Tracks in the Snow and a 3 year old

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Lake Girl

Lake Girl

Moderator
Nov 12, 2011
6,939
NW Ontario
I enjoy my walks with my GSD but sometimes it can be like walking a turtle;lol With the snow, tracks become a big item of interest that has to be sniffed over multiple times and followed. We can tell when the neighbour has gone out with his dog and track movements of the snowshoe hares, deer, fox. The occassional fishers have come close.

Hubby and I were gone for two days and when I talked to my daughter, she mentioned that the dog wouldn't go very far and all but drug her home on her last walk of the night. Since we got home after dark, I couldn't examine the tracks that the dog so badly wanted to follow... since the scent must have dissipated ... until today. Turns out we must have had a wolf pass through - came off the ice into the neighbours yard, crossed over ours and followed the driveway out. Paw prints seem to be a 1/4" to 1/2" bigger than my girl's prints (she's 27" tall). Not the first time, likely not the last...

Black cougars have been spotted about 10 miles west of us ... would prefer not to see any of those_g I did see one about 100 miles east of here on the highway. Thought it was a bear at first ... until I got close enough to see the tail that was about as long as the body:eek: Close enough for me! They have been sighted and not too far away.
http://www.cougarnet.org/uppermidwest.html

I have chased otters out of the yard in the summer and they weren't appreciative...

What's in your back yard?
 
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Lake Girl said:
What's in your back yard?
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grass, thankfully!

Occasionally, the neighbors cows get out and come over and leave prints, usually only when the frost is coming out and they can sink a good 6 inches down to make certain things get messed up really well.

Other than that, I just have to watch for the errant porcupine as far as danger really goes before letting the dog out.

We do have a lot of red foxes, and have some fishers around, but they don't bother with much so long as they aren't rabid.

Did have this little screech meet me and the dog out our first trip out in the morning a few weeks back. When I first went out on the porch I wouldn't let the dog off as I heard a great horned making some really messed up calls and was wondering what was going on. When looking for him I found this little fella. I think he was trying to stay hidden and decided the great horned owl was a bigger threat. He stayed right until sunrise.

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Can't imagine having wolves near by, that would keep me alert while outside.

I'm lucky enough to have about 3000+ acres in my back yard, and despite being walking distance to town (under a mile) we've had several beasts pass through.

Every spring brings the bears, usually mom and cubs then the previous years 1 yr Olds come poking around, they're usually the most aggressive, ultimately, they all are chased off and don't return once they figure out that there's no food to be had.

Have had one moose in the yard in 5 years (that I know of), several deer, possum, skunk, occasional fisher (every other year) just this year I saw my first porcupine! Strange looking animal and much bigger than I had thought them to be.

This summer i saw the biggest black bear i ever saw at the edge of the yard, sent shivers up my spine, thankfully my dog keeps most of them at the wood line, and that's fine with me.
 
Wild turkeys, deer, the semi feral cats from across the street :mad:
 
Doing The Dixie Eyed Hustle said:
Wild turkeys, deer, the semi feral cats from across the street :mad:
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We had one of those semi feral cats decide he wanted to join the household because it meant he could eat, be warm and safe. Contacted owners a few times but owner stated that they were having a problem with him attacking since he came back all beat up (figured he ran into the wrong critter). He's a bit of a bully still with the older two cats but plays well with my daughter's cat.

I do have partridge (grouse) in the fall until the son comes home to go hunting...


Warm_in_NH said:
Can't imagine having wolves near by, that would keep me alert while outside.
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They definitely keep you alert ... can hear them howling at night across the lake or when they make a kill up on the old logging roads. When I would go out at night to load the outdoor boiler we used to have, I made sure the dogs were with me.

We did have a young moose in our area a few years ago ... they are usually farther east. Travelling home after work one night and saw the eyes so automatically slowed down for the "deer." As I got closer, I realized it was as tall as the road sign it was near and definitely not a "deer.";lol

The bear on the deck wasn't a picnic either. We don't keep garbage in the yard at all but he wandered in. When I opened the door and let out a blast with the airhorn to get him moving, he turned and growled at me_g Usually they take off but this one took his sweet time and won that round!

Eagles are more frequent visitors close to the house than the owls ... can hear them but don't often see them.
 
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Neighbor called me earlier this week. A coyote got a dog in the neighborhood this last weekend. :(

Guess I will have to keep a close eye on our 16+yr old partially blind/partially deaf pooch.
 
Keep a good eye out ... the old pooch probably can't smell too well now either so won't be very effective in telling you there's invaders in the yard.

We've lost a couple of cats over the years ... one we figure an eagle got because she loved to sun herself on the large part of the driveway. Over the 20 years we've been here, we have been worried about the dogs out wandering too long in case the wolves were close. My current girl usually is on a 15' leash when out walking ... she does occasionally sneak away when we're out working in the yard but I've always been able to find her in about 15 minutes.

Her nose is pretty sensitive and she's not bashful about heading for home when there's something that worries her...
 
Lake Girl said:
Her nose is pretty sensitive and she's not bashful about heading for home when there's something that worries her...
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With those sort of concerns around, she's a smart one!
 
Lots of cougars here this year. Had real trouble with one getting kicked out of the den but we figure didn't ever figure out how to hunt. He ended up on a neighbour's porch chewing on his leather shoes :(. The conservation officer kept him from a slow death.
 
