The latest scoop on Emily-the-coyote
July 24, 2010
I have written elsewhere on this board and in my newspaper column about Emily-the-ugly-coyote. She lives around the farm, does no harm, and provides us with considerable amusement when we watch her eat apples in the orchard.
This evening I cut the patch of hay below the garden. Emily oozed out of a stand of ragweed, then decided to ignore the tractor and continue her hunt for the very large mice (I can’t call them rats) that I often see on the ground there while mowing. More power to her.
But I got a very good look at this almost hairless coyote over a period of time as I made repeated trips past her. The more I looked at her head, the more I kept thinking of a Jack Russell terrier. Finally it hit me. Emily is not a spectacularly ugly coyote. She’s a coyote-coloured dog with a skinny tail. Jack Russell tails are docked for good reason, likely. When regarded as a terrier Emily suddenly looks like a large, robust, very well-fed specimen with a tight coat. I didn’t see any evidence of mange, just short hair.
This might account for her casual attitude toward us when we happen upon her. Terriers aren’t afraid of much. There’s a family of coyotes about, but the pair I saw two nights ago in the young walnuts were patterned more after a German Shepherd than a Jack Russell. They’re not exactly terrified of me either, but they keep their distance.
Emily obviously gets along with the coyotes because they share a territory, but I don’t know if she belongs in their singing group or not.
So I googled images of terriers. No, even though Emily is much shorter than most coyotes, she is way too big to be a Jack Russell. And her skull is too straight and triangular. It’s more like a bull terrier’s. Come to think of it, The rest of her is very like a bull terrier, as well, though she is somewhat lighter in build. Her Coyote’s ears are a poor fit for that skull. Face-on, peeking up out of the hay, she shows a distinct resemblance to Yoda, the Star Wars character. Anyway, as Dr. Bill Barrett commented the first time he saw Emily, “There’s a lot of dog in her.”
The Spring Goose Hunt Report – by Martin Mallet
April 27, 2010
With no word from Martin for a couple of days after the much-anticipated expedition, I sent him a query, and the following is his response. – Rod
TO: Rod Croskery, Vanya Rohwer
FROM: Martin Mallet
RE: Goose Hunt
I picked up the car Saturday evening and could barely contain my excitement for the drive up Sunday. As both of you well know, I had been absorbed in Greater Snow Goose statistics for the past several weeks, reveling at the sheer number (over 1.4 million at the last census) and extraordinary bag limits (20 per day) associated with this species.
I was to meet up with my cousin at a sporting goods store in Quebec. It was like a cross between a Cabela’s and a Mountain Equipment Co-op store. Heaven. There I learned two things: 1) gun cleaning kits are ridiculously overpriced — $60 for a rod and a couple of brushes? and 2) no one shoots 2 ¾ inch shells anymore. I stocked up on the steel BBs we had successfully deployed at the farm this fall, and off we headed to Cap Tourmente.
We wanted to check out the site the day before our hunt to make sure we knew where to go and modulate our expectations, if need be. Let there be no doubt, snow geese are an overabundant species! We saw thousands upon thousands in a very small geographical area. Most were on the water, but we also encountered several hordes in fields and in the park proper. Here they were unafraid of humans, both on the ground, letting us approach to within 15 yards with no problems, and in the air, frequently buzzing us. It was fun to visit the preserve, wolves among the flock, mixed in with the tourists and birders who were there to take pictures and stare at the geese.
Needless to say I did not sleep well Sunday evening. By 2:30 a.m. I was wide awake, and woke up my hunting partners at 3:00. On the drive up to our hunting site we again saw thousands and thousands of snow geese sleeping on the river. When we stopped for coffee we could hear them chattering, probably deciding which poor farmer’s field to decimate that day. We were at the blinds at 4:20, ready to help our guide set up the decoys, all fifty of them. As any Google search will tell you, fifty decoys is by any account a paltry number, but we figured there were so many geese that there were bound to be some stupid ones out there. Right.
As it turns out we arrived at high tide and the blinds were flooded. We couldn’t set up the decoys at all and had to resort to pass shooting for the first few hours. Unfortunately, the long-term forecast I had consulted when booking the day was off by 24 hours: the high winds were present but the clouds and rain had been crowded out by clear skies. As a result we saw lots of high-flying geese in the early morning and few shots were taken (none reasonable).
We finally got the decoys deployed and our blinds pumped out (each individual blind is like a giant rain barrel) by around 6 a.m. We still had fourteen hours of hunt ahead of us, so a small missed opportunity in the morning didn’t seem like the end of the world.
