Wednesday, October 8, 2014

wordless Wednesday

3 comments:

Imperfect and Tense said...

Wordless? I'm speechless :o)

Brent said...

Just this weekend I gave voice to an idea I've been thinking for quite some time - that there ought to be a trail guide to scat. Yes, I know that John Muir Laws has a section in his book, but it's really not scratching my itch to know the local fauna better.

Even more curiously, this weekend I found scat much like the ones in the second picture - three movements of differing freshness in one shallow hole, poorly or maybe even not covered.

I hoped it was a large cat. But not too large.

Katie (Nature ID) said...

Graeme, indeed, this was my way of expressing certain expletives as I hit a wall of frustration this week with my project.

Brent, I've been using bear-tracker.com (strictly online, but they have a CD???) and some personal communication with folks who've been looking at (and smelling - no thanks) this stuff more than I have. My understanding is that bobcats do not eat berries, so the first photo is most likely from a coyote. Maybe? Bobcat scat tends to be segmented, like in the second photo. Again, maybe? Who's to say the piles aren't mixed, either - cross species communication?
http://www.bear-tracker.com/coyote.html
http://www.bear-tracker.com/bobcat.html
(scroll to the bottom of the pages for full scat details)