More Mammals!

Long-eared Chipmunk (?) - Neotamias quadrimaculatus (?)

This week we went for a hike up in the Lakes Basin and luckily saw several different kinds of mammals!  The chipmunk (above) was busy eating some kind of nut or seed.  Chipmunks hibernates during the winter.  Right now they are eating lots of food, and storing up some fat for the winter.  Their diet consists of conifer seeds, fungi, flowers, berries, various nutlets, and insects.  They will also store small caches of food underground, to consume before and immediately after hibernation.  

I'm not sure if this is a Long-eared Chipmunk or a Lodgepole Chipmunk!  Two characteristics that distinguish the Long-eared Chipmunk from a Lodgepole Chipmunk, are the white patch behind the ear and the longer ears.  I'm going to submit my photo to www.iNaturalist.org. and hope that someone confirms my guess!  I'll let you know what response I get!

    Columbian Black-tailed Deer - Odocoileus hemionus columbianus  &  Chickaree - Tamiasciurus douglasii

We also came across these Columbian Black-tailed Deer (above left)!!  The pair of them were busy foraging on grasses, flowers, and shrubs in the forest.  As you can see, the male's antlers are covered in "velvet"!  The velvet is a highly vascular skin that supplies oxygen and nutrients to the growing antler, which is actually a bone!  Once the antler is full-sized, the velvet falls off and the bone dies!  The resulting hardened bone is the mature antler.  Only the male deer grow antlers. They use them during the breeding season as weapons in competition between males for females, and in sexual displays.  Males with the largest antlers are usually more likely to obtain mates!  After mating in November, the females give birth to one or two fawns the following spring!  Males drop their antlers in winter, between January and March. These discarded antlers are a great source of calcium for many other mammals, such as mice, squirrels, and chipmunks!

The Chickaree or Douglas Squirrel (above right) was dragging this huge fir cone up a tree trunk!  These squirrels do not hibernate in the winter!  They store 100's of cones on the ground, in large caches for winter!  They will dig down through the snow to eat the seeds in these stored cones!  They do not live underground!  Their nests are mainly found in hollow trees, or abandoned woodpecker cavities, 15'-20' above the ground.  They will also sometimes build a ball or cup-shaped nest out of leaves and twigs, up in the branches of a tree!  Maybe this Chickaree was afraid that we might take his cone, so he dragged up the tree trunk!  It was really interesting to watch!

Aplondontia or Mountain Beaver - Aplondontia rufa

Photographs by Chris Wemmer

Aplondontia!

 I have never seen an Aplondontia, even though they are listed in all of my field guides!  In fact none of my friends have ever seen one either!!   I was wondering why they weren't listed as endangered or rare, since none of us have seen one.  It turns out that they're rarely seen because they live underground and are mainly nocturnal!  

I had asked my friend and local resident, Carl Butz, if he had ever seen an Aplondontia and he had!!!!  He had noticed some burrows on his property in 2014, and a friend of his, Chris Wemmer, set up a motion activated camera outside the burrow and caught these photos of an Aplodontia!!  WOW!!!  Look at those big rodent teeth and sharp digging claws!  It looks like a gopher but is much bigger in size.  Gophers are usually 7"-11" long, and weigh 2.5-9 oz.  Aplodontias are about 20" long when fully grown, and weigh from 1-2 lbs!!  

Aplondontias are subterranean, herbivorous rodents.  They create a maze of underground tunnels in which they live and raise their young.  Their preferred habitat is forested damp slopes and ravines near streams and creeks.  Apparently Aplondontias live near water because they have very primitive kidneys, and must drink 1/3 of their weight daily!!  Their diet consists of the above and below-ground parts of ferns, dogwoods, willows, alders, young conifers, nettles, Fireweed, and Bleeding Hearts!  They do not hibernate in winter and remain active underground, subsisting on caches of grasses and forbs.  

It would be so cool to see one of these in person!  
If I spend more time in local ferny, damp areas I might get lucky!

You can see lots more of Chris Wemmer's photos and videos of animals at www.cameratrapcodger.blogspot.com  Check it out!  He has done amazing work!

Gray Fox - Urocyon cinereoargentus

Neighborhood update!

The Gray Foxes are still staying in the same area near our garden!  This week I lucked out and got the above photo!  They are so camouflaged and so beautiful!  I'm hoping that I'll get to observe them for several more months!  