Then we spent the day staring at geese in the distance. They either avoided the decoys or that particular field like the plague, constantly tormenting us with 100+ yard overhead flights. When the tide came down the mudflats were exposed, and we were soon treated to the spectacle of a sizable feeding flock developing about 200 yards directly ahead of us. Shooting in their general direction in an attempt to flush the group produced no response whatsoever. Our only hope seemed to be to wait until high tide, when a few of the hundred and fifty birds might be driven up to shore.
Eventually a lone runt of a goose decided it needed some friends and cautiously approached our decoys. Encouraged by the electronic goose call, it eventually settled into a leisurely descent. At about thirty yards the three of us opened fire. The result was a dead snow goose containing a mixture of BBB, BB, and Blackcloud ammunition. Another pair passed within range later on and we took down one of them as well.
Out of sheer stubbornness we stayed until 8:08 p.m., a full sixteen-hour day in the field. We slept very well last night. I came home today with the two snow geese (my partners generously offered me the group’s bag), one of which was in good enough condition to keep whole. I should also mention that, due to the wind direction, the geese we shot plummeted straight into the mudflats, which made for some pretty miserable plucking. On the drive home I hit a major snowstorm, traffic in Montreal was awful, and some idiot almost drove me off the road.
Yet, oddly, I am still happy. And now I know why snow geese are so abundant…
Martin
Those three great blue herons* are still around.
November 6, 2009
While eating my lunch I just watched them glide past the kitchen window in tight formation, circle the field to the north, and eventually glide right in to the shelter belt of immature pines at the north of the property. They rode the breeze like vultures, not flapping their wings until within a jump of the ground.
What amazes me about these three is the way they always travel and move together, in formation. Even when walking across the field they are a tight group, as if they think as one. And what are they doing in a field, in November?
NOTE: 11 November, 2009
Queen’s doctoral candidate Martin Mallet just suggested in an email that the trio are most likely sandhill cranes. He saw them in the area last week. The Wilkepedia description of the birds’ behaviour is very much in line with what I have observed.
Pinfeathers!
September 27, 2009
Saturday for the first time in thirty years I took out my shotgun for the opening day of migratory bird season. Geese had been flying over the house in increasing numbers lately, and I resolved to bring one down for dinner.
Several hundred have been feeding each day in Chant’s large field near Crosby. I watched how the flocks approached their airport, and calculated that if I stood in a clump of nannyberry bushes at the northwestern corner of our property, I’d have a reasonable chance at about ten percent of the birds on their approach.
Steel shot was the variable. I had never used it before, and Louis Burtch last week told me “It’s like throwing a handful of sand at a goose.” Nevertheless I resolved to try, keeping in mind another Louis adage: “Don’t bother shooting if you can’t see their feet.”
I quickly discovered how difficult it is to determine distance with a bird as big as a goose. All my experience wing-shooting has been with ducks, and these things look as big as an airliner by comparison. I let the first few flocks pass because they were far too high, but then I realized that I had seen the odd foot on a couple of lower flocks, so I resolved to pick a single goose and shoot at it.
Then while I was occupied with a handful of nannyberries, a silent group glided in low and my snap-shot was directly at the goose, rather than ahead of it. Strangely, the birds ignored the blast and glided the half-mile to their landing zone, unperturbed. Resolving to lead the target more carefully, I blasted at my next goose, the third from the right in a flock of twelve. It folded and dropped like a stone. O.K. fine.
My trophy didn’t seem all that big compared to other geese I had handled, so I decided to add a couple of more birds to the larder. That’s when I discovered what thirty years of idleness can do to one’s co-ordination as a shooter: I tried for a pair, missed both, but to my surprise I found myself flat on my back after the second shot.
Chastened, I made sure of my footing before the next pass, and managed to rock a large goose, then killed it with a second shot, even keeping my feet during the process.
The biggest mistake of the morning was a case of nerves when a dozen geese lifted off and flew across Chant’s field, right towards my hide. The Remington started too soon.
Canada geese are big, and I’m used to targets flashing by me without much warning. I should have waited for the feet, but instead I blasted three loads of shot up into their path (which they ignored) and stared stupidly as, somewhat later, they flew over my head.
Alerted by this ill-advised fusillade, the big flock took off and headed for Delta. Still, I had two birds. Not a bad morning for an old duffer, and there would be plenty of goose for dinner that evening.
Following the usual photographs, I started to pluck the larger goose. The bird eventually dressed 6 1/4 pounds, but I think a quarter of that must have been pinfeathers. I plucked until my hands cramped. Mom plucked until her hands cramped. The cruel irony of it was that my young friend Sean grabbed the other goose and had it cleaned in just a few minutes. No pinfeathers at all. It was a beautiful bird, dressed at 4 3/8 pounds.
An Internet site suggested holding the older bird over a propane stove and burning off the down and pinfeathers. I should have known better: the page also had a recipe for crow marinated in garlic.
