Happy Birthday Gram

My grandmother's birthday is today. She would have been ninety-six. Gram died last June in a nursing home. She battled cancer several times throughout her life, and won. She had a heart attack and numerous broken bones. But her indominable spirit always touched everyone she met. Gram, Florence, a.k.a "Mac"(McCann) always had a positive attitude, but she worried about people incessantly. Gram greeted her family and friends with a smile, always. She was one of the most stoic people I've ever known. If she was hurting she really never complained, she just dealt with it as part of life. Arthritis bent her body, and she kept right on trucking like the "energizer bunny". Often she would try to take care of chores, even the hard stuff, rather than ask for help. We would scold her for not calling. I think she got a kick out it, as if she had gotten away with something. Gram was a really bad "fibber" too. She would fib about little fender-bender she got into, despite the evidence on her car's bumpers. She would fib about eating this or that. She would fib about knowing about something. Gram would have been terrible at Texas Hold'em.

We all love Gram even though she is gone. There is barely a day I don't think of her and remember her. She had some funny coloquisms. I wish I could remember them all. Let's see if she got mad at someone, she'd "Lay them out in Lavender". If she saw someone speeding, they were "Hell bent for election". She told me if someone was getting the best of me, I should tell them to "run up a gum tree, and stick there!". That was my favorite.

Busy, busy, busy

It's been a hideously busy week for Anatomy & Physiology II! I had to do a life size drawing of the major blood vessels. It was alittle difficult to trace my own outline. Of course I took artistic license and made myself thin. Not that I'm huge, but you know... I have to write up a case study that I have been working on with four other students. Tomorrow is a huge lab practical exam, so I will have to be able to identify various tissues, blood vessels, formed elements in blood. I have to gather up all the lab sheets, complete with drawings of those pesky cardiac muscle fibers, and maps of both the systemic and pulmonary circulation.

Last week I asked my instructor if she would be interested in having me bring in the deer fetus I collected. She was totally psyched, so I'll bring that into class tomorrow night also. It's been in my freezer. I know what you're thinking. I have other frozen creatures in there too..... If some unwitting person went looking for something to thaw for dinner, they might be alittle surprised! I promise no human remains!

Unfortunately I have not had time to go out exploring in the natural world. But I will soon!

Who Let the Dogs Out?

I went back to the site where the doe had been killed. No more canine activity, which leads me to believe that it was dogs that took the doe down. I don't think coyotes would leave a kill like this. There is still so much left of the carcass. I noticed a lot of bird tracks around the carcass, crows I imagine. I took a hemlock bough and swept over all the footprints, so that I can return tomorrow to see what comes by.

The photo is also from yesterday, these are Fisher tracks.....not Fisher Cat, since Fisher's are not cats, but members of the Mustelidae (Marten)family. I would expect Fisher traffic to the dead deer as well. This picture was taken farther a field, during my hike. Notice the prints show five pads which Fisher have on both their front and hind feet. One night while I was hiking, I surprised a Fisher who was in a tree along the trail. We exchanged pleasantries and I continued on down the trail. Wearing a headlamp often provides these great opportunities on night time hikes. Try it!

Not For the Squeamish

I've not been out on my snowshoes for forever it seems. There has been so much ice lately, I've been relegated to the treadmill for my exercise. But today I got out after a light snowfall yesterday. I was out over three hours, and keeping my eyes open for things to take pictures of. I flushed two owls, found skads of tracks, grouse, fisher, coyote, fox, snowshoe hare. I recently "pecked" tree, demolished by a Pileated Woodpecker. I took photos of the Fisher and Grouse tracks, fearing I wouldn't find anything really interesting. Then not more than about 15o yards up behind my house, I came upon a horrible sight! A freshly killed doe.

Last night on my way home from class, at about 8:30 p.m. three deer crossed the road near my house. I thought it somewhat odd, considering they don't like to travel much through crusty snow. Today it added up. I had noticed so many canid tracks on my way out, many tracks appeared to be of the animal skidding and quickly braking.

So I did the math on the way back when I found the carass. There was plenty of it left, which makes me wonder if dogs were responsible. Tracks of all sizes all around. And blood, like a massacre had taken place. I can only imagine an arterial bleed would cause such a mess. What's worse is I found two fetuses, completely developed and about 5" long. There was a female and a male. The trail of death was evidenced by the very lengthy drag mark from upslope. I found the spot where she fought for her life. She had been chased, and tired through the crusty snow. Finally she fell, and soon after, the arterial blood spatter literally everywhere.
I can only hope that death came swiftly.

I had hoped for an interesting day, I had no idea how interesting it would become.

Hors d'Oeuvres Anyone?

A gourmet hors d'oeuvres you ask? Nay, it's an owl pellet. I found the owl pellet on a recent snow shoe hike. The pellet was found at the base of a tree, near some bird droppings. The bird, an owl. Owls regurgitate undigestable animal tissues. Fur, bones, etc. is burped back up from the bird's crop, in the shape of a ball. Kind of like a hairball my cat might "upchuck". This pellet is a smaller one, but it clearly contained gray fur, and bone pieces. If I were to break into it, I might find some teeth. Most likely this pellet used to be a mouse! Yum