Shari said:
Neighbor called me earlier this week. A coyote got a dog in the neighborhood this last weekend. :(

Guess I will have to keep a close eye on our 16+yr old partially blind/partially deaf pooch.
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We've got a pack of them around our house . . . a few less though after last night . . . wife was out with the dog around midnight letting him do his business and she said she heard some of their howling followed a minute later by a gun shot and a little while later another gun shot . . . guessing there may be one or two less coyotes around the place.'

As to the original question . . . coyotes, bobcat, turkeys, deer and the usual small animals.
 
Our neighbor raises buffalo. A while back we had his 2000# bull in our yard. Ground was soft and had tracks about the size of a 3 gal. bucket all over the yard.
Neighbor forgot to latch the gate.
The old bull fortunately was a big teddy bear.
 
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Update on the wolf ... may be the one that the neighbour down the lake shot. Don't know the details on the how and why but found out there was a pack of 5 or 6 down the lake. Not sure if the wolf that was shot was with the pack or lone. Lone wolves may be a bit more desperate for food as pack hunting is the most efficient. Haven't seen any fresh tracks since the first set...
 
A bear, some moose, deer, LOTS of turkeys, coyotes, and a goodly amount of owls.

I saw a wolf in Glacier Park in MT. It left an impression on me due to the size and the fact that we were three days from anywhere without a firearm (that was the law at the time).
 
Yeah I seen one a while back (Wolf) while getting wood in a remote area. Big and grey.

Shoot on sight.

If you don't have a weapon just keep the saw running.

Don't mess with them, 3 times the bite of a GSD.

Usual Rockies Mountain wildlife. Not had any Moose or Wolves in town that I know of. The odd dump bear and deer.
 
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Dump bear ;lol We've definitely got them too ... along with dump Eagles and Turkey Vultures.
 
Lots of wildlife here. You can hear the Coyotes howling and yelping most nights. I've heard them or a wolf taking down a animal once and it put a chill down my spine! It sounded like they were hungry!!! Lol. Here's a Bobcat trail from we could figure that I posted in another thread. We figured the cat was dragging a rabbit.
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I've heard the howling here too ... just appreciate that it has always been far off. Bobcat or cougar tracks? Bobcat shows no claws not sure about cougars.

Deer appears to have returned to the area - it was missing for a few days but tracks were out there yesterday. Silly pup has to stop and sniff all the bunny tracks!
 
One of my nieghbors goes up to Canada often to hunt and fish and he just gushes about how the bag limits are so much more lenient since the numbers are stout enough to support them and what a experience it is to hunt and fish there! And this area is no hunting and fishing flunky either. The world record Muskelunge has been caught more than once a few miles from here on the Chippewa Flowage but the Deer numbers are down from the tough winters and letting hunters bag however many doe they practically wanted for years.now it's Buck only for awhile.
 
May just be perception because of a new experience... May just be a really experienced guide who knows his neck of the woods!

Friends with some folks in northern Minnesota - deer have definitely been over hunted with too many looking for the "trophy". Leaves very little in the gene pool to keep building on and overall size will diminish. Although there is some movement across the Rainy river, our deer still seem to be larger.:p
 
It is truly amazing how things differ in this vast country, and how different parts of the country handle situations. Here on the eastern half of Long Island the deer population is out of control. It's hard to plant anything from the nursery without it being eaten overnight.

What's our solution: hire Federal (USDA) contractors to shoot deer from the back of pickups with night vision scopes and silenced rifles. The goal is to cull 3000 deer. First time I've seen Animal Activists and local Hunters standing together, equally outraged.

http://www.newsday.com/long-island/...al-sharpshooters-sights-this-winter-1.6573185

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/19/n...-a-plan-to-cull-deer.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Of course the money was spent, but the results were a bit short of expectations.

http://suffolktimes.timesreview.com...200-deer-killed-in-225k-cull-that-didnt-work/

About a $1000 per deer. Our government at work. ;sick
 
Here lately there is a beagle dog who likes to run animals in the middle of the night. She is not quiet about it either. Also was noticing the outside cats food missing very quickly. I noticed movement outside one night and figured I'd caught the perpetrator. So I flung the door open in an attempt to scare off whatever it was. I have never opened and closed a door that quickly because the food bandit was a skunk. Yikes he can have the food.
 
We have bear, very large "feral cats" with long tails that look and act like a cougar, coyote, fisher, raccoons, and feral cats.

I know we don't have cougar because there are none in MN and all the ones that are captured on trail cams and even that one that got run over wasn't a cougar. Even the family of them that my next door neighbor saw was just a family of very big "feral cats'. Granted the buffalo farm that these "feral cats" have attacked and ripped apart was a great accomplishment for a "feral cat" and was blamed on the wolves with very long claws.

Honestly I would rather have a wolf in my area than those large "feral cats" that look exactly like a cougar. There are many stories about how a wolf is not much a danger as movies put them out to be. Wolves keep the more dangerous animals away from their area, like the cougar or the panther. Now a coyote, that is another story.
 
Not many sightings but 14 verified in the last four years per DNR (trail cam photos, scat/hair DNA). They generally stay away and into more remote areas...

FYI http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/27/nyregion/wild-cougar-traveled-east-1500-miles-tests-find.html?_r=0

http://www.mprnews.org/story/2012/06/14/environment/cougars-bounce-back

http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/mammals/cougar/index.html

I guess you can believe what you prefer ... but isn't a cougar a very large feral cat? I know what I saw with my own eyes 150 miles east of here!
 
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Lake Girl said:
I guess you can believe what you prefer ... but isn't a cougar a very large feral cat? I know what I saw with my own eyes 150 miles east of here!
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Hmmm...I think I noted a bit of sarcasm in the "very large feral cats with long tails".;lol;lol;lol
 
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