I'm going to keep it short and sweet this week since life is moving at an increasingly alarming pace right now, and I'm enjoying the ride, and can't stop for long.
John brought us a wonderful work this week to contemplate, and I have found that my most amazing moments to share recently were all squashed up into this day.
I have been working with ringtails since 2000 alongside my mentor, David Wyatt, out in the Sutter Buttes of California and have absolutely loved every chance I've had to be out in this truly wild area. The Sutter Buttes are just west of Yuba City, in the Northern Central Valley. They are a tiny isolated volcanic uprising that are home to some unique species and have been held in primarily private hands for a hundred plus years, so traveling across their peaks is like traveling back in time.
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Transition this week is my own. I've been visiting this beautiful, quiet space for more than a decade and the pictures I have from these many trips have been an eye into the blossoming of my own spirit, and the awakening of my nature-loving heart. It's been a transition so slow and so melodic I hardly remember the days when I didn't know what a ringtail was or the absolute transcendence of a majestic oaks shade.
Pictures from the last several years:
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| I also catch bats at the Sutter Buttes as well :) |
Just falling in love with my life all over again today. I wish you all blissful transitions and can't wait to visit the wonderful
people who play Weekword with me. Come join us!
Pictures from the fog and mist today. We caught three ringtails named Carla, Bella, and Jeffrey.
Some wonderful pictures! I am so happy to hear that joyful ring in your writing again. :-)
ReplyDeleteOh what a beautiful place and what amazingly beautiful animals. How wonderful to be part of this project. You are lucky to have this in your life.
ReplyDeleteOh Carmen, I love this post. The pictures are so beautiful, and the little ringtails are super cute. So what exactly do you do with them? You mentioned that you have been working with them since 2000. And I'm with Adrienne - you are lucky to have this in your life.
ReplyDeleteCarmen, I am just so impressed with your words and your photographs, they are inspirational. Such beauty within and without. I too am curious as to what you do with these beautiful little creatures?
ReplyDeleteThank you for the comments everyone! Ringtails are related to raccoons and are relatively common in the American Southwest from California to Texas. They are fully protected in California so we are required to have permits to capture and release them, and very little is known about them due to their nocturnal activity and aversion to heavy human habitation. My mentor Dave Wyatt has been studying ringtails since 1987 and is the first person in known scientific literature to be studying the ecology of these animals in such a broad spectrum (multi-year homerange studies, scat analysis, DNA markers, habitat surveys, etc) using ear tags, radio collars, and infrared motion sensing cameras. So the basic answer out of all of this as to what do we do with them is that we do short term (a few hours at most) capture of them to take morphological and physiological data, tag and/or collar them for range studies, and release them back into the wild. They are amazing, sensitive, stunningly beautiful creatures that I feel extremely blessed to have had the opportunity to be near. Thank you so much for your interest in my little sciencey world :)
ReplyDeleteWOW! What a great post. Wonderful pictures, I love them all--the fog one is striking.
ReplyDeleteI used to do scientific research--I studied the social behavior of free-ranging horses in Idaho and assisted with some bat studies and owl studies. I wanted to go on like that, but it was hard for me to have children and do fieldwork at that time, though nowadays, people do. I am working on a couple novels that involve women doing field research (one on turtles and salamanders, one on trees) and I get really excited reading about your research! :-D Sounds like a great life.
what a treat to get some information about an adorable critter on this Earth! loved seeing the photos from your prior years work with your mentor! I especially love the pics of the raindrops (or fog mist?) in the seventh picture from the bottom...
ReplyDeleteI love this post! Such a cool thing to be doing and in such a beautiful place! I love the top fog and mist photo, would make a superb watercolor, any chance in sharing it with me? Hint, hint...
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful post! Amazing photos and I was thrilled to read of your adventures and find someone with passion. Thank you for welcoming me to the Weekword and for the compliment.
ReplyDeleteYour great photos make me think that I should have been a biologist :) Bats are so fascinating and these little ringtails are too cute for words. I am so glad to hear you are a bee fan. They could always use more people on their team :) Thank you for sharing. I love the photo of the reddish brown tree bark against all of that lush green mossiness. What kind of tree is that?
ReplyDeleteThe reddish tree is one of my favorites and a definite favorite to our local bees, it's a whiteleaf manzanita-one of my absolute favorites in the field. Thank you for the kind words all, I feel so lucky to share my little weird science stuff with a group of creative minds like this-you all rock!
ReplyDeleteWhat a fascinating post! I enjoyed all your photos. Must be truly amazing to be doing this kind of work.
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