Judy came in to help out around 12:30 so I did office work and wrapped some more hair snares in black plastic while I waited. I also discovered we have Adobe Photoshop Elements on one of our work computers so I was able to lighten up all of the trail camera photos that I had a hard time seeing which was great!
When Judy arrived we headed out to the Canaan Loop Road sites starting with the Big Rock. Everything was going good, except a lot of the snares were still open with the bait (we are now using just sunflower seeds) gone...I think it may be mice again because they are the only things light enough to not trigger the snares. When we got to #6 it was on the ground and it once again looked like the bear stomped on it (if you remember from my blog on July 17th, #6 was on the ground and stomped on). I'm really starting to think the bears don't like the #6 snare because it is always knocked down. After we get a new one I'm going to try moving it a little ways away to see what happens. Judy pointed out the snare might be on a common pathway used by the bears. Snare #9 was also down, which is another "popular" one for bear activity...
At Flag Run all but 2 snares were still open and baited -- not really surprised -- and only 1 was knocked down. #6, which is the one we have a camera on, was moved a little but it was still hanging on. At #5 I lifted a small log and found a baby Allegheny mountain salamander. It was so cute and small, and as soon as I went to take a second picture it took a leap of faith off of Judy's hand and back onto the ground! Don't worry, it was fine, and it scampered away under some of the decaying log.
Today was the prefect day, weather-wise. It was nice and cool with just a slight mist every once in awhile -- I love being up in the mountains! It's so lush here and it's the perfect climate! Although, my van window got stuck down during the drizzly period of the day, while we were out in the field -- I finally got it up though, I just had to kick the inside of the door while holding the window button in the "up" position...ha, ha.
To end the day I had a conference call at 7pm with some people from the Climate Change conference we had on June 7th. We just recapped the event and we each talked about what we liked and threw in our own suggestions, it was a pretty productive call.
Right after I clocked out I looked out the window and noticed a woodchuck out in the grass! It was so cute just eating the grass and he would instantly freeze every time the Canada geese in the pond nearby honked at each other. Great ending to a great day!
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