The inferno approach produced a few scars on the bird, short, nubby hair roots on my left hand, and a gawd-awful stench which required a complete change of clothes and shower before I was allowed in the kitchen.
Then it was over to Bet to cook the beast, pinfeathers and all. She warned me, “You’ll just have to skin it while carving the bird, but be sure you cut it up where nobody can see it.” The cooked goose smelled great, but the pinfeathers made it easily the ugliest thing yet to come out of the oven at the farm. What’s more, I discovered I couldn’t even skin it while carving: the skin remained welded to the meat. Strange bird, indeed.
At dinner Roz and I went back for more; Bet and Charlie barely finished theirs. Mom didn’t seem to like it. The bird served five with leftovers.
I asked the biologist how she would describe the taste of a large wild goose. Roz thought about it and told us it seemed most like emu of anything she had eaten. The flesh was dark and very firm, though hardly tough, dry, but not parched. With a little applesauce I thought it was a high-quality meat, though the blackened pinfeathers were a bit hard to take.
The next carcass in a similar state will be cut up into mystery meat, and should make an outstanding ingredient in a pasta dish or casserole. Lunch today was goose tortillas, solid Canadian fare.
A trio of herons
September 14, 2009
These three great blue herons keep turning up in meadows around the area. This afternoon I saw them skulking across our back field. I wonder what they’re hunting? I haven’t seen many frogs. Would they catch mice? If so, they’re welcome.
Zeke, again
July 21, 2009
Tony and I were standing in the yard today looking down over the field where Bill Barrett was raking hay. Hovering high above the tractor and poised to strike was a large, brown hawk. The only bird I know that can hover like that is Zeke, the red-tailed hawk who grew up in the woodlot. For some reason Zeke’s favourite method of hunting involves following a vehicle moving around a field.
Zeke’s back for his third haying season and he seems less bothered by blackbirds than before. Today he pretty much ignored the redwing which was swooping around him. I guess he had mice on his mind.
Later in the day I spoke to Bill’s wife, Lynn, and she mentioned that Bill had reported at lunch that he “had help in the field today”: Zeke was keeping a close eye on things.
Fight or flight: a note from the old house
July 21, 2009
More trouble with Daphne
July 4, 2009
In an email retired MNR guy Brian Anderson suggested I protect my walnut seedlings by putting out a blood-scented bait to scare the deer out of the field. Opening day of bass season produced a supply of fish carcasses, so I placed them around the field, producing immediate results: within a couple of hours the fish-heads were widely dispersed as though a litter of coyote puppies had played with them. From then on I saw no more damage to the seedlings in the back field.
Then came the episode with the spotted fawn E. T.’s visit to our orchard last Sunday. Yesterday morning over my pancakes I watched E.T. and Daphne’s Mom grazing in the neighbour’s soybean field, about six hundred yards away. Fine. No problem.
This morning after a heavy rain I looked over the walnut fields on the way to the woodlot, then settled into a casual mushroom tour on the Ranger. I picked three different types of oysters, one in quantity, so now I need to determine if the things are edible.
On the way back to the house I looked down into the new 5 acre patch of seedlings, and there was Daphne, cheerfully munching on one of the priceless blight-resistant plants the butternut people entrusted to my care. Yelling and waving my Tilley, I gunned the Ranger to the rescue across the 700 feet to the culprit and her victim.
Daphne was not impressed by my wild west routine. She simply retreated into the tall hay about a hundred feet, turned and stared blankly at me. I stopped by tree #WP92-23 and shut the machine off. If you’re interested, #23 is located at
N44.39.720′
W76.13.561
441′
She raised her eyes and ears above the hay, looked at me and my Ranger, and slowly started to walk toward us. Again, she walked up to about forty feet from me, licked her lips, chewed her cud a bit, and looked quite frustrated that I had put myself between her and her breakfast. It doesn’t seem to matter to Daphne that the whole world around her is green with potential food for a deer at this time of year. When she sets her taste buds on one particular tree, that’s the one she intends to eat.
She tried several circles downwind of the Ranger. My one-sided conversation with her seemed more to intrigue than frighten her. Growing a bit tired of the standoff, I tried dismounting from the Ranger to give her a scare. She just did her gallop-into-the-tall-hay bit, then turned around and returned, tail held high, and gleaming in the sunlight from the dew on her flanks.
She’s a beautiful animal, but I couldn’t notice how, while walking in silhouette in the hay, she has moves a lot like a young Michael Jackson in his early dance steps. That jerky, but fluid step?
So we’ve established that Daphne has a very strong will, fixates on a particular plant that she wants to eat at that time, has some decent dance moves, and that she’s also not very afraid of me. The fact remains that she’s poised to damage a priceless bit of the Canadian genetic heritage, and the only way I could get her to give up on her breakfast in time for me to return for mine, was by running after her across a five-acre field until she eventually gave up and ducked into the woodlot to await my departure.
