Little Lions...

Hi Everyone.

Apologies for the gap between posts.  Mary and I have been on the road for the past three weeks and I haven't had the chance to grab the camera cards to see what's been going on in the woods by my house. 

Before we get to that and by way of explanation, we were in the Chicago suburbs for a week in the middle of May.  We were there helping my son Bobby and his family move to a new place in Cary, IL.  We had hoped to visit family and friends while there, but the move was a sustained effort for nearly the entire week.  Even though it was hard work, it was great to see Bobby, Lindsay and the grandkids, and we really love their new house.  They should be happy there for a long time.

We made the long drive home from Illinois, spent a couple of days at the cabin, then hopped on a plane to Chattanooga for a family wedding.  We spent the Memorial Day weekend at a little bed and breakfast on Lookout Mountain, finding that part of the country to be as pretty as a picture.  Too many mosquitoes in those mountains for my liking, though.  The wedding was really fun and it was great to see family again after the Covid isolation of 2020.  Six of Mary's siblings were there with their spouses (Tom and Angie, Dee and Dick, Danny and Karen, Mike and Jan, Debbie and Dave, and the proud parents of the groom, Pam and Steven).  We all had a great time together.  It was great to see our nephew Brandon McCoy (the groom) and meet Jess (his bride).  We also got caught up with nephew Scott and niece Madison (both McCoy's) and nephews Michael and Dustin (both Nolte's).  Dustin brought his girlfriend Sam and it was really nice to meet her, too.

So now we're back home and happily enjoying our little mountain paradise.  We celebrated Mary's birthday on June 3rd (Happy Belated, Mary!).  Did a nice Zoom call with the grandkids and had a chocolate chip cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes.  If you've got one of those shops in your area, I highly recommend you try them out.

Our nephew Mark Doroba and his wife Nora are visiting for a few days and we've had a really nice time so far.  They're heading out this afternoon to raft the Arkansas River with our son Craig.  That should be a blast.  Can't wait to hear about it; if they get any good photos or videos, I'll post them next week.

Mary and I took Mark and Nora on a little tour of our place yesterday.  I used that opportunity to swap out the cards on my trailcams and found some really cool videos.  There are too many videos to share in one post, but that means that I have material you can look forward to over the next week or so.

I decided to start with five videos of a mountain lion mom and her twin cubs.  As I think I've said in a previous post, it's always cool to find videos of mountain lions.  I love the elk and mule deer, bears and bobcats, but there's nothing like seeing a mountain lion in the wild (even if it is on a trailcam).  Seeing a mom with cubs is all the more special.

So, here we go.  Rather than try to describe the videos individually, I'll just post them in order and allow you to enjoy.  The flash of light you see in the background is a second camera I have set up on the opposite side of the water hole.  The infrared light provides really cool background lighting for these videos.  I didn't know that would happen - I'm just testing a new camera and thought it would be fun to get views from different perspectives - but I'm happy with the result...

Aren't those videos fantastic?  The mother is collared - she was captured, collared and released as part of a recent mountain lion study in the area - and I think she's the same lion that hung around our place last fall.  If so, she had those cubs last year and kept them hidden because they look too big to be newborns. 

The cubs are adorable, especially with the infrared highlighting the markings on their faces.  Even though they're cute, it won't be long before mom is teaching them to hunt.  They will be efficient little killers in the next year or so, then will move on to find their own territories.  In the meantime, I'll hope to see them again.  On video.

That's all for today.  As always, comments are welcome...