Erin Hauge
Blog by Erin Hauge
The weather is starting to mellow in the Central Valley as the earth once again moves toward autumn. Today on the Cosumnes River Preserve was about as good as it gets, with golds, greens and rusts coloring the landscape and a breeze that kept things to just around 70 degrees. There’s a feeling that the seasons are changing, and nothing brings that feeling home more than seeing the first Sandhill Cranes in the sky, coming south for the winter. These magnificent birds are a joy to watch and it’s comforting to see them appear on the horizon again with their beautiful, primordial calls echoing for miles (up to 2 miles!). All’s right with the world on the Preserve!
Erin Hauge
These first crane scouts are the intrepid front wave. After fattening up in their summer stomping grounds and hearing the changing seasons calling for their long migration, they kettle up into the sky, higher and higher to catch the powerful thermals that will propel them southward for another winter. They touch down in the Central Valley exhausted and depleted, ready to feast on rich resources including grains, invertebrates, amphibians and small mammals of the wetlands and agricultural fields. The Cosumnes River Preserve's managed wetlands are prime feeding grounds for Sandhill cranes and you can expect to see many more of them arriving there soon. Some will not survive the grueling journey but many do, and crane families will spend the winter fattening up and loafing on the Preserve and other places in the Valley along the Great Pacific Flyway. The youngsters, called colts, will continue to mature and practice their delicate and athletic dancing skills in preparation for courtship in the spring as well as to build muscle coordination and as an aid in defense maneuvers. Mated pairs of Sandhill cranes usually stay together for life and migrate south in the fall with their families.
Out on the Preserve today we counted four barn owl kill sites within a small area (several acres) between two of the cameras. Generally, when a predator like a bobcat or coyote kills a bird, they spend a deal of time plucking out the feathers so they don’t ingest the quills while they’re eating the carcass. At the sites we observed, it looked as though most of the feathers had been plucked out where the kills were made and then the carcasses were possibly taken to another, more protected location to be consumed.
A predator killed these barn owls, maybe a bobcat or a large raptor. Erin Hauge
We saw bobcat scat and bobcat tracks near several of the kill sites so it might be that a resourceful bobcat has figured out how to kill barn owls when they’re on the ground, maybe preoccupied with their own kill. We don’t know if the barn owls were killed at night, or what they were doing on the ground. They may have been immature adults who were inexperienced and caught unawares. One of the kills was made in an oak tree, again pointing to a bobcat as the possible predator. Larger raptors like Great Horned Owls and large hawks, coyotes and mountain lions also eat Barn owls. The reason we speculated it could be a bobcat is because we didn’t see many coyote tracks or scat in the area on this day, and we did see bobcat sign.
We also saw what looks to be an old deer scrape on a medium size oak tree. Bucks rub their antlers on tree trunks and branches in the fall to ease the molting of the felt that covers their antlers during the spring and summer. It could be that the felt is itchy and so bucks find relief by rubbing. It’s also thought that larger bucks rub on bigger trees as a status mark and younger bucks will rub on smaller trees. Deer have glands on their face that also leave scent on the rubbings, telling the neighborhood who’s been where. It was clear that this rubbing was some years old as there was a distinct callus ring formed around it as the tree tries to heal itself from the bark damage.
An old deer scrape, made years ago when a buck was rubbing felt from his antlers. Erin Hauge
As we went to check one of the cameras there was movement in the brush and we saw that two pheasants were warily watching us and ready for flight! As we approached with our cameras, they eventually ran and flew down the road away from us. It turns out these are two immature male Ring-necked pheasants. Juveniles can look similar to females, much less showy with mottled plumage and shorter tail feathers. Males begin to show their bright, hallmark plumage around the breast, head and back about 10 weeks after hatching. So these guys are starting to fill in and grow up! While they may be siblings and seem like they’re hanging together, come spring they’ll be fighting to establish breeding territories and claim mates. Ring-necked Pheasants eat seeds and grain from the nearby agricultural fields, grasses, leaves, roots, wild fruit and insects.
Two immature male Ring-necked pheasants - they'll get their bright feathers at about 10 weeks of age. Erin Hauge
As we headed back to the car, we heard the familiar cry of a Red-tailed hawk in the sky. We were told that there was an adult and an immature nearby and so this adult may have been calling to the youngster. We watched as the hawk soared high and came low, disappearing behind a stand of oaks and reappearing with the tell-tale cry. We didn’t see the youngster venture out but likely this fledgling is getting ready to take to the sky and test out some flight moves.
Red-tailed hawk. Erin Hauge
At one of the cameras we found a small area that had been dug out by an animal and in the middle of the exposed dirt was a track! An interesting track! One that could have been made by a mountain lion. Based on recent sightings, it may be that a mountain lion has been laying low in remote oak forest areas a few miles from the camera we were at today - not so far that a cat couldn’t mosey back and forth unseen along the riparian areas, oak forests and brushy edges of agricultural lands adjacent to the Preserve. He or she would have to cross a well-used road to get back and forth between these areas but that's possible to do. The other possibility is there may be more than one lion in the vicinity.
An interesting track. It's been sent to the experts for analysis! Erin Hauge
We’ve sent the image to BLM biologists for study and we’ll let you know what they think. We're encouraged to question anything we think may have to do with lions. Because of this, we volunteers have an opportunity to learn and in turn, to ask more questions and give input down the road that may provide important information for this project. If it seems this could be a lion track, then our crew will be out there, with vigilance and determination doing our best to 'think like a lion' and intercept his or her path on the trail so we have a photo to show for it!
As we move into autumn, mountain lions might still be dispersing from the Sierra Nevada, looking for territory and mates. And we’re still learning about how the exceptionally wet rainy season last year followed by California’s devastating fire season this summer have affected wildlife and their habits and travel patterns. Mountain lion mating season can happen at any time during the year, but commonly lions will mate between December and March. That means that they're very likely feeling the call to find a mate before winter sets in and will be looking hard for those opportunities.
Walk in the woods! Erin Hauge
The Cosumnes River Preserve volunteer lion camera team, with the guidance and support of the Bureau of Land Management will continue our efforts to capture an image (or more!) of the elusive lions on the Preserve. Given that mountain lions are spotted in areas surrounding the Preserve to the east, that they've been spotted on the Preserve this spring and summer, and that lions are highly intelligent, sensitive and secretive, it’s likely that while we don’t see lions on the Preserve very often, they see us.
For the lions.
Great Blue Herons. Courtesy of the Bureau of Land Management
Great Blue Heron and Great Egrets. Courtesy of Bureau of Land Management