I guess the only solution will be to bait the butternut seedlings with fish heads and hope she develops a taste for Glen Baker’s soybeans. Time to go fishing. Now that’s a plan. Thanks, Brian.
UPDATE: July 11/2009
Another encounter with Daphne went somewhat better for both of us. When I came upon her she was firmly ensconced in the middle of my neighbour’s wheat field. She looked up at my approach, froze, and stared me down until I grew bored and drove away. Hey, she’s not eating my nut trees, so what’s the harm? Hope you enjoy the wheat, Daphne.
E.T.
June 28, 2009
Sunday afternoon Bet called me to the back of the house: “Something is making a distress call out there! I don’t know if it is a bird or a cat up a tree, but something is in trouble. It’s making kind of a bleating noise.” She wandered down the stairs into the orchard. “Look! There it is!” she whispered. Bet pointed at a two-week old fawn, standing lost and bewildered on the edge of the lawn. I tried to calm her down and get her to come back into the house before she frightened the thing out of its wits, but she kept babbling away, all the way up the stairs and into the kitchen.
Our son Charlie had heard the commotion and made his own way to the orchard. He stood there, stock still. Apparently pleased by the company of these strange animals, the fawn began gamboling about the orchard, trying out the unfamiliar, closely-cropped turf. Suddenly he noticed this tall animal with strange hair, and so he bopped over for a visit. Then came that great E.T. moment: the fawn, legs braced like a little, spotted saw horse, nose stretching, stretching out to the man’s fingertip. The merest touch, a flip of the tail and E.T. was gone. Well, not really; he went for another lap of the orchard, then posed for a photo and gradually faded into the vegetation along a fence row. At least he was quiet after meeting Charlie.
E.T. seemed in excellent physical condition, so we were pretty sure he wasn’t the fawn orphaned by the accident on Hwy 15 this week which left a doe dead. I had looked at the carcass, if only to make sure it wasn’t Daphne, the featured character in last week’s column in this space. This doe was twice the size of the winsome yearling. In fact, I suspected that the victim might have been Daphne’s mother, but the good condition of this fawn and my increasingly ragged walnut trees suggest that that very large doe is alive and well and living in the shadow of our barn.
Daphne, on the other hand, has given up ownership of the back field. This might have something to do with the new player, a coyote who has just arrived. I haven’t met the critter yet, but the signs are all there. To my great relief, nothing is eating the walnut seedlings in the back field now.
But Daphne’s mom may have moved her fawn into the tall orchard grass just below the house to hide from the new predator. The trouble with that stuff is that it’s easy to get disoriented in 7’ high growth, and maybe E.T. got away. Or perhaps there’s a second fawn.
The point of telling about all of this confusion Sunday afternoon is to underline a basic principle of environmental management: in theory, many things sound wonderful which don’t taste so good in practice. Take, for instance, the idea of coyotes keeping down the deer population to the betterment of the herd and the ecosystem. That sounds really good on paper, and the picture of a coyote eating a couple of dozen mice causes no one alarm. But the local coyote-popularity poll took some wild swings today while E.T. tore around our orchard looking for a playmate.
Why do the blasted things have to be so cute? Or why do they have to act so vulnerable and foist their family dramas off on the humans in the neighbourhood? Deer have a genius for doing that, all the while munching their way through prized shrubs and orchard growth.
Indian Lake Marina owner Wayne Wilson still chuckles about the doe and two fawns who spent opening day of deer season on his back patio one year. And of course you can’t drive through Chaffey’s Locks without a few eye-to-eye encounters with local whitetails.
Take the family of three deer which stroll at will around the lawns of Newboro at the moment. They must have learned urban living from Canada geese.
So the rest of the day was an uproar of worry. If it wasn’t bad enough for Daphne’s Mom to foist off her half-grown and quarrelsome adolescent on me, now she has to make us kid-sit the little one?
This week I bought my deer license, and hope I win a doe tag in the draw. I won’t pick on the little ones, but if Daphne’s Mom or her current swain show their ears around here, there’ll be cutlets-a-frying, come November. That’ll teach her to dump her family problems on the neighbours.
Bambi
June 28, 2009
Quite a show here this afternoon: Bet heard something making distress calls and wandered down into the orchard to see. Turns out it was a young fawn, lost and lonely, but unhurt. It flounced around for awhile until it spotted Charlie, standing there still. Over to him it gamboled, assumed the E.T. pose, nose to finger tip, then thought better of it and bounded away. I got one picture with a 35 mm on a long lens, then it faded into the greenery to await rescue from Mom, I guess. It’s a lot easier to talk about coyotes controlling the deer population when it’s in the abstract. When Bambi is in the orchard, the votes swing wildly in favour of the deer.
the Walnut Diary 