Usually our River Otters are in small groups on the beaches and in the sea. This one was alone in a flooded ditch by Chinese Gardens lagoon and was very interested in me.
Second photo is a feather found as-is under favored roost
Location is accurate to mountain, obscured for protection.
Jaguar photographed on nearby trail camera about the same time.
Photo is poor quality but can see black bill and yellow lores. It was about 1/2 the size of nearby Great Egrets
20 minutes after first sighting and ingesting a crayfish, this mink returned and caught another crayfish.
I know this isn’t an animal but i saw this really cool. Wether phenomenon called a circumhorrizon cloud
This animal was rescued off the beach by the Marine Mammal Stranding Network and is currently on the way to Seattle for rehabilitation. The Guadalupe Fur Seal is the only species that the stranding network currently picks up for rehab, because they are so far away from their normal range that there survival is compromised.
Found earlier by Stefan Schlick.
Handled under appropriate permits.
There were actually two bobcats here, getting a bit shirty with each other. Eventually the larger of the two drove the smaller one away. I suspect the second set of four photos is of a different cat than the first set, but I'm not certain. I saw the small one run off out of the corner of my eye. I think it was the cat in the first four photos, but that might have been the bigger one, and thus the same in all eight photