After a few exciting weeks of big critter spotting, it has slowed down, other then seeing a lot of deer (some are starting their antlers) and some javelinas.
Even though it is still cool at 6:30am, I haven’t seen any bobcats since the 2nd and I haven’t been seeing the coyotes at sunset like I was. It has gotten much warmer then it was, so that may be effecting it. We hit 99 the other day. Or it could be that time of year on the changing of animal activity or that we had more critters that were passing through due to the fire we had on the mountain a few miles away.
I can tell what I saw when it was hopping….grin Which always happened when I didn’t have the camera, rolling eyes.
A few weeks ago we had an issue with a neighboring ranch herd of cattle coming on the preserve. After the Matt got them off of the property, we had an issue for a about a week of cow piles and tracks being left everywhere and a spotting of a big red bull by visitors. He was coming on by the way of the creek and was claiming it has his terriority. On one of my morning walks on the edge of the clearing I saw a huge red creature….which turned out to be the bull. He just took his sweet time munching and walking as if he owned the place….LOL I followed from a distance, texting updates of his location until he crossed the creek, laid down and just looked at me like “what?” They got him back to his own property and enforced the fencing in the creek. So far, fingers crossed, no more signs that he has returned.
We were still seeing the owl and one her hatchlings until about a week ago. The hatchling was no longer just a fuzz ball of a head and was getting some form. I even had one evening where mom and hatchling were both staring at me, looking like duplicates of the same owl, except the young one was a smaller version…that was cute.
I had a 2 coyotes walking parallel to me about 40ft away one evening, they just looked at me and saw that I was no threat and kept on. Then the next night and accidentally scared one out of the bush….I heard something and then next thing I know I saw it briefly like an action photo of coyote from nose to tail as he took off away from me.
This morning I ended up with a pack of javelina heading directly towards me on the trail. They have really bad eye sight and unless the you are noisy or the wind is going in the right direction, they won’t know you were there. They were about 20ft away and since I had no where to go, I started talking to them, which helped stop them in their tracks. The lead one stood there trying to smell me and wasn’t succeeding. We all stood there for about 10min, I was hoping that they would move with me talking to them. It wasn’t until I moved off the trail into the dry leaves, so I could make more noise, kept talking to them and started walking to them did they move. Well, can’t call it moving, they scattered with their heckles raised….lol They are very skittish and it doesn’t take much to get them to move, you just don’t want them charging you….they are FAST.
The COOLEST thing that I’ve seen that I’m upset that didn’t have either a still or a video camera. On June 2nd I was on a totally different part of the trail and in the the dried bush I saw a big jump, it was a bobcat pouncing! He was totally blending in if it wasn’t for his pounce. Had all the same expressions of our kitties when hunting, his tail was wagging like crazy. I was 30ft away and he didn’t have clue. The rest of the trail is a marshy and is surrounded by green grass about thigh high, when he was done, he hopped on the trail and started walking towards me! It wasn’t until he came around the bend, about 20ft from me that he saw me. He just froze, his ear twitched and he starred….lol Then quickly turned around and walked a fast pace away, until he disappeared. It was so cool!!
We are enjoying ourselves, but I do have to say that it makes us really miss Oregon. You get so tired of the rain at the end of spring and you want it to stop and when Oregon hit is dry season it is so stunning, we miss the snow capped mountains. We are so looking forward to monsoon season here because we miss the rain, not looking forward to the very high humidity with the heat, but the monsoons will make it the landscape pop.
We really like the people here at the Nature Conservancy Patagonia-Sonoita Creek Preserve. Everyone here is friendly and doesn’t have an issue with answering questions and we are learning a lot. Which is what we want…to learn. I really need to hang out more when Matt does talks with groups that come, those are loaded with info.
We are given a free range on expressing ideas and helping. We’ve been working on the retail part of the visitor center. We got some product transferred over, rearranged the pictures, reorganized product and slowly going through some of the older info and cleaning it out. Pretty happy how it is looking.
We finally got our satellite for directv last week. Got the NFL package so we can get our Colts & Saints….grin Not happy that we don’t have the main networks….we have to get a waiver and prove that we are mobile so we can the East/West coast stations of them. Was really looking forward to our ABC news. Then to do that, we have to submit the info by snail mail…..rolling eyes. According to priority mail they got it Saturday and we should know in 11-14 business days if we are getting them….which shouldn’t be an issue, it is the wait that is the real pain…lol