Wild Kingdom

[ergophobe]

It's been Wild Kingdom around the homestead lately....

Aside from the robins that nested under the entryway eaves before I could shoe them out... lots of birds.

A few days ago, the first bears of the year came through the yard - a large fat sow after a mild winter in which she wasn't pregnant, since her yearling was with her. Neighbor left trash unattended "for less than five minutes" (come on people!) and they were at her front door peering in.

Then on Sunday we were walking and saw a fox cross the road. That's rare here. We sort of stealthily went down a side road to intercept it and came face to face with it about 5 feet away.

A couple hours later, my friend Sam and I met at my house to do a short run up to the bluff. As I was toiling along behind Sam (who is an absolute beast), I noticed what looked like drag marks. We stopped and followed them to the uphill side of the logging road and saw deer hair. Followed them to the downhill side of the road and say all kinds of tufts of hair stuck on the sticks below the road. And then we heard a big rustle in the bushes about 30 feet/10m away. Sam got a glimpse as a BIG mountain lion leapt out of the bushes and went airborne for a second (I missed it).

That last one was very spooky. We walked the rest of the hill throwing rocks into the brush until we were pretty sure we were well clear of the lion.

A couple months ago we were seeing 10 deer at a time in the yard. Then a month ago, the neighbors found a carcass in their yard. A week later, there was another carcass near another neighbor's house. This one that was killed on Sunday makes three *known* kills and for that one the brush was so thick we never saw the deer even though we were only 30 feet away, so there are probably more that just don't happen to be in places people can see them.

Haven't seen a deer in the yard in a couple of weeks.

[Travoli]

Is it odd knowing you might not be the apex predator every time you step outside?

[ergophobe]

I don't know whether I would use the word "odd." I would say more "disconcerting," but there is also something about it that makes me feel in touch with my surroundings.

The trivial version: a lot of people seem to run with headphones and music. I have been bluff charged by bears 4-5 times and on two occasions, the first warning I had was their huffing and stamping (they were close, but hidden so I didn't see them until they freaked out). I've been rattled at by rattlesnakes a handful of times. So I keep my ears open, no headphones.

And, of course, there was this encounter with a mountain lion. Headphones wouldn't matter there - by the time you hear an attacking lion, it's probably too late. But I background scan in a way that I might not elsewhere.

A couple years ago, I was spooked by a deer by the side of the trail and realized I was not paying close attention, so I started scanning more carefully for that tawny color and vaguely noticed a greyish stump, but dismissed it because nothing grey and 2' tall is deadly. When I got genuinely within 20 feet, it flew up to a branch about 12 feet up - turned out it was a rare Yosemite Great Grey owl and it waited until I was that close because it was wrestling with prey. When it flew up to the branch, it dropped a vole that hit the trail less than 10 feet from my feet and scurried away. I swear that owl had hate in its eyes as it glowered at me from the branch.

Anyway, all that to say that if I were confidently the apex species, I probably would have seen the owl, but since small grey things aren't dangerous, I did not.

[rcjordan]

In another post you mentioned watching for rattlesnakes.  Saw an article on this in my feeds yesterday

California surge in rattlesnake bites linked with warmer temps
https://www.newsnationnow.com/jesse-weber-live/california-snake-bite-increase/

[ergophobe]

Yeah... I have a big fear of rattlers since my childhood growing up in a state with not a single rattlesnake. It was all those damn Westerns on TV in the 1960s.

Up here, we have had snow a week ago and it is currently 42F, so I'm not *too* concerned with snakes yet.

My more rational and newer fear is ticks and mountain lions.