coyote – Page 2 – David Kotz

Lyme wildlife – November part 3

Final installment of clips from my wildlife cameras in November.

I recently doubled the number of cameras I have posted in strategic locations in a nearby forest of Lyme, New Hampshire. Last week I shared my first video of beavers, busy collecting trees and repairing their dams; then some video of other visitors to that same brook. Today I return to my traditional stomping grounds, where we get to see who was roaming that hill… the steep/rocky east side, the flat hilltop, and the vernal pool (now dry) on the west side. The video opens with a view of a beautiful canine, provides two angles on a mature buck (with unusual markings, whom we saw in this location last month), startles us with a one-eared black bear (shouldn’t he be asleep by now?), and ends with a flock of turkeys. I left out most of the (many) deer, and the deer hunters 😉 Check out the video, and read on for more information about the canine.

Lyme wildlife – November part 2

So much to share this month!

November was a busy month in the forests of Lyme, New Hampshire… especially evident because I doubled the number of cameras in late October. Last week, I shared fun video of beavers captured next to one of their dams along a brook near home. Well, beavers weren’t the only visitors to this brook! Today I share two short videos: one showcasing the variety of other critters that follow the beaver’s trail, and the other highlighting animals that cross the brook further downstream.

In this first video, taken alongside a game trail the busy beavers created while dragging trees down to the stream, you’ll see a puzzled buck, a curious raccoon, a busy mouse, and… a special guest. Don’t miss the special guest! and read on for a second video.

Wildlife cameras – September

Spoiler alert: Not all the cameras survived!

September was a busy month in the forests of Lyme New Hampshire, as the foliage started to turn and forest residents began their preparations for winter. This month I’m organizing the videos by location – with each video mostly in chronological order. It’s interesting to see the variety of animals that pass by a given point – sometimes within minutes of each other. I captured first-looks at two species I’ve never seen on camera before: a solo flying squirrel, and a group of strolling crows, both foraging among the leaf litter. Unfortunately, one of my cameras did not survive the month! Read on.

Lunar eclipse

Partial eclipse of a harvest ‘supermoon’.

Last night we arrived home from almost three weeks of international travel just minutes before the beginning of a lunar ‘supermoon’ eclipse. The cloudless sky was dark and the moon had just risen over the hill to our east, bright and full. I quickly reconfigured my camera from our travels through sunny Japanese gardens into settings suitable for photographing the full moon, and captured a few shots as the partial eclipse began, and then peaked at 10:44 EDT. Below is a photo during peak, when the top of the moon was darkened by earth’s shadow.

Canon R5 with 100-500mm lens + 1.4xTC, at 700mm, 1/100 at f/10, ISO 125. Cropped.

It was a calm, cool evening, and I stood in the driveway for about twenty minutes enjoying the growing eclipse. While I watched, I listened to the local coyote family howling at the moon, somewhere on the far side of the hill. Closer at hand, in the shadows to my south, I heard the alarm call of a white-tailed deer: a high-pitched snort while leaping away from an imagined predator. Meanwhile my cat, Sebastian, wove his way lazily around my ankles, equally happy to be spending an evening in the moonlight.

See the gallery of three photos – at full resolution, you can see even more detail.

Lyme wildlife – a walk in the forest

A weekly ritual.

I currently have six wildlife cameras in a hillside forest near home. Every week or two I take a walk, from one side of the hill, over the top, and down the other side, stopping to check each camera along the way. I enjoy the opportunity to be alone in the forest, off trail. I pick my own path, following my own sense of direction, recognizing familiar landmarks like a particular fallen tree, a fern-filled glade, or a notable boulder. I scan the forest floor for fresh tracks, listen for birdsong or the crackle of branches, and just immerse myself in the experience. I find it intellectually interesting and spiritually restorative – and a good workout, climbing up and down the steep hillside. Read on for the video!

Lyme wildlife – August

August treats us to bears, coyotes, a bathing owl, and more!

I woke at 2am to the howls of the coyotes, and they sounded close. It’s increasingly common for us to hear coyotes near our home, but in 33 years living in New Hampshire I’ve only once seen a coyote in-person. (They are mostly noctural, and I am not!) As noted in my post from June, I was thrilled when my wildlife camera caught a daylight video with a litter of coyote pups visiting a vernal pool. So, as I lay awake listening to the coyotes last night, I imagined those little pups were out there now, learning the ways of their pack, and wondered whether they might be in view of of one of my cameras.

Indeed my cameras brought us many exciting treats in August: a pack of coyotes, many views of both mama and papa bear (and baby bears too!), a fastidious barred owl, a nosy skunk, and more.

Two bear cubs explore the shore of a vernal pool.

Lyme wildlife: June 2024

New surprises!

My wildlife cameras have been busy this month! With the return of spring, I placed a camera back down by the riverside… and started capturing the daily visits of a couple of Canada Geese and their brood of little goslings. As the weeks wore by, the goslings grew bigger… and fewer. (We started with four, then three, then two.) They were fun to watch, but the really cool stuff came later. Read on!

Wildlife camera – February

New cameras and exciting footage!

As you may recall from my prior blog post, I purchased and deployed two more wildlife cameras, allowing me to explore several interesting locations simultaneously. I quickly captured some exciting video of a fisher, a small but fearsome predator I’ve never truly seen in the wild. The new cameras were blurry, and flaky; after numerous iterations with tech support they sent me two new cameras. So I have lots of video to share this month! Check out this new video of the fisher, nice and clear. Later, watch the deer sniff my camera.
Read on, though, for the most exciting video!

Wildlife camera – January

Deer, fox, coyote, and fisher!

Winter has been fickle this year – bringing us some good snowfalls, but also tremendously warm weather and bare ground. I expanded my set of wildlife cameras from two to four, and explored several new locations in the forest near my home. Check out the video! I caught many videos of white-tailed deer, including an interesting behavior: food is scarce for them in winter, so they browse on the thin branches of hemlock trees. I placed a camera next to a fresh fallen hemlock, surrounded by deer tracks, indicating they come often to nibble.

I also caught two red fox running by on a brilliant sunny day and a glimpse of a coyote trotting by in the middle of the night. Most exciting, though, was the fisher, a well-known local animal I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen. “The fisher (Pekania pennanti) is a carnivorous mammal native to North America, a forest-dwelling creature whose range covers much of the boreal forest in Canada to the northern United States. … It is sometimes referred to as a fisher cat, although it is not a cat.” [Wikipedia] Indeed, Wikipedia’s image of the fisher in its winter coat is a dead ringer for what we see in my video:

By http://www.ForestWander.com, CC BY-SA 3.0 us, Link

Unfortunately, my fisher video came from one of the two new cameras, which seem to be perpetually out of focus. I’ve tried numerous tests and fixes, and communicated with tech support, to no avail. They are sending replacement cameras, so I hope February will bring me more clear video!

Sunday Mountain Sunday

I hadn’t been out hiking for a month, so I was itching to get back out in the woods. It snowed (a lot!) last weekend, but this week’s rain compacted and froze most of that snow into a hardpack. Nonetheless, Tim and I headed out this morning for a quick hike. An overnight snow squall had dusted the forest with a fresh, thin layer of snow, which made for pretty scenery. We chose Sunday Mountain, a forested bump of about 1800′ elevation up in Orford, NH, along the Rivendell Trail.