Sunflower Seed Eaters!

Down in our garden the Towhees, Goldfinches, and Jays are still busy eating the ripened sunflower seeds!  I watch them every morning for an hour or more.  It is so much fun to watch their seed-gleaning acrobatics!

Lesser Goldfinches (females) - Carduelis psaltria

There's a small group of 5 female Lesser Goldfinches feeding in our garden.  

The male Lesser Goldfinch has a black cap on his head.  

I've only seen one male so far, but failed to get his picture.  Rats!

I'll keep trying this week!

Green-Tailed Towhee (adult & juvenile) -  Pipilo chlorurus

Every day I see these two Green-tailed Towhees!   

It looks like the juvenile is getting his rusty-red feathers!  

There are still tons of sunflowers seeds that haven't ripened yet.  

So hopefully I'll get to watch these two for quite a while still!

Spotted Towhee (juvenile) - Pipilo maculatus

Last week I found a bunch of feathers in the garden, that looked like they may have come from a Spotted Towhee.  Luckily, they weren't from this juvenile!  His eyes, and the eyes of the adult Spotted Towhees, are red!  I wonder what purpose the red iris serves?  I'll have to look that up!

Steller's Jay - Cyanocitta stelleri

There are about 7 Steller's Jays that are gleaning sunflower seeds in our garden!  

They are quite clever in their seed getting antics!  

They are a lot heavier than goldfinches, and can't perch on the smaller, thinner-stemmed sunflowers.  I watched the one in the photo insert repeatedly leap up about 4.5 feet to get the seeds of one particular sunflower head!   Wow!

River Otters - Lustra canadensis

River Otters at Last!!!

There's a section on the North Yuba River, about 1/2 mile downstream from our house, that seems to be a magnet for animals!  I have photographed Spotted Sandpipers, Water Striders, Rainbow Trout fry, and Aquatic Garter Snakes there!!!  I was there twice last week and each time we saw amazing wildlife pass by!!!  On Monday, I was there with my sister and two River Otters swam past us!  It was SO exciting!!!  I have never seen River Otters in the No.Yuba!!!!  They swam past us pretty fast!  Their heads would pop up for a few seconds, and then they would dive underwater.  A few seconds later their heads would pop up many yards downstream. It was so wonderful to finally see them, after watching for them for years!!!  Yahoo!

River Otters are pretty big!  The males can weigh 11-30 lbs!   They can be 3'- 4.25' long, with the tail an additional 12"-20"!  Their main food is fish when available, and will eat up to 2.2 - 3.3 lbs per day!  They rarely "chase" fish, but use "surprise" as their main hunting method. They will also eat frogs, newts, garter snakes, aquatic insects, and ducks!  They usually travel 1.5 to 3 miles daily, but have been known to travel 26 miles in one day!  They are fast swimmers, 6-8 mph, and can swim underwater for 4 minutes.  Both their ears and nostrils close underwater!  They are absolutely amazing animals!  How lucky we were to see them!

Common Merganser (female & ducklings) - Mergus merganser

A Merganser with her ducklings!

A few days later, I went down to the same spot with a friend of mine and we saw a Merganser with her ducklings!!!  A few weeks ago I posted a picture of a female Merganser with her 4 downy ducklings.  I'd bet that this is the same Merganser!  There were only 3 ducklings this time, but they have grown a bunch and are getting their adult feathers!  It was SO exciting to see them!  I sure hope the remaining three survive till migration in October! 

Common Merganser ducklings - Mergus merganser

It's been HOT and SMOKEY for this past week.  We don't have any fires in our neighborhood, but smoke is coming from the fires northwest and northeast of us.  The forecast for this coming Wednesday is a chance of thunder showers.  Hopefully we'll get some rain, but no new fires, which might clear out some of this smoke!  

I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

The Black Bears are back!  

Here's another photo of bear poop (above) for you to analyze.  What kind of fruit do think the bear ate?

One of them tore down our two bird feeders early last week!  I still haven't seen any in person!!  

What kind of crickets are making that 

constant racket in the night?

There haven't been signs of Crayfish anywhere!!!  

What happened to all of them?

I haven't had time to research about our local bats.  Hopefully I will this week!

Check back next week for the answers 
to these questions and more!

Your comments & questions are greatly appreciated!  
Please email me at northyubanaturalist@gmail.com! 
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