Take a Walk on the Wild Side

I have been in Texas a little over a year now.  Those of you who have been reading this during that time know that one of the hardest things for me to adjust to here, besides the heat, was having to walk my dog on a leash rather than letting him romp through the woods and by the sea unchained.  We were both pretty sad about it.  The irony was that I live where there are miles of hills and pastures but it is all private property, fenced and often sporting signs that say “We don’t call 911” which, I can only take to mean, that they shoot first, ask questions later, so it seemed not worth the risk to trespass.

Then one day, returning from church, I noticed a TX flag and an open fence leading to an area of some 50 acres that was “for sale.”  Now, I had just read a book by a TX naturalist who said, “Before you bought land, you should walk it for a year, get the feel of it under your shoes, and then consider a purchase.”  Hot dog!  Just the benediction I needed to feel free to walk this parcel with dog off leash for a year while I got the “feel of it under my feet”.  And indeed, I did.  It was THE best place for finding coyote scats and signs of wildlife other than just deer and more deer.  It even had a watering hole that provided swimming for the dog and great track-sighting opportunities for me. Of course, that dried up in summer and we went less then for it was just too hot.  But now “winter” is back so the dog and I are “walking the land” again.

Two weeks ago, when we were there, we came across a deer kill, a buck with a large set of antlers and I made note to self to keep checking on the site in hopes that once all scavengers had cleaned it up, I might have a set of antlers to use in my walks.  I wasn’t sure what to make of the kill, just absent-mindedly thought perhaps a hunter had injured it and coyotes had finished it off.  However, the very next day, I returned, this time with my brother-in-laws grandchildren and 8 adults to show off this great spot.  They of course loved seeing the bones and the cool addition of realizing that right in the middle of the kill site were hundreds of pupas.  We deduced that they must have came from maggots who had had a feast here, pupated and moved on as flies.  Kids love this sort of detective work; the grosser the better.

Now, in my year of walking this area, I have never come across any other people.  On this day, when I have 15 people in tow, of course I would come across, gulp, the owners?  No, just some workers who were clearing more trails to enhance its sale prospects.  They were friendly and seemed to have no trouble with all of us being there but before we parted ways they gave us an admonition to “Be watchful, a mountain lion was spotted here recently.”  A MOUNTAIN LION!!  A real mountain lion?! How cool is that!  Amazingly, over-the-top cool!

 

Then it hit me-that buck; maybe it was a mountain lion kill!  We went back to look more carefully at it, and this time I noticed that the rib cage and backbone had been separated from the main body and were several feet away from the rest.  The ribs were sheared off from the bone and wow, oh wow, when I read about mountain lion kill sites, this is exactly what they do.  Not only that, but the rest of the body was further up the hill, against a ledge that was right at the edge of the woods. The kill was probably weeks old, think of the pupated flies, but, and this is conjecture, it would seem as though it might have eaten the insides where it had brought it down, then dragged the rest of it further up towards the edge of the woods where we found it.  Maybe.  One can’t be sure.

 But, the other “smoking gun” was the scat I had noticed the first time I saw it, it was straight and gray, not like the twisted coyote scat I often found there.  Looking that up in Mark Elbroch’s amazing book of, “Mammals Tracks and Sign”, I found the scat in the photograph to be identical to the one I had seen.  Wow, wow, wow! 

Now, of course, some people are saying, “Surely you won’t walk there anymore”, but lets think about it.  Male mountain lions have a range of 20-200 miles, and females 20-100, so if we even take the least amount of 20, it doesn’t seem likely it will be hanging around here everyday.  They hunt at night and at the crepuscular times of dawn and dusk, so it would seem if I go at high noon, there should be no worries.  They also are shy animals, with plenty of deer to eat, so I shouldn’t expect to find myself on their menu.  However, the dog, which is getting older, is probably the one I might worry about.

But believe me, it made my day just realizing, I, for the first time ever, lived in mountain lion country.  Taking a “Walk on the Wild Side” just got a little wilder and I love it!