Mink

I have found this critter's tracks on the snow-covered ice of the creek.  It's a member of the weasel family.  From a couple of years ago some grainy infrared images taken with a trail camera.   And from last week a nice daytime photo of Mustela vison.  A mink.

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Nocturnal and diurnal this critter may be out and about hunting its prey (they're carnivores).  It's also mating season - so perhaps it out looking to get lucky.

Of all the weasels the mink happens to be the most aquatic.  I'd be willing to bet that it's burrow might be in the vicinity of the creek or the pond. 

Infrared Doe

Trail camera.

Night shot.

Girl deer.

Black and white.

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All In A Day's Work

Tree farm work weekend (again) pruning and clearing. 

Dogs finally had some success hunting shed antlers with the black Lab materializing with one.

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Had a close encounter with Mephitis mephitis. Fortunately, Mr. Browning (who always accompanies us in the woods) administered a sudden and fatal dose of lead poisoning. 

Crisis averted.

Never a dull moment…

Talking Turkey

More longbeards crusing thru The Platz.

Getting closer to spring turkey hunting.  Hubba, hubba...

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Coyote

The resident coyote makes his nocturnal presence known...

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Guess the Critter

From one of the trail cameras.

This was taken in the wee hours of the morning by a camera strapped to a tree.  The base of the cam was about a foot off the ground.

What the heck is it?

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Good Morning

Nothing like a trail camera sunrise to start your day...

 

Talking Turkey

The turkeys are starting to strut and display.  Nothing like it to get the blood flowing for spring turkey hunting.

A sequence of three pictures captured by one of the trail cameras of a jake (juvenile male bird) entering from stage left....  

He begins to display...

And continues to behave like a grown-up gobbler...

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You can tell this is a teenager because his 'beard' on the breast is only a wee bit of sprout (barely noticeable) and his tail fan sports a distinctive irregularity - the middle tail feathers are longer than the rest.

During the mating season nothing more attracts the wrath of an adult gobbler more than the intrusion of a young upstart.  He'll get his turkey butt kicked by the boss gobblers if he tries to put this move on the ladies.

Stay tuned...

Fifty Pounds of Goodness

Twenty five pounds per box.  Delivered to the day job.  Free shipping too.

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If successful the critters are going to love the results.

Can't wait.

Night Sky

To the west - just above the horizon - Moon and Venus in the springtime night sky...

 

Talking Turkey

A flock of hens strolling thru one of the active trail camera stations.

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How many?

Mama and the Twins

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Moving through at dusk at the edge of the yard just north of the house.

Shamelessly bold those deer are...

Rub

I don't ordinarily find deer rubs of this size.

Nevertheless, last weekend the girls and I encountered this bigtooth aspen (Populus grandidentata) worked-over and very scarred by some buck's antlers.

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Bigger tree = bigger buck.  Probably why he picked on a bigtooth.  Groan...

Death by the Roadside

I spied this going to town the other day.

I haven't a clue how they got here.  They certainly don't look like they got runover by a vehicle.  But they're in the ditch aside the should of the the town road.

Strange.

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How to Cook a Dog

Take two Labrador retrievers.

Let them romp in the woods for most of the day.

Add mud.

Warm shower on the driveway afterwards.

Repeat a second day in a row.

Feed, stoke a fire in the woodburner, turn-over occasionally.

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Mud Season

As of this past weekend - with the exception of some shaded, north-facing exposures - the snow is gone!

The ground in the woods remains frozen but the trails are nice and soggy.

Mud season is upon us and the Labs have been exceedingly enthusiastic about all of the standing water and muck wallows.

When the girls get all covered in slop and mire they willingly submit to the indignity of a bath on the driveway.

As for the equipment I have a new secret weapon courtesy of the deer camp crew.

Check this out...

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The Famdamily

The Frau, Swamp and the Girls.

The whole family...

Dawgs

Cannot keep the dogs away from the trail cameras.

Oh.  

Wait.

It's probably because the cameras are positioned on frequently traveled game trails.

And there's all that good stuff to sniff....

 

Talking Turkey

These are some really nice looking gobblers.  Check out the spurs!

Turkey season opens in a month.

On the march.  Hup, two, three, four...

The Frau

This good-lookn' babe showed-up in my woods to perform corrective pruning on some smaller oak trees.

Antler Hunting

Was out this past weekend a couple of times with the dogs and no shed antlers have turned-up.

Odd - as no antlered deer are showing-up on the trail cameras.

And this boy has obviously shed his as you can see the scabs...

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Dawgs

Just dogs.  And one people.

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Trail Camera Photography

Anyone that tells you that an inexpensive trail camera is incapable of taking nice photographs is nuts.

Sunrise....

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Trail Camera Photography

Anybody that tells you that an inexpensive trail is incapable of taking cool pictures doesn't know what they're talking about.

The camera that composed this photo was repositioned to face directly east so as to get the morning sunrise and the softer tones of an evening sunset.

Check out this late afternoon picture of a doe...

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Aliens Depart

Not sure if this is permanent - as one can only hope it is.  The aliens have left.

Whew!  Not a moment too soon.

Here is a picture of their spaceship taking-off.  

The flames from the rocket motors scorch a chunk of my trees, melted the snow beneath and almost blinded the trail camera.

 

Dump Run

Trip to the dump today.  Unlike city dwellers who enjoy curbside garbage pick-up in rural America we do not.  It's probably because we have no curbs.

In polite company we call this: Paying a visit to the Brussels Waste Disposal and Recycling Facility.  

Don't you think it still looks like a dump?

Oddly-enough the old pick-up truck started.  It was really slow to crank and fire-up but it did finally start.  No wonder - it's been sitting in the shed since Christmastime I think.  And it's been horrifically cold lately.  I was feeling really sort of smug about that old, reliable truck of mine.

In any event, I arrive at the dump and dump my three barrels of recyclables and a pile of broken-down cardboard boxes.  I prepare to depart and the battery is frankly just about dead.  Engine won't crank.  The guardian of the dump facility performed a good turn by allowing me to hook my jumper cables to his truck battery.  Vroom! 

So much for smugness.

 

Return of the Alien Invasion

Yup.  They're back.  Little green men from Mars or wherever they're from.  They're all creepy aliens.

And recently they tried to zap me with a deadly green laser death ray from their space ship.

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 I'm still here.  They missed.  

Interloper

Not my dog.

Someone's been running hounds - for fox or coyotes maybe?

This is definitely a trailing hound...

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Things might get a bit tense with the canines if someone's running dogs across the property and the girls are doing their thing.

The Hairy Eyeball

I'm not sure what the attraction is.  Maybe whitetail deer are just naturally curious about things in their environment.  Particularly man-made devices.  

More of the hairy eyeball...

Munch Munch Munch

A common fallacy is that whitetail deer are grazing animals.

Not so.  They are browsing creatures.

Grazing animals clip vegetation close to the ground.  Think cows and bison.

Browsing animals clip leaves, buds, stems and other woody vegetation from trees and shrubs.

Occasionally a deer might clip something from the ground and eat it.  They raise havoc with agriculture and will munch on a pile of corn if you dump it out for them - but they're mostly browsers.

 

Herd of Deer Redux

Posted some pics this morning taken early in February.  A group of deer - possibly a couple of does with last year's class of fawns.

Yesterday I relocated one of the cameras to cover a well-established deer trail.  

Check out these pics taken this morning.  I didn't post all of them but judging from the sequence of photos over the space of a couple of minutes there are possibly 5 to 6 deer in the bunch.  

Same group or a different group?

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