Trail Cam Scavengers

We went to feed the dogs the other day and noticed blood on some of their faces.  J was immediately worried that they had killed a calf.  We went looking and all the calves for fine.  I finally found a dead deer in a gully.  We set up the trail came to see what all would come to the feast. 

Mr. Fox showed up, 

and in color too. 

The coyote was a frequent visitor. 

Lots of black and white, no color. 

Of course the dogs were there at varying times. 

And lets don't leave out our birding friends.  There were crows, 

and ravens.

Looks like the raven and turkey vulture were not getting along. 

I think we have a vulture selfie. 

Trail Cam #8

It's camera trapping season again.  J and I have put out the trail cam a few times without success.   Then J took it down into the gorge a couple of weeks ago and retrieved it today.  It was a very successful spot. 

 There were several deer pictures,

 some bucks and a doe. 

 We got a two legged creature.  Only one person other than our son-in-law has permission to hunt.  We might should find out if it is him.  Then J got a picture of sometime he has been hoping to see....

 Yes, that is a big black bear wandering around in the middle of the day.

Then something we didn't want to see, those old hateful coyotes. 

 At least we have some protection.  Thank you Bumble.

Looks like the goats made a pass through the gorge.  They are doing a good job keeping it cleaned up. 

Happy Thanksgiving

E set up a camera trap here for a class she is taking.  In less than 3 days she had 165 deer pictures.  

 She must have done a great job finding where they like to browse.

 There were not any large bucks but 3 different smaller ones,

and several does. 

And camera trapping isn't complete without a raccoon.

Trail Cam Deer and Dear

Well, we got the trail cam back and took a look at the pictures hoping for a bear but alas, there wasn't one.

But we did catch this "dear", V as she was testing out the angle. 

Then 30 minutes later there were these deer. 

We got some pretty clear shots of them.  

Then there were lots of cattle at various times on the day an night. 

And it looks like the goats ventured through the area one afternoon.

Then there was this guy.  Not on the trail cam but on a hike I took through the woods yesterday to work on my horse trail.  He was slow enough for me to photograph.

100 Mile Yard Sale and a Bear

This is the weekend for the 100 mile long yard sale.  Last year we participated by selling.  This year we tried shopping. 

V was looking for things for her new house.  All that she managed to find were 2 shirts at our neighbor's house.  I decided that the stuff everyone else was selling was worse than what I wanted to get rid of so I had no trouble not buying anything. 

The fire station was selling hot dogs so J treated us to lunch there for a good cause.  Then we quit and came home.

Now for the bear. 

Tuesday J saw a bear in the area he refers to as "the gorge".  The was on top of the hill and the bear was down here near the creek.  We rode Brother and Otoelene through here this morning before the yard sale.  I said I would like to set up the trail cam to see if we could catch the bear. 

So this afternoon we went on a hike to the gorge. 

We found several things that we interpreted to be bear signs.  This log was rolled out. 

We imagined that these were claw marks.  

I'm pretty sure that this is a large track of some sort. 

And this log was torn up.  

Deciding that this was a good place we crossed Chaney Branch to set up the trail cam at a path between the fence and creek. 

V made the final inspection and turned it on.  Now we will wait a few days then see what we caught.

Trail Cam #5

It's been a while since J put out his trail cam, a year to be exact.  But when Mike and V came to visit last weekend, they set it back out.  

 We got lots of pictures of squirrels.  

 I think this might be a fox.

 Definitely a raccoon.

 A couple of deer but no bucks.

And my favorite picture, 10 turkeys.

Trail Cam #4

J is really enjoying his new hobby of trail cam picture taking.  He set it up is another location to see what he would get on top of the ridge under the oak trees. 

 This was the first raccoon sighting with the trail cam.

 He got a picture of another nice buck,

 and doe.

And this one was interesting with both the deer and raccoon.  E's friend that wants to hunt here called to ask specifically where J had set up the trail cam.  I believe he is interested in spotting that buck.

Trail Cam #3

J got a little better variety of wildlife this time on his trail cam.

 Our first little critter was a squirrel.

 J got a beautiful picture of some turkeys.

 They did a little sprucing up.

 And then one took a selfie.

 At 3:44 one morning a spike buck walked by.

And then another squirrel.  I'm still waiting on a picture of a bear.  I've been told one crosses the road at our farm but I've never seen it yet.