The dust mop and the powder puff

Opening day of the regular deer season was November 17th. I found myself, as usual, at my Father's property. It is only the two of us now. The other regulars have all hung up their guns for the last time. So a day hunting typically plays out like this: We get up early and ride double on Dad's ATV out back. We fist bump and head to our different spots. The Van Niel's are tree stand hunters and there are several to choose from on Dad's 80 acres. We hunt for a few hours on our own and then I usually head over to Dad and join him for a bit longer and then we ride back to camp for lunch. After lunch, it may be a quick snooze before the evening hunt, dinner, and usually grading papers for me.

7 point buck
(Fremont, NY 11/12)

The only variation to the routine this year was checking several camera traps while working my way to Dad's treestand. Results will be the topic of a future post :) By the time I arrived at Dad's stand it was noon. It only took a moment to catch up on the events of the day, since neither of us had seen much. But as so often happens in a hunt, everything changes in an instant. I was still settling in when Dad grabbed my arm and whispered "Buck!". I froze. The ettiquite is simple: His stand, his deer. I ducked out of the way and caught a glimpse of the large bodied deer walking slowly across the field. One shot and it was over. Just like that. Dad has been hunting for over 50 years and still gets a thrill out of each hunt.

We paced the distance as we walked up on his buck. 193 yards. I snapped a few photos of my proud papa and then got down to the messy work. Truth is, I enjoy gutting a deer (or any animal for that matter). Besides being "The Eviscerator" I am also the butcher. But the reward is venison for us and a carcass for the camera trap.

I selected a location in our short hedgerow simply becuase it was close enough to the house to check easily. The carcass has been out for several weeks now and the cast of characters has not changed.

THE DAY SHIFT: The diurnal crew is all-avian. A murder of crows and a single red-tail hawk. I have up to seven crows in one frame but the one below is my favorite.

THE NIGHT SHIFT: The nocturnal crew is decidedly furrier and toothier. I call them the Dust Mop and the Powder Puff.

Dust Mop -- This was the first image of the opossum that I obtained and it was so unglamorous that I had to laugh. The poor opossum has quite the image problem already without me plastering unflattering photos all over the internet.

To be fair, let's have a look at a good hair day:

 

In fact, opossums can be downright cute if given the right light, a bloody carcass and an open mind:

Opossum on deer carcass
(Seneca Falls, NY 11/12)

Powder Puff -- My other nighttime visitor has more of a dramatic flair. This one knows how to make an entrance. Powder Puff makes the most of her assets and owns this carcass the moment she sets foot on the stage.

An unexpected benefit of the carcass is that Powder Puff is no longer tearing our lawn to shreds in search of grubs. This is clearly the same skunk from a previous post.

For weeks, the day and night shifts never crossed paths. No skunk or opossum photos in the day and obviously no crow or hawk photos at night. But in addition, the night shift and day shift didn't intermingle within their respective tours of duty. Not surprisingly, no photos of hawk and crow appeared and no photos of skunk and opossum were captured. But that changed recently. A few nights ago, numerous photos of Dust Mop and Powder Puff in what I would like to believe is a tentative detante.

Opossum and striped skunk
(Seneca Falls, NY 11/12)

The not-so-impressive white tails....

This has not been a typical camera trapping fall in regards to white-tailed deer. I have had dismal results on my property and not much better on my Father's. I have not had the number of overall deer I normally get nor am I getting the quantity or quality of bucks seen in past years.

Here is an interesting pair of photos taken about an hour apart. This first photo is of a deer with his first set of antlers. Since deer are born in the spring and data is collected from harvested deer in the fall, deer ages are usually given with an "and a half" added. For example, this deer is one and a half years old.


Yearling white-tailed deer
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/12)

Now take a look at the next deer to walk past the camera. He is sporting a much larger rack. Now that could be for a variety of reasons. He could have better genetics. He could have better nutrition. He could have both! But this guy is almost certainly just OLDER than the first deer. We can look at two clues in the antlers. One is the larger spread. Almost every single 1.5 year old buck has a rack that is inside his ear-spread. This second deer is not quite past the ear-spread either, but that is still common for 2.5 year old deer. The next clue to the age of a deer is the diameter of the antlers. Look at how much thinner the rack is above than the one below.


