{"id":4448,"date":"2015-07-18T14:30:32","date_gmt":"2015-07-18T14:30:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/?p=4448"},"modified":"2015-07-18T14:58:08","modified_gmt":"2015-07-18T14:58:08","slug":"the-daily-forest-report-july-18-2015-blood-spattered-sitka-the-oldest-trick-in-the-book","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/?p=4448","title":{"rendered":"The Daily Forest Report July 18, 2015 Blood-Spattered Sitka & The Oldest Trick in the Book"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes it’s best if I just admit that this is<\/em> my circus, and these are<\/em> my monkeys.<\/p>\n

But first\u2026<\/p>\n

\"Butterfly\"<\/a>

Butterfly<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2026let’s start with this butterfly.<\/p>\n

\"Morning<\/a>

Morning Pile-Up<\/p><\/div>\n

The heatwave has abated and a few storms have grumbled through the valley\u2026 stirring everyone to action again.<\/p>\n

\"Cougar,<\/a>

Cougar, Bobcat or Lynx<\/p><\/div>\n

What we’ve noticed most is the sheer numbers of visitors to our little corner of the woods.<\/p>\n

\"Four<\/a>

Four Toes No Claws<\/p><\/div>\n

There’s still fresh coyote poop everywhere while various cats patrol the roads at night.<\/p>\n

\"Snake<\/a>

Snake 13<\/p><\/div>\n

While I was documenting footprints in the mud, the thirteenth snake got out from underfoot. The last two snakes, numbers eleven and twelve, inserted telepathic salutations in my mind just before I spotted them. For this one I was too preoccupied I suppose. (I always figured I was more Gryffindor than Slytherin, but I seem to have a real knack for parseltongue.)<\/p>\n

\"Layered<\/a>

Layered Storms<\/p><\/div>\n

The dark and the light are assembling into bands and striations.<\/p>\n

\"Into<\/a>

Into the Heart of Darkness<\/p><\/div>\n

And too often, it seems, we are asked to venture within the heart of darkness.<\/p>\n

\"Injured<\/a>

Injured Pack Rat<\/p><\/div>\n

I don’t know what happened to this guy. It’s not like Sitka to toy with rodents; she just tends to kill them outright\u2026 when she can.<\/p>\n

\"Moved\"<\/a>

Moved<\/p><\/div>\n

He managed to flip himself over when I moved in for a better shot, so I didn’t really know how badly he might be hurt. We let him be until the following day.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Next Day<\/p><\/div>\n

He didn’t make it through the night; it looked like the birds had gotten to him. Sometimes the Forest can be somewhat cruel.<\/p>\n

And that brings us to the real story here. Yesterday, while we were walking along the power-line– myself and the three dogs– a coyote approached from the western tree-line, coming in very close. Then it began yipping very loudly at us– a very deliberate communique. As I fumbled around in my pack for the digital audio recorder, I told the dogs to all stay put\u2026 but they were immensely intrigued.<\/p>\n

After a moment, Sitka took off running toward the noisome critter\u2026 with Toby following quickly on her heels. I yelled my absolute loudest growliest yell, but my dogs weren’t listening. Only Lhasa– the old girl– stayed by my side. Meanwhile, Sitka and Toby were busy falling for the oldest trick in the book\u2026 when it comes to coyotes.<\/p>\n

We already knew that the coyotes in the area had loosely banded together as a co-operative. When domestic dogs encroach on their preferred hunting grounds, they go about trying to eliminate the competition. The individual coyote who came in so close was probably their fastest runner\u2026 presenting himself as bait.<\/p>\n

The puppies totally fell for it\u2026 and I knew it. I kept whistling and calling, so at least the coyotes would get the impression that the dogs and I are all together– despite the young’uns having been lured off\u2026 foolishly. Sitka is very fast; Toby, not so much. Within a couple of minutes, Toby returned from the direction they’d all disappeared in, having basically lost the chase. Good! She didn’t know how lucky she was to have me scolding her in that moment. Sitka was still running straight into the trap. We waited\u2026 and listened.<\/p>\n

The yipping resumed way off in the distance\u2026 from the opposite side of the power-line. The chase had circled from the west going south, and now they were in the east\u2026 where presumably the rest of the pack waited. There was a lot of noise, and I kept whistling, hoping that Sitka was fast enough to get away once she realized her error.<\/p>\n

After a minute, the sounds died down, though I kept whistling for Sitka. Another minute after that she appeared south of us, down the length of the power-line. Usually when she knows that she’s in trouble, Sitka will take her sweet time coming back once she’s back in sight. This time though, she just kept running straight for us. As far as we could tell, there was no one in pursuit any longer.<\/p>\n

\"Blood<\/a>

Blood on Jowls<\/p><\/div>\n

I noticed right away that there was blood around her mouth.<\/p>\n

\"Blood<\/a>

Blood on the Neck<\/p><\/div>\n

There was also some blood on her neck and down her front legs. I inspected her closely, but I could find no obvious injury. The blood must’ve belonged to a coyote. Sitka is no fighter, but she is slightly bigger than your average coyote, and like I said, she can run very<\/em> fast. She had fallen for the oldest coyote trick in the book\u2026 but had managed to get away with her mistake nevertheless.<\/p>\n

I still gave her supreme shit. Sometimes she really does<\/em> have to listen to me\u2026 despite being originally initiated into the Forest Life by Cougar.<\/p>\n

Later that evening, Sitka was in a great deal of pain, apparently having injured her back left leg. There were no visible signs of injury, but she whined pitiably every time she got up and refused to put any significant weight on it.<\/p>\n

This morning she’s considerably better\u2026 and now she’s even insisting that she’s ready to resume her regular patrol of the woods\u2026 hopefully a little wiser.<\/p>\n

(Note: the tricksters are up to their worn-out tricks. Only the youngest or most naive among us will fall for their shit now. Keep a close eye on the young’uns and the dumb’uns!)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sometimes it’s best if I just admit that this is my circus, and these are my monkeys. But first\u2026 \u2026let’s start with this butterfly. The heatwave has abated and a few storms have grumbled through the valley\u2026 stirring everyone to (…)<\/p>\n

Read the rest of this entry »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-forest-report"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4448"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4464,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4448\/revisions\/4464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.nielskunze.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}