Mighty Trackers Catch a Frog

We went looking for more cougar sign this week. As before, after identifying the spots on the map where we’d found cougar sign previously, we tried to find other spots, using a topo map and Google Earth, that display similar characteristics. There was much back-and-forth, discussion, and little agreement. It was well into the morning by the time we agreed on a game plan.

Our first stop was along Gazos Creek Road. The landscape was spongy, moist and lush, cut through with waterfalls and rivulets. We found no cougar sign here, but this plant was pretty neat. The three-parted flower looks like something from Venus and smells like a fishmonger’s gut pile. Weird! I wonder what uses it might have for human beings, besides being fascinatingly bizarre.



Finding only a rank splat scat, very similar to the splatty nastiness in this video, we concluded that we weren’t really able to find and log definite cougar sign here. We piled into the car again and set off for Cloverdale Ranch Gate 2.

We found many deer and a number of other cool things at Cloverdale, but nothing that I would identify as cougar sign. We spent most of our time making jokes and laughing at each other.



This golden-crowned sparrow was lying in the grass as we approached. It was dead, but the eyes were still bright and a tick still fed from it. How long ago did he die? What did he die from? We couldn’t tell, but had many speculations. The bird was frozen in a crouching position though we found him on his back, possibly having toppled over at the point of death. We propped him back up and the little body stood easily, braced on wide-spread feet and drooping wingtips. He looked very much like a distressed but still living bird. Creepy.




As we continued up the hill we noticed a small creature hopping rapidly away from the nearby pond. One of our group shouted “Red Legged Frog!” and pounced on it.



We followed it for a while, snapping pictures through the grass.



I finally picked it up and examined it.



It doesn’t look like a bullfrog or an African clawed frog, so that leaves one of our three (possibly) local native frogs: Rana boylii, Foothill Yellow-legged Frog; Rana draytonii, California Red-legged Frog; or Pseudacris (=Hyla) regilla, Pacific Treefrog.

R. boylii seems to like shallow, slow-flowing water, of which there was none around. Also, there was no yellow on this frog’s legs.

R. draytonii seems to also like flowing water, but I’ve found it in still pools before, too. And this frog did have red legs, as well as dark stripes over the thigh and calf and a dark streak over the eyes. R. draytonii also has two distinct ridges running from behind the tympanum down it’s back, and well-webbed hind feet with no toe pads. Also, the dark streak on the face seems to rarely if ever continue past the frog’s eyes toward the nostrils.

P. regilla, on the other hand, seems to be confusingly variable in coloration, with some being strikingly similar to R. boylii and R. draytonii. Most, though, seem to have that dark mask over the eyes, and distinct toe pads on all four feet, as well as an absence of lateral ridges. The adults are also much smaller than adults of either Rana species.

I’m still not entirely sure what this frog was, but I have a better idea now that I’ve done some research.

On our way back, we saw a group of deer feeding on a ridge upwind of us. We decided to test our stalking skills. When we came over one ridge, there was the largest deer silhouetted against the sky, radar-dish ears pointing right at us. I guess we weren’t quiet enough.

On the way toward the deer, I passed this little inch-and-a-half-wide hole. I liked the occupant's little south-facing porch. Who made it?



I followed the deer downslope and skirted the edge of a big gully, hoping to find cougar scrapes along the drainage. I trailed the deer as I went.



This track is less than ten minutes old. I know it’s age because I found the deer at the end of their trail, not because I’m that good at aging tracks. But I did select my path according to the freshest tracks, and confirmed they were the freshest when I saw the trail leading to the animal’s hooves.



The deer led me past an interesting little cave in the vegetation, sheltered by young pines on the northwest side and coyotebrush surrounding the other edges. In the little clearing was an old buck kill, nubs of antlers shoved into the earth, spine twisted, and ribs chewed off. Most of the bones were still in the vicinity of the kill but well-gnawed. Was this cougar sign? And if so, when was the cat last feeding off of the kill? Some scraps of skin, still flexible and a little slimy, clung to the bones, but all other flesh was gone. Some of the bones had gone green with algal growth.

After the Cloverdale shenanigans, we decided to try one last place. The south side of the Candelabra trail in Butano Park has brought us to cougar sign before. We decided to go up the north side of the trail in an effort to connect the dots of previously-seen cougar sign in Butano and Cloverdale.





Once again, we found no cat sign that we could positively identify. We returned to Blue House farm to end our day with a bird sit.