Destination by Whim - A Mountain Lion

Destination by whim. For the last ten years or so I've been trying to get The Michellles (three els when referred to collectively) to move and had, somehow, gotten the notion that Tuscon would be good for wintering. It was time to go see.

By the time I got to Socorro (to the tune of that Glen Campbell song) it was already too hot. I camped at my spot on Caballo Lake where the braying of sandhill cranes competes with coyote howls. But if it was this hot here, it was gonna be WAY too hot in Tuscon. So I went to Silver City and took highway 180 north.

The Fall colors were hard at it and in Alma we took the road to Cooney's Tomb where, just beyond the "residential area," we crossed the creek (4WD!!!) and found a nice hidey-hole next to a tidy, well-built corral.

We, Smith and I, strolled back down to the creek where she clambered aboard a huge cottonwood and stroad its decks, practicing her Captain stances and yelling "Avast!" and "Ha'd tuh sta'bd matey!" 

After a while I started back, calling every 100 feet. I could see her moving between the crotches, ignoring my encouragements. (Whaddya expect? She IS a cat.) After waiting a bit, I returned and stood peering up into the mass and calling. It was so big I had to crane back and it wasn't until I paused to rest a moment that I noticed a cat, the very one I was interested in, nonchalantly sniffing an old limb lying on the ground a few feet in front of me. Cats!!!

I picked her up and carried her toward camp until, after about 300 feet, she started squirming and (silently) yelling, "Put me down! Put me down!" Assured she wasn't gonna go back to the tree, I wandered back to camp and she, enjoyed summiting the ones along the way.

Near on tuh dusk I heard a truck stop on the road and a door close. I waited at the trail and, sure enough, 'bout five minutes later a bean pole of a guy showed up. He said he'd heard there was a corral and he'd come to look at it. I was skeptical and thinking him a rancher investigating his new "neighbor" asked how long he'd lived here. Turned out he'd moved down from Aragon a couple of months ago. He was into photography and really had come to see the corral. 

I invited him up and led him through camp. Somehow the conversation drifted to some pictures he'd gotten of a mountain lion a few days earlier. He'd managed, with his little Cybershotesque happysnapper, to catch the lion in mid-stride as it, nearly 1,000 feet away, leaped for safety after it heard the click of his first "shot." I gave him my email but he doesn't use a computer so we'll only get to see it if his son follows through. But it's nice to know they haven't killed 'em all. And this one was a fine specimen!

Photos arrived (11/18/16)!! 

 As original......
                          The lion is almost dead center.

A bit left of and below center. 




Cropt....

...the upper image. One could mistake it for a bobcat. Its tail is hidden by the rock.

It's right rear leg is forward and its tail is above and parallel to the left rear leg. The white area is at the base of its tail. It moved approximately 200 feet between the time it heard the click of his first shot. (Youse might wanna consider carryin' some catnip when yer out hiking in the Alma area.)

Not having seen the sequoias in the Fall, I headed west. Somewhere east of Barstow this rabbit showed itself. 

                                                             Bunny behind Barrel (cactus).

Cactus growing out of rock!!!  

And that fine, crafted-with-enthusiasm and attention-to-detail roofrack tonied out our "overlander" look, don'tchewtink?

Note German flag on rear door.

Whole Lotta Poopin' Goin' On

UPDATE 3/4/15: Mary Katherine Ray of Trapfree New Mexico thinks the berry-laden scats are from coyotes. She said coyotes eat a lot of juniper berries in the winter. Ms. Ray is New Mexico's leading advocate for banning traps on public lands. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help support her efforts.




It was about 20 miles south of Silver City, New Mexico on highway 90 that I chanced upon the Continental Divide Trail trailhead. I stopped at the part in the Burro Mountains in the Carson National Forest between Silver City and Lordsburg. The small blue symbol in the lower right of the image below is the "brand."

It was heavily littered with scats. I'm not an authority, but judging from the formative remains, I'm surmisaling they're bear...small bear, but bear nonetheless.

And while I'm demonstrating the manly quality of conjecture, I'll further postulate that this one (below) is cat. 

I like to think the frequency was the animals' way of teasing the hikers. It certainly put me on alert.

And it went on for over half a mile. As Jerry Lee Lewis was wont to say, "A whole lotta poopin' goin' on!"

Coyote Killing Contests - New Mexico Leads the Nation

FINALLY!!! New Mexico Senator Mark Moores & Representative Jeff Steinborn introduced a bill to outlaw coyote killing contests (more info here). The Southwest Environmental Center (SWEC) in Las Cruces, New Mexico sent a notice prompting the following email to my contacts...

On Sat, Jan 31, 2015 at 1:55 PM, Wahnfried wrote:

My apologies to any of you who may be annoyed by yet another societal entreaty.

Killing contests, contrary to what one might think, have little impact on coyote populations. They ARE however, an obscenity and affront to human dignity. Do you know anyone who would stand and proudly announce their participation in this activity? And the days when wanton killing in the name of sport can be tacitly condoned by the state are long past. 

As you probably know, I've spent much of the last five years travelling throughout the west. It isn't a new activity and in the '80s and early '90s it was common to hear coyotes, especially in the single-digit hours before dawn and again around sunset. Now however, it's a rare treat. Most of the blame can be laid on cattle ranchers and the focused removal of any animal that competes with cattle forage including the billions of mice that are the mainstay of a coyote's diet.

The predations of cattle ranching are far removed from coyote and other wildlife-killing contests, but the contests are often "sold" as a nuisance abatement and public service...for ranchers. Regardless of who or what's to blame for the dawn and dusk silences, this legislation is a no-brainer. And, contrary to the implications in the paragraph that begins "If you live in New Mexico....." I think hearing from you out-of-staters might give them REAL pause for thought.  After all, tourists are a large part of our economy. That said, I find it incredible that we're a leader in contests to kill what is probably our most beloved icon.

Happy New Year!!

MFH

One of the folks I sent the above to wrote back...

If I'm gonna kill something, it'll be something that is causing harm to someone else in the way of life threatening shit... I have killed animals, but it ain't my deal. If something was endangering someone or something I would. 

My father is the "great white hunter". He, in fact, roped a mountain lion and brought it in to town alive to collect on bets, and then killed it for the bounty. I thought it was a big kitty and wanted to pet it.

This is not the same one. There were A LOT of them. Well, it IS my dad. There is only ONE of HIM.

DECADES LATER:

Yeah, that's me and dad with a stinky dead lion.



​
I (MFH) hadn't thought about this for many years, but while looking at the above picture I recognized his grin from my teen years in the South. It was a common sight on (white) peoples' faces as they egged on the police in the race-riots of the '60s. They thought the police were performing a public service.

Update 6:29 p.m.  2/4/15
I pulled this excerpt from an online post about recent developments. “These coyote-calling contests are a management tool,” said Phil Bidegain, a rancher from eastern New Mexico. “I think God did give us dominion over the animals.”

It's not clear if Rancher Bidegain advocates killing coyotes or just calling them. But I, Wahnfried der Nomad, disagree with him. And while I respect his right to his opinion, be it calling or killing, it's time we stopped "letting" God take the responsibility for behavior that the majority of mere mortals deems no longer acceptable.

Remember Horton & the Who's!!


Trap Free New Mexico works to enact legislation banning trapping on public lands. Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution in support of their efforts.