Two and a half year old buck
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/12)

Just one more year or two and that buck above will be a nice trophy. And that has been the theme this fall. Any photos of deer I have gotten, all show the promise for future seasons, but none look like the kind of buck I would like to harvest this year. The test for me always comes on some cold day when I find it hard to remember the last time I saw a deer and along comes a young buck. It is then that I feel torn between letting him walk and HOPING to see him again or killing him then and there and filling the freezer. In the last decade, I have let far more deer walk than I have shot. In the end, I do not regret that. There always seems to be venison from Dad, even when I don't find the buck I want to shoot. One last photo to share. A ten-point buck that I need to find next year....

Look up, look down, look all around

Gray Squirrel
(Seneca Falls, NY 9/12)

I have been playing around a little with different camera angles. My secret goal is to get some flying squirrel video footage. To that end, i have a Cuddeback Attack pointed up a tree in our backyard. I chose the tree only out of pure convenience. Without getting a ladder, I was able to reach the lowest branch and attach the camera at an interesting angle. The results so far have been slim, but today I found this photo and video of a gray squirrel. I cannot label this as "special" but perhaps "cute" is enough to blog about.




The video is only 16 seconds long and not particularly special, but I really like the angle. For a moment at the end there, I always forget that he is moving up and think he is moving straight away from me :)



Gray Squirrel
(Seneca Falls, NY 9/12)

The squirrels have been busy getting food cached for the lean times ahead. Last year we had no real winter to speak of but these guys don't seem to be fooled into thinking that will happen twice in a row. So here at our property it is all hickory nut mania. I have lots of streaky photos of squirrels going about their business and a few posers that seem to be mugging for the camera. But it is a different story at my Father's property. He has more pines and fewer hickories than I do. His acorns are nearly nonexistent this year so his gray squirrels supplement their diet with less than ideal food.

Gray Squirrel
(Fremont, NY 8/12)

Red squirrels are the ones that thrive in the pine forests. But that doesn't mean a gray cannot eat pines seeds. I found references that mentioned casually that grays eat pine cones and others that mentioned that they only eat green cones or eat cones at the end of winter when nothing else is available. All I can say is that I personally have not watched gray squirrels collect pine cones.

I also have had a few cameras pointing down hoping to catch some deer behavior. Monday, October 1st was the opening day of archery season here. Traditionally, the opener is October 15th so hunters are out two weeks earlier than usual this year. I was hoping for a nice big buck on one of the cameras to get me excited but no such luck yet. This first photo is a very small buck, almost certainly a yearling buck. I am only going from memory here, but I believe the statistic is that 90% of 1.5 year old bucks grow antlers that are not as wide as their ears. The second set of antlers are usually wider but even at 2.5 years old 25% of deer are still growing antlers that are not as wide as their ears. Even if the width isn't quite there yet, the diameter of the antlers is increasing. This final photo is set at our farthest pond. There is an area beaten down by the deer as they come to drink. I have a Cuddeback Capture set high on a limb. This is the only buck so far. I think that the thin rack that is not as wide as his ears tells me he is almost certainly a yearling or 1.5 year old deer. When I see a deer like that while hunting, I let him pass hoping that he will grow. I am not a trophy hunter by any means, but I enjoy the challenge of taking a deer that is wiser for having survived a season or two. Other hunters disagree and I can respect that. Taking the first legal deer is a valid goal and one that I ascribed to for many years. I guess I enjoy mixing it up, whether I am stalking prey for with the gun, bow or camera trap...

