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Project Noah Nature School
Puma concolor
The Mountain Lion is my favorite North American animal. The elusive cat is rarely seen first hand but often leaves behind signs of it's presence, a find that always brings me joy. These tracks were found within the Sugarite Canyon State Park which is situated within a Ponderosa Pine/Gambel Oak forest. The area ranges from 6900 ft to around 8000 ft. I spotted several cougar tracks during my hike there. Some very nice prints too! These prints were approximately 8 cm x 8 cm.
Montane Ponderosa Pine and Gambel Oak forest with several intermittent streams, rivers, ponds and open grassy hillsides. The forest lies next to two large lakes as well.
This forested area is located within the Sugarite Canyon State Park which had suffered major devastation from the 2011 track fire. The fire burned massive amounts of trees and ground vegetation which forced the park to close for several months. The severity of the track fire is still seen today. Approximately 27,000 acres of surrounding land was burned, fish populations were completely decimated in the park's lakes and rivers due to massive amounts of ash. It has since recovered quite a bit and is full of green life; though signs of massive amounts of burned and felled Ponderosa Pines still haunts the area. Despite the obvious destruction I thoroughly enjoyed my time hiking through the park's mountains and was very impressed with abundant presence of wildlife.
Spotted on Jun 10, 2015
Submitted on Jun 16, 2015
2 Comments
Yes, thank you! I was very happy to have seen several signs of wildlife during my visit there. Especially after learning the magnitude of the fire. It shows how resilient nature can be.
That looks like a big paw print! It's awesome to hear the wildlife is plentiful four years on from those fires! Great spotting. Thank you for sharing :)