Mountain Lion Encounter-Grave Creek Montana

Once a week I take a hike with a dear friend of mine. Since I spend so much time not in the company of humans it is a very important day for me lest I lose all my social skills. This day we decided to drive up Grave Creek Road which takes one into the Ten Lakes Scenic Area. We were curious to see how far we could get before running into the snow line.

Grave Creek 4-22-10

We parked the car about ten miles in and walked as far as Clarence Creek before we hit snow. Clearly it will still be awhile before we can get to the lakes. We turned around and marched back down the mountain. When we got back to the car I said "Let's walk down a little further.", which we did. Shortly after passing the car Koty started pulling on his harness and acting like a crazy man. He'd been a whiny brat all day so I didn't really think that much of it.

We walked maybe three quarters of a mile before heading back up the mountain. Normally, when I'm in the woods, I am alone and very attuned to my surroundings. I often spot wildlife before Koty. But, when I'm with my friend I end up chattering like a magpie and paying absolutely no attention to what's going on around me.

As we were walking back to the car I was expounding on who the heck knows what, I have a theory about most everything. Suddenly my friend says "What's that?" I look up the road, maybe a seventy yards away, and I see a figure I can't quite make out standing not twenty feet behind the car. At first I thought it was a wolf. But then the coat was so dark I thought it might be a bear cub. I quickly snapped off a couple of shots.  Even looking through my 300mm lens I still couldn't quite make out what it was.  The animal just stood there looking at us until I started to move toward it. Then it scampered back down the bank toward the creek. It wasn't until we were back in the car out of the glare that we could clearly see what it  really was. Below is what we saw looking right at us.

Mountain Lion In Full winter Coat 04-22-10

No wonder Koty was having such a fit. He could smell this cat and knew it was quite near. Normally, I would have been on red alert based on Koty's beahvior alone but as I said this was my attention MIA day.

The rest of the day was anti-climactic but I still have a couple of nice photos I'll share. When we got back to the valley floor we went over to the campground. The below photo was taken from the bridge.

Over at the campground we puttered around in the rocks and boulders along the creek. I just love this stuff. The designs are to die for.


Intergalactic by Kinsey Barnard-----Loaded to Gallery

Here's another on I call "Moonstruck" because it looks to me like craters in the moon.



Moonstruck by Kinsey Barnard-------Loaded to Gallery

Well, this certainly wasn't a day I will soon forget. These are the days that I live for. These are the days when I know I am truly alive. These are the days that I bow down and give thanks for the inestimable privilege to live in this magical place!

©Kinsey Barnard Photograpy


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How To Tell a Mountain Lion track From a Wolf

Well, the big event this past week was my birthday. Egads! I turned sixty-one. It's really hard to imagine but I know it's true when I look at actors from my era and they are getting mighty long in the tooth. Every time I see favorites like Clint Eastwood and Robert Redford I now wonder will I ever see them again. Both these boys are in very good shape for their age so I'm hoping many more times. I just watched Gran Torino for the first time and what a fantastic movie.

My house herd of mule deer dropped by to wish me happy birthday. There is a herd of about twenty deer that pass through about once a day. I had a photo of the group but that dumb Lumix camera malfunctioned and I lost all the photos. Either that or I did. :) But, I did get some new mule deer shots with my Nikons. Nothing to write home about though.

Mulie Doe

Spotted one nice little buck. He won't be having those antlers for long. This is about the time of year when they start to shed them. I wish I knew where they dropped them. For all the wandering we have done we have found very few sheds.

Mulie Buck

As always, when you live in the woods, the weather was/is a major topic. We have been in the midst of a major thaw. The snow has been melting at a prodigious rate turning our world into an ice skating rink. I don't mind cold. I don't mind snow. I loathe and fear ice. It is so treacherous. One false step and you can go down for the count. I wear Kahtoolas when I hike on ice. These are not for urban walking.

The drama for the week was what looked like a mountain lion kill. We stumbled upon a place that showed a lot of blood in the snow. I had seen fresh wolf tracks but knew there were also mountain lions about. After examining the area closely, I concluded that the destruction had been the work of a mountain lion. The main sign was the tracks. Cat tracks are different than wolf tracks in two main features. First and most importantly cats have retractable claws wolves do not. So when you are looking at cat tracks you will not see the telltale toenails. The other thing is that the lion paw is more rounded than the wolf.

Scene of the Crime

You can see from the photo that quite a altercation took place with one party getting the worst of it. Not very pretty but that is the dichotomy of nature.

Mountain Lion Spoor

Interesting to me is the fact that the average wolf is smaller than the cat. The average weight 0f a wolf is 110 to 130 as apposed to the lion which is 120 to 145 pounds. Yet, the wolf has a larger footprint. The wolf front paw is approximately 4.5" x 4.0" and the lion is more on the order of 3.5" x 3.6".

Wolf Track

So, now it's Sunday. The fog is as thick as soup. Koty sez let's just hang at home and so we will. Hard to imagine January is more than half way gone. It will be spring before we know it.

Hanging Around

Cheers for this week.


©Kinsey Barnard Photography