink . . . or a coyote or bobcat.

I'm ruling out raptors, because I would expect them to drag the prey into the open or fly with it to a roost.

Llano Seco is one of the smaller components of the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge Complex, but it's the nearest (33 miles) to our house.

2008 annual report

A few words to wrap up camera trapping in '08.

First, I expanded my home range, which means I made 75 camera trap sets in three states.

Most were in California (Butte, Napa, Yuba, San Mateo, and San Luis Obispo Counties), several were in New Mexico (Mora County), and one was in Virginia (Arlington County).

The yield was 2488 animal photos. The majority (2371 photos) were of  32 species of mammals. (I am not certain about my identifications of mice and shrews, so the species estimate is conservative.)



These statistics have nothing to do with relative abundance, and if anything, have more to do with the habitats I have chosen to set the cameras.

I added several new mammals to my species list: desert cottontail, white-throated wood rat, Douglas squirrel, Allen chipmunk, northern flying squirrel, Heermann's kangaroo rat, beaver, American marten, elk and feral pigs.

Bigfoot continues to elude and play tricks on me, like running in front of the camera and giving me blank images. I am convinced they have a sense of humor, but one of these days I am going to trick their butts.  

Two observations got me jumping: gray foxes carrying recently caught wood rats at Rich and my cams in Napa County, and black bears dragging nesting material into their den at the Wind River Ranch.

The 21 species of birds were incidentals. I wasn't looking for them.

It's hard to get good pictures of small birds with these cameras, and I just haven't spent enough looking for raptor roosts. 

Nonetheless, little birds just show up, and their variety makes camera trapping more interesting.

The bird thrills were the pileated woodpecker, blue grouse, and the bathing Cooper's hawk and screech owl.

My new MO was camera trapping with fellow codgers. This was the upshot of a little workshop with some old college buddies I did here a year ago.

As a result, Reno Taini reintroduced me to the wilds of the coast range in San Mateo county, while Rich Tenaza opened the gates to the Cleary Reserve in Napa County.  

Brian Miller led me to the bears den at the Wind River Ranch in New Mexico. I can't say enough to thank Brian and Carina for their hospitality to Dave Rentz and me last September.   

In June we visited Greg McMillan on his splendid ranch in San Luis Obispo County. Greg  treated us just like family. Not only did he cart us to the springs on his property to set cams, but he secured permission to camera trap on his neighbor's spread.  When we couldn't align our schedules he collected the cams and mailed them to me. I photographed more species there than any other locations. Thanks, Greg.

I also want to thank Etienne Benson, Mickie Enkoji, and Douglas Fox for three popular articles on my camera trapping activities. The articles generated food for thought about ethics and interpretation of animal behavior. 

Plus the publicity boosted blog readership. I'm self motivated when it comes to camera trapping, but I can't deny that its nice to hear from folks too.   

Thanks for your interest.

Several whacky new projects are cooking, so stay tuned. One of these days you will see the Sonoma Tree Mouse disporting itself on its arboreal midden of food scraps or a tree climbing mountain beaver pruning alder twigs in the high Sierra.