White-tailed Deer
(Seneca Falls, NY 9/12)

A different perspective

I wasn't trying to be creative. It was only out of necessity that I placed my Cuddeback Capture camera on an angled limb high above my head. You see, I wanted to know what has been using a trail in my south hedgerow and the underbrush simply prevented a good view without some major trimming. And I had no tools or motivation to do the work. So I located a branch that grew above the trail and set the camera as high as I could. That was five days ago. I am only getting deer photos. I wonder if I need to asjust the aim of the camera in order to get anything smaller.

White-tailed deer
Seneca Falls, 9/12)

I hate to be picky but I am not entirely happy with the angle of the photos. They look "interesting". Perhaps it will grow on me...
Anyway, have a look at the darker winter coat coming in on this doe. The summer coat is not only redder in color but is also thinner. She appears to have at least one fawn with her.







Here is a blurry photo of a doe but the coat is just too interesting not to post:

Doe growing her winter coat
(Seneca Falls, NY 9/12)

Finally, a buck. Not a very wide rack, indicating he is probably young. The photo was very foggy so I added a lot of shadow.

White-tailed deer, male
(Seneca Falls, NY 9/12)



Trying out the Cuddeback Attack IR video

I purchased some Cuddeback Attack IR cameras through a grant. Now we are in the process of testing them out to make sure they work properly. I have to be honest and say although I have been (and continue to be) a big fan of the Cuddeback cameras, we are experiencing problems with two of the six Attacks. I am confident that the people at Cuddeback will make good on them, but it is disheartening. Anyway, I had two set on my property this past week and was anxious to see what was moving during the deer season. The answer, in short, is not much...

Raccoon
(Seneca Falls, NY 11/11)

There seems to be no shortage of raccoons on the property. Here is an image from a Cuddeback Capture (I had three of those out as well this week). I used some scent lure in a branch in front of this camera and the raccoon seems to be looking right at it. That nose must be in good working order! One of the Attack camera traps captured a nice video of a (the?) coon as well. That can be viewed here. I edited down to about 20 seconds from the original 30. It is worth watching to see the technique it uses to search for food under a submerged branch.

White-tailed deer running
(Seneca Falls, NY 11/11)

I also captured some video and stills of white-tailed deer. There are two deer here and it appears to be an adult doe and her fawn. This Attack was set very close to one of the Captures. Let's look at an image from the Capture first. This deer appears to be really on the move! There was a bit of a fog, but otherwise a great photo. But what got the deer so spooked? Well, I think I got the answer when I checked the Attack. In this first video, watch as a single deer seems to be alerted to the presence of the camera. Click here. Now I have always gotten photos of animals looking right at the camera and when it is a still photo, it is hard to convince me that the critter wasn't just guilty of looking in that direction. But with the video, I am seeing more of the story. Whereas the raccoon in the earlier video gave no evidence that it detected the camera, this deer sure gets spooked. But if that doesn't convince you, maybe this next video will. Before you watch, let me set it up for you. It occurs only two minutes after the previous video.   If you watch until the end, note the second deer that becomes visible (mostly a glowing eye..). She is coming from the location of the Cuddeback Capture. The time stamps on the two cameras lead me to believe that I captured a video of one deer being startled on the Attack and the deer it was traveling with reacting to that on the Capture. Kind of neat.... Oh, the link! Watch it here.

Dad's Camera Trap Set continues to produce...

I have posted a few entries regarding my Father's camera trapping adventures. He has had a particularly good run as you can see here. I spent the day with him yesterday. Mother Nature joined us with a nice gift of wet sticky snow, the first of the season. We had a nice day of hunting. My highlight was a nice red fox trotting by at about 40 yards in the fresh snow.  Dad decided he wanted to adjust the placement a little so the next batch will show a different angle. I took the opportunity to make two camera sets of my own. Anyway, we checked the camera and got a few nice photos:

Ten point buck
Photo by: Jack Van Niel, 10/11

1. Ten-pointer! This is one nice deer. There is one tine there that is pretty small, but I believe it is at least an inch and therefore "countable". There have been no shortages of buck photos from this set, but many have been yearlings with thin, narrow racks. But this guy has the look of an older deer. Some people believe that the number of points on the antlers can tell the age of the deer, but the diameter of the beams and the spread of the rack are much more reliable indicators of age. More on that in future posts.

