From the Northern Crew:
My dearest deer people,
I left off last week saying we had an MIA fawn. Well, we tracked it down on Monday morning, 2 miles away. Even more interesting though, it was back to its regular hangout that same evening! So, between Saturday night & Monday night, its mama decided to take it on a little adventure I guess [Seems to fit in with theme of some recent posts!]. Since then, they have remained in their usual territory.
Everything else went rather smoothly this week. No mortalities, at least as it relates to fawns. We did come upon 1 deer exclosure that found itself in the path of logging equipment sometime this past year… needless to say, the exclosure is no more. Other than that, we only have 1 more veg plot to get to! [that is expected to happen in a working forest during a multi-year study and we will reconstruct the plots and exclosure and continue to monitor the site]
This upcoming week, we will help the bear bio aide set and check traps starting on Wednesday. I’m also hoping to get our truck out of the shop for the umpteenth time.
-Hannah
Field Crew Leader
PGC Deer and Elk Section
From the Southern Crew:
Hi all,
This week was just a regular (but good) work week.
We detected a fawn mortality signal on Monday. When we investigated, we found a collar underneath a honeysuckle bush with all the stitching ripped out. The collar was in good condition and we didn’t find any evidence that a predation event occurred.
The crew completed all of the fence plots except one. Apparently it has experienced some damage, so we are waiting for instructions before we complete this plot.
We continued obtaining estimated locations. Kara and Sarah saw the collared fawn at Reeds Gap State Park. Both she and her sibling were standing near the road again. The park manager also sent me a photo of them from her office window.
Finally, the lilies are in bloom! I found a Turks Cap Lily (Lilium superbum) on Thursday. Now, if only I could locate a Wood Lily (Lilium philadelphicum) before the deer eat them all (just kidding). [many species of the Lily family are considered tasty by white-tailed deer]
Next week, we’ll continue monitoring fawns and most likely get involved in some predator-monitoring work.
Field Crew Leader
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