Working on the Teton Cougar Project

I’ve been volunteering with the Teton Cougar Project for a week now and have already seen 12 kill sites, many beds, and hiked over 40 miles.  Its been intense!  But I’ve learned a lot and seen a ton of cool stuff.  Here are some pictures…

Big mule deer cached by F109, one of my favorite cats.

Road-killed grouse foot.

Dr. Elbroch has an amazing track cast collection.

Cliff swallow egg.

Badger hole.

Pronghorn foot.

Pronghorn killed by M68.

Track of M68. We just returned from a 4 day road trip finding all of the recent kills from dispersing young male, M68.

Here is where M68 sat and looked out for miles into the desert sagebrush, from the top of a ridge.

Michelle, standing near one of M68’s bedding areas.

Little rock overhand where M68 bedded. From here he had an endless view into the sagebrush desert.

Full moon in the desert.

I’ve always wanted to find where a cougar scratched a log… here it is! They do this to stretch, sharpen their claws and maybe scent mark too. They are just big house cats.

Close-up of the scratch. You can see some hairs stuck in there too.

View from one of M68’s beds.

A recent burn where M68 hunted for a couple days (unsuccessfully). There was a ton of deer and elk sign in here though.

Uinta ground squirrel tracks.

Badger tracks.

We use the teeth to record what age the deer was that was killed. This is the jaw bone of a yearling mule deer.

Bears foraging, flipping over rocks.

Hiking back from one of M68’s kills.

Magpie cough pellet.

Snowshoe hare killed by a cougar. Amazing how the skull is perfectly skinned.

Here a woodpecker pecked into the bark to reach a grub.

The remains of a fawn killed by a cougar.

Fresh wolf tracks.

Back to the Tetons and back to studying our local cats. This was a nice moment from my drive home from the office the other day. Beautiful landscapes full of wildlife seem to be everywhere here.

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Wolf Tracking

I’ve been on the road for a couple weeks now camping in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.  It is wild country out here.  At one camp we woke up to find cougar tracks, black bear tracks, elk, moose, a grizzly bear rub and very fresh wolf tracks… all with in a couple hundred yards of our camp.  Amazing!  I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much mega-fauna packed into such a small space.  We got on some great trails – fresh moose, elk, deer… but the best of all were the wolves.  Lots of open ground and a recent rain made for incredible trailing and we got a rare insight into the lives if these animals.

Here you can see a much larger wolf with a smaller one – I think this is the male and female out patrolling. They came to our camp the first night we were there and checked us out.  From the bottom up it goes: front, hind (of the female) then front, hind of the male.

Perfect front track of a gray wolf. Sometimes its hard to get a feel for the size but this is a big track! That is a six inch ruler on the right.

Getting ready for some fly fishing.

 

Fishing with my Uncle Urbie on Henry’s Fork. Caught a couple nice rainbows in there.

Young cow moose in Montana.

Long blonde hairs of a grizzly bear.

Trailing wolves in Idaho.

Henry’s Fork at sunset.

Idaho sunset.

I believe these are Vesper sparrow tracks.

Uinta ground squirrel tracks. I know their tracks but still don’t know how to pronounce their name.

Tiny shrew tracks… do you see them?

The Grand Tetons.

A couple more days of free-wandering fun before we start our internship with the Teton cougar project.  Will post more soon…

 

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