Black Bears, Fremont, NY
Photo by: Jack Van Niel, 10/11

2. Black Bears: Ahhh..... a nice family scene here. But what do I have? Two siblings? A cub in the foreground and Mom in the back (The more I look at this photo, the more I am convinced that the bear in the back is larger and an adult)? I cannot say for for sure. If they are both cubs, Mom is probably just off camera someplace. Despite the size of that lead bear, it is a cub. Cubs in New York are most likely born in January and weigh less than a pound each. At this exact same spot in June, my father took these photos of a mother and cub. I cannot say for sure we are looking at the same bears. Regardless, the cub(s) in THIS photo were that small in June. Now, in October, cubs can weigh upwards of 100 pounds. They will den with or near Mom this winter and when they emerge in the spring, they will be yearlings. I am bringing my black bear management class down in two weeks for an optional field trip. Let's hope we have some black bear photos of our own to discover.

Early scrape activity

White-tailed deer scrape
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/11)

I am not bow hunting this year. But that doesn't mean I have no interest in the comings and goings of deer on my property. This past Sunday I went to check my camera traps and found two half-hearted scrapes. This first scrape is larger and is under a black locust sapling. It is a bit difficult to see in this photo but click on it to enlarge. You are looking at the bare area in the mowed grass trail. Scrapes are normally found with a tree branch hanging above it. The purpose of the branch is for the deer to apply additional scent. They will mouth the branch and perhaps rub their pre-orbital glands as well. This next photo is a nice close up of the scrape itself.

White-tailed deer scrape
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/11)

Here is the scrape up close and personal. The scrape is made by the male. He uses his hooves to clear the vegetation and then urinates through his tarsal glands to produce a calling card for other deer to investigate.

White-tailed deer scrape
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/11)

The second scrape I encountered was not as fully formed. Only about 20 feet away, this other scrape was much smaller but contained a nice clear deer track. The track is just above my finger. Note how much vegetation remains within this scrape. I have seen this behavior before and often these early scrape attempts are never quite finished and probably play a very small role, if any, in the reproductive story each fall.

I was anxious to check my camera and see if I had captured any images of bucks. In fact, I had only a single photo of a buck. I cannot say for certain that this buck is the one that made these scrapes, but the camera is only 20 yards from the scrapes on the same trail.  Not a bad buck...

Male white-tailed deer
(Seneca Falls, NY 10/11)

An apple a day...

As mentioned in a previous post, I just received over 300 photos from my Father's camera trap in Wayland, NY. Since the camera was set under an apple tree, there are plenty of deer photos. These four tell an interesting story:

Doe and fawn
Photo by: Jack Van Niel
(Wayland, NY 9/2011)

In this first photo, you can see a doe and her fawn with their heads together. But with that trunk in the way, I just couldn't tell what was going on. There is a large amount of contact between does and fawns so this could have been lots of things. My best guess however was that they were eating apples or maybe some of the acorns Dad had also spread around.

Doe and fawn eating apple
Photo by: Jack Van Niel
(Wayland, NY 9/2011)

This second photo helps tell what may have been happening in the last image. What is happening? Is this a photo of two deer that just happen to be vying for the same piece of food? Is mom trying to take this from the fawn or is the fawn trying to take this from mom? My Father asked: Is the doe teaching the fawn that apples are good to eat? In the end, I do not know. A quick (and I do mean quick!) search of my references did not produce anything to support that theory. But I didn't find anything to reject that theory either :)

Doe and fawn
Photo by: Jack Van Niel
(Wayland, NY 9/2011)

Photo number three shows that the apple is now gone. But who got it? If mom was trying for it, did she manage to "steal" it away from her fawn? Is that an apple tucked into mom's left cheek? Is the fawn sniffing out a consolation prize? I have heard anecdotal stories that deer at feeding stations have a "take no prisoners" attitude when it comes to food.  But that photo above looks for all the world like a mother gently teaching her offspring the ways of the world, at least the ways of apples. So, who got the apple? I think I know...

