Canadian Lynx in New Hampshire

 

 

If a lynx bounds through 18 inches of fresh power in the woods of northern N.H. and nobody is there, does it still make a noise?  

Trick question.

       Day in and day out, as the lynx races through thick underbrush searching for a snowshoe hare, it makes no noise. The the trees, almost in awe of such beauty, appear to bow outwardly to tunnel of travel. Massive paws allow this cat to skillfully and silently walk on top of the softest snow.

     With such a low density of lynx in N.H., I truly enjoy the challenge of trying to photograph them. For me, it is the ultimate test to design the right tools (remote camera systems) and combine those tools with the past experience and knowledge of wildlife to predict why/where an animal will be before it gets there.

          When working with remote cameras, in particular long term camera sets, if things can go wrong, they will. Moisture in the camera leads to blurry pictures, batteries die, the cold stops components from working, a curious moose or bear moves/steals/punctures the camera only to be found face down or waterlogged months later, and the list goes on. These photos, taken in the winter of 2013, highlight one such success. One lynx, eight pictures, frozen in time.

Winter Life for the North American Beaver

The above video is a series of short clips taken this winter of an animal extremely well adapted to cold New England Winters. Despite average night-time temperatures of -15 F°, this beaver left it's lodge to forage and was never bothered by the cold. Peak activity was from 1-3am and not one clip was recorded during daylight hours. This is a two minute condensed version from 4+ hours of footage during a one week filming period.

Weasel on a log

 This photo of a weasel was taken at 3:54 am. Weasels are built like a snake, basically just a head and tail. Being long and thin has it's advantages, such as fitting into small holes and spaces to find their favorite prey-mice. It also has its disadvantages...with lots of surface area weasels lose heat quickly and require a fast metabolism to keep warm, which means they are constantly moving, hunting, and searching for calories.

American Woodcock stroll-video

The video setup was designed to capture large mammals, however I was most amused by the American Woodcock that strolled across the bottom of the screen. There is a certain flamboyance to it's walk as it picked its way through the short grasses on one particularly dark October night. Video is best viewed full screen and by selecting HD 1080 in the bottom right under the settings wheel.

Spruce Grouse in Pittsburg

                A curious spruce grouse photographed in Pittsburg N.H. during the fall of 2014.

Moose Selfie

 

 A curious moose photographed in April in northern N.H. While the moose is one of the largest animals in the woods, it's fate often is determined by one of the smallest, the winter tick. Yearling moose in particular face extreme pressure and mortality from winter ticks. Moose are not as effective at grooming as deer and often rub the hair off the chest and shoulder areas where they cannot reach. Excessive rubbing and grooming exposes white broken hair shafts which why many also call them "ghost moose". This particular moose was looking pretty good after a long winter.

N.H. Winter Coyote

        A winter coyote looking for food during the 2014 winter in Success N.H. Despite the bad press some people give them, in my mind the eastern coyote (coywolf) is one of the most amazing and respectable animals-and one of the hardest to photograph. When it comes to being successful and filling a void in the eastern U.S.-they certainly take the cake.
      This set of pictures is only a few of many, but the coyote has that look in his eye-a wild look I would expect to see if I curled up on the open ground in nothing but a sleeping bag but had that nagging sensation like I was being watched. Poking my head out I can imagine seeing this face staring back...one to me that is questioning the difference between a threat and a potential meal. Lucky for me, the camera I built was designed for a long deployment. Set on September 22nd 2013, it was still taking pictures on June 4th 2014 when I checked it.