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| Happy St Patrick's Day! |
Welcome to the Vinalhaven Sightings Report
Special Estrus Edition!
March 17th, 2018
Proudly brought to you by VLT and MCHT –
“protecting habitat for estrus and estrus associated activities” for a
long time now.
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| kirky trail |
Trivia question
– what movie from the 80s had a woman in it named Larry? More clues and the
answer below.
The recent snows – March 6th and 13th/14th-
where both impressive in amounts of snow and how long it took the snow for all to
fall. Warm(ish) snows like these tend to
be wet and heavy – anyone who shoveled over the last two weeks knows what I am
talking about. They are the kind of snow that drives home the difference
between 35 degrees (and windy) snow and snow at 20 degrees – heavy and moist
vs. light and fluffy. This is not winter.
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| mink bounding trail |
The biggest difference for me
(getting personal now) is how the wet snow sticks to a snowshoe thus making the
going very labored. Labored snowshoeing means a sweaty Kirk. And while I fully
respect folks who get out there and are looking to sweat (“exercise” is what
some people call it – whatever gets you out there!), my goal with snowshoeing
is always to “not sweat”. Getting sweaty means getting cold and having to keep
moving. Labored and sweaty conditions basically mean that I don’t go as far or
for as long, but I come back tired and drippy. Not the goal. St times like
these I make mini-sweaty-expeditions instead.
(3/7)
the first noticeable tracking action I came across was a pair of mink trails
bounding through the yard. I had only seen one set of mink tracks all winter,
and so to have this pair weaving their trails led me to believe that something
was up. I followed (and sweated) these two mink for a labored ¼ mile and found
bits and pieces of their soft trail over the course of a mile long stretch.
These two had spent some serious time together.
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| mink bounding trail on Greens Island photo by John Drury |
And while there was no outward sign
of mink courtship from their tracks and trails – other than maybe running
together (is that courtship?) – from tracking mink on Lane’s Island over the
years we know that March is mating time for mink. The timing of mink breeding in the Marsh would be pretty similar
to those mink on Lane’s I would suppose, and these two hopefully – for their
sakes – would be “hooking up” to promote and create the next generation. John
Drury reports mink activity and lots of trails on Greens.
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| local otter ice-hole. on our property! otter came out and went back down check out the tail print to the right of the hole. |
Other observation (3/7) –an otter
made an ice-hole through the thick but slushy ice – and right along “our”
shore! A single otter, presumed to be Larry, came out and turned around. Check
out that tail imprint. We got an ice-hole! The royal “we”!
Back to the mink pair - We know March is mink mating time from finding “estrus” in mink trails
twice on Lane’s over the years. Here are
some definitions -
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| typical mink bounding trail across old harbor pond! |
Estrus – noun - “a recurring period of sexual receptivity and fertility
in many female mammals; heat.”
estrus es·trus or oes·trus (ěs'trəs) n. The
periodic state of sexual excitement in the female of most mammals, excluding
humans, that immediately precedes ovulation and during which the female is most
receptive to mating; heat.
Being a “periodic state”, it would
seem that “estrus” would usually fall into the “thing” category of nouns,
rather than either a “person” or a “place”. When finding sign such as the blood
in the mink trails on Lane’s, it seems like estrus is morphs into being a “place”. Especially since the snow on Lane’s
in 2015 could theoretically hold the bloody markings for weeks (probably) if
nto longer.
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| not your everyday mink bounding trail lane's island - winter 2015 |
Estrus can be “people” as well - I
just looked it up and found 4 people in the states with the name “Estrus”.
Probably more that fly under the radar, go by “Jimmy” or something. Please
don’t contact them – unless you are already friends with one. I am sure they
know what their name means. Whatever.
Movie trivia –
famous line from the 80s movie in question – “I love your body Larry”
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| serious estrus in a mink trail lane's islan march 2015 |
Back to now -
Anyway, (3/14) so the story goes that after the snow finally stopped I went
out to see if the mink were in session and whether Larry had come returned to
our property!
The snow had stopped mid-day, so any
tracks or trails from the night before would be covered by a thin layer of
snow. A little soft, but all trails are educational opportunities and any
tracks laid through the night should be observable.
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| odd trail going through the slush ice |
The mink continued their bounding,
weaving trails in and out of the water or into the subnivium layer hunting
voles, playing hard to get or whatever. The otter, though had not re-used its
ice hole from the previous storm as the ice was noticeably thinner with more
open zones than the snow from a week before. An otter had more options and
could go, essentially, wherever it wanted instead of at the mercy of its
ice-hole.
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| mink trail leading to a disturbed area in the snow |
I followed the mink trail, which was my
dream for that day anyway, and after a few steps spied an odd formation in the
slush ice - the slush ice that had been
created during the previous 36 hours of continual snow! From watching the late
Feb/early March slush ice form, retreat and reform I saw a line in the slush
seemed particularly odd. I thought to myself – if an otter swam through the
slush to the shore that might be what the ice would look like. I actually thought that – no spraint! One of
my best thoughts ever!
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| clearly disturbed (area) |
Following the mink trail and keeping
my eye on the trail through the pond slush I noticed an area of disturbance in
the snow along the shore. Something had clearly
rolled or bounced around or belly smeared its way around this spot, and even
though the mink trail went right to the disturbance, it was clear that the
animal that created this area came from the water and was bigger than a mink.
And it was right next to the spot where the odd break in the slush led to.
These are the days that dreams are made of.
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| coming and going |
It wasn’t too tricky to tell that an
otter made the impressions in the snow. As mentioned,
the trail through the ice
was the path the otter took to the shore and you could see where Larry (I
presume) came out and went back into the water. Thank you Larry!
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| before |
Patches in the disturbed snow were clearly
stained, mostly looking a yellowish color, but with hints of orange in a couple
of spots. Hard to tell if it was urine, or some gross intestinal thing or maybe
some dirtiness rubbed off the otter furs, which is most likely disturbingly
disturbing (judgment) in its current “wild” state (but those otter furs do
clean up super nice!).
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| after |
Closer inspection showed hints of red
and I felt a big smile hit my face. I cleared the snow off with my hand in a
couple of spots and it became obvious that the scene was a bloody mess. That’s
when I decided not to use my hand anymore.
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| once again, before... |
Movie trivia clue #3 – It was the great actor Chevy Chase saying the last quote to the great
actor Geena Davis over the phone. The last clue is the answer!
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| after |
Finding a kill site, or a devouring site,
(or a pooping site for that matter) of any animal is cool. Kill sites can be
special because of all the blood. This was not a kill site.
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| snowshoe in the estrus |
Otters eat fish, and most often eat them in the water. At times they will move to a rock or nearby dock to feast. I have never found sign of an otter devouring spot in Maine (doesn’t mean they don’t exist!). In Homer, Alaska the local river otters would sometimes leave fish heads (not phish heads) on the floating dock. I think that may have been because the species of sculpin up there where huge and had huge thorny things sticking out of their head, probably tricky to eat.
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| side view - cutting the cake |
But this wasn’t a devouring spot, but could easily have been a latrine that I had never seen before. What was clear was that the blood was extensive. Forming an impressive layer of red between snow, like a layered cake.
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| kind of looks like a limited edition hostess cake of some sorts. heat season cake |
I used my snowshoe to break though the
scene a little and the blood that oozed out (did not really happen, it was
frozen!) was beautiful. So bright and so much of it. It ended up being about a
2x5ft spread of blood under the snow. Impressive.
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| estrus cake - 2 parts snow, 1 part blood |
Now, I have found what I interpreted
as otter estrus before – a drip or two of blood in the snow, which may or may
not be more typical. But never anything like this bloody spread. Got me
thinking – is Larry a female? I guess so….Should I call him “Randy”?
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| estrus from a few years back |
Funny how Larry seemed so big on the
ice, but then when I saw this other big daddy it became clear that Larry was
not a big male. Now it ends up that Larry is a female (if it turns out this is
the same otter). How the world turns!
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| larry seemed big.... |
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| ..until I saw this big dude at a different pond |
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| not hard to see where the otter headed up the dam |
I caught up with Larry’s trail above the beaver dam in hopes of finding a den but no such luck. She did bring me to two new latrines before heading out under the ice, probably not too far. Hopefully a family den in the upper marsh. That would be pleasant.
Finding the estrus means, of course,
that Larry would consider being receptive to a male (Moe? Curly?) for some
mating activities. Female otters come into estrus – the periodic state – for
somewhere around a month a year – in early spring and coinciding with the birth
of otter kits. There is a chance that Larry gave birth to some youngsters
recently – or would have if she was impregnated last March. It’s a yearlong process,
one where gestation happens to be only 60 days or so. That leaves about 10
months of “delayed implantation” – where fertilized eggs are not connected to
the walls of the uterus and instead free float (that’s how I picture it) until
the time is right. Cool adaptation that river and sea otters have, as well as
bears and other mammals.
Anyway – and the point is – if otters
and mink are feeling frisky on the mainland then undoubtedly the otters around
Vinalhaven are feeling the same “fire down below”. In you go to Lane’s your eye
out for bounding tracks of mink as pictured. See if there is any blood in the
trails. If you have a favorite otter
spot, latrine or location where you have seen otters before – maybe walk that
shoreline or visit that den area and see what turns up. Estrus spots make great
family fun – and wonderful photo opps!
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| I asked leif if he was going to tell his class about the estrus. He told me he's leave that to me photo by Amy Palmer |
Anyway, we’re psyched – see you out
there! Spring is here! The heavy, wet, bloody snow told me so!
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| blood on the snowshoe |
Oh yeah – the answer is the wonderful
movie Fletch. Possibly the last
great movie that Chevy Chase! His daydream about playing for the Lakers is the
best!
Rock on!