Fawn
Photo by: Jack Van Niel
(Wayland, NY 9/2011)

Although the time stamps have been cropped out of these photos, these were all taken in a very short period of time (camera was set for 30 second delay). In this last photo, the fawn is licking her chops... just as one would after eating a nice juicy apple... :) Is this proof that mom was teaching her fawn to forage for food? Heck no. It isn't even proof that the fawn got that apple. But we can speculate. I will file this observation away and hope that more evidence will present itself in time...

Happy Mothers Day!

Black bear mother and cubs
(Wayland, NY 11/09)

It is only fitting that I use today's entry to honor the important role mothers play in the world of mammals. The term "mammals" is derived from "mammary gland" that makes mammals unique. The females of all mammal species produce milk for their young. As I tell my students, producing milk implies a whole host of other behaviors. For example, mama mammals must be good caregivers or the milk would be useless. Being good caregivers often means that the build a nest of some kind. It may mean that they protect their young from danger. And in the case of larger mammals, it means the investment of many, many months. Take black bears for example. Black bears will care for a set of young for up to 15 months. In New York, cubs are born primarily in January (I have several posts regarding black bear den visits. Search for black bear label or go to: http://con102.blogspot.com/2011/03/another-black-bear-den-visit.html for a posting that shows some cubs). After leaving the den, the mother bear spends the entire spring, summer and fall teaching her cubs the ways of the world, especially how to find food. When the cubs are born, they weigh less than a pound. In the camera trap photo above, courtesy of my father, you can see that they have grown substantially. Here in Western and Central NY, the cubs can reach 100 pounds by November. That is an amazing rate of growth! The photo was taken on November 1st and these bears will be heading to the den soon. When they emerge from the den, they will be called yearlings. By June, they will have dispersed to their own territories.

Tapir at clay lick
(Manu National Park, Peru 8/08)

Black bears are so small when they are born because the fetus spends very little time developing. That is NOT the case with our next critter. Meet the tapir. Tapirs are pregnant for 13 months before having a single calf. This odd looking animal was photographed in the Amazonian jungle of Peru. We were specifically staked out at this particular mud pit in hopes of a tapir visiting. Tapirs come to these clay licks in order to ingest mud. The theory is that the mud helps the herbivore deal with some of the toxins that are found in the leaves they eat. According to our guide, this was the first observed visit of this baby at the clay lick. I would like to believe that this was its very first visit; that we were there to witness an important moment in this tapir's education. Regardless, it was an important moment in MY education. This was my first wild tapir encounter, and to be able to see a mother and young was just more than I had hoped for. The pattern on the young tapir affords it a little extra camouflage as it learns the ways of their predator filled world. But tapirs are not the only babies with a unique pattern...

White-tailed deer fawns (Seneca Falls, NY 7/10)

I would guess my readers are more familiar with white-tailed deer than tapirs. So am I. We are only a few weeks away from the birth of this year's crop of fawns. In our part of NY, the last week of May is the peak of fawn births (so many fawns are born over Memorial Day weekend, I think we should rename it Labor Day :) ). The spots fade in the fall, but throughout the summer you can spot a fawn by its spots. Here is my favorite camera trap fawn portrait. It has an abstract look to it...





So, a big THANK YOU to all moms out there, no matter what the species. Every mammal owes his or her early success to a mom that provided food, safety and lessons on life. It was our job to follow and learn. Thanks Mom!

Raccoon family (Seneca Falls, NY 9/09)

Signs of Spring: Antlers starting to "bloom"

I put a camera out in a new spot on Thursday and was excited to check it today. Imagine my disappointment when I checked it this evening only to find I had left it on "test" so it took no photos. Since I was so in the mood to post a photo, I went into the archives to pull out this buck photo from two years ago.

One way that antlers differ from horns is that antlers are shed and regrown each year. As you can see from the photo, they are just starting to pop out at this time of year. Only deer grow antlers and typically only males grow antlers. Exceptions include caribou where the females routinely grow smaller versions of the massive antlers the males sprout and any female of any deer species that has high amounts of testosterone.

Antlers beginning to grow (Seneca Falls, NY 4/09)

Throughout the summer, the antlers continue to grow. They are covered in a soft tissue called "velvet". They are soft during growth and filled with blood vessels to provide the nutrients necessary to maintain the extremely fast growth. How fast? Antlers are the fastest growing tissue in an adult mammal. Only a fetus grows faster... By the fall, the antlers have reached their full size for the season. Below is the latest I have ever seen a deer in velvet.

Deer still in velvet (Seneca Falls, 9/09)

It is a common misconception that you can tell the age of a deer by the number of points he has (I should also add that here in the Eastern US we count all points, while in the West they only refer to the points on one side of a rack. So our 8 pointer is their 4 pointer). A much more accurate measure of age is the width of the rack as well as the diameter of the beam. About 90% of white-tailed deer have a first rack that is narrower than the width of their ears. Likewise, the beam is thin. As the deer gets older, it gets larger overall as well as in thickness of the actual antler. Since antlers are grown and shed every year, a buck's best antlers are grown when he is at his peak. Horns are not shed so that an animal with horns, like a bighorn sheep, will have his largest headgear when he is oldest. Deer will actually show a decline in their antler size after they have reached their physical peak for at least two reasons: As they are older, their teeth wear down and they will have less nutrition to grow antlers. Secondly, it is possible that an older deer will be pushed to more marginal habitat by younger ones, further decreasing their available nutrition. But let's look at a buck in his prime:

Mature white-tailed deer (Seneca Falls, NY 11/09)

Impressive? My neighbor thought so and this deer hangs as a trophy on his wall. Before I show the last photo we ought to visit the purpose of antlers. Many people believe they are to fight predators. Certainly an antlered deer COULD defend itself with those tines, but that is not the main purpose of antlers. Think about it: If antlers were so good as a means of defense, why do only the males of them and even then, they are useless for defense until they are hard. Antlers are for breeding (Our first clue to that was the fact that only males have them). They announce their owners' health to females and potential male competitors as well. Males will spar with their antlers but these are most often pushing matches. Only rarely do these battles for dominance end in injury to either combatant. So each year, after the breeding season, the antlers loosen and fall off. This can happen as early as December. But as the photo below shows, it can happen as late as the end of March (although that is unusually late). That doesn't give him too much time until he needs to grow his next pair. And camera traps help tell each chapter of the story.....

White-tailed deer with antlers in late March (Seneca Falls, NY 3/09)

Sunny Sunday: Turkeys, Ticks and Trampolines

The word of the day is "sunshine". It never got very warm due to the wind but that didn't dampen my enthusiasm for the day. Laura and I checked the cameras and got some nice photos today:

Male turkey strutting (Seneca Falls, 3/11)

1. Turkey: What a great pic! The rising sun cast some amazing rays in this photo of a young male turkey strutting his stuff. I know this is a young bird (or jake) because the two central tail feathers are longer than the rest. In an older bird, the entire tail fan is the same length. Opening day of turkey hunting season is May 1st. The birds will still be strutting then, but the difference will be that the females will be paying attention!

White tailed deer with tick (Seneca Falls, 3/11)

2. Ticks: I have one of the camera traps set low on the dike of our backyard pond. The muskrat photo in my last post came from that camera. It is set so low, that this passing deer was cropped at the top of the legs. Look closely at the front leg and check out what looks like a tick. Any other guesses? I had a deer a few years back with a similar circle on rear leg...

3. Trampoline: Sorry, no amazing camera trap photos of a critter doing a back flip. I guess I just needed a third "T" for the title. But today on the way home from basketball Danika said "Wouldn't it be amazing if we had an ingound trampoline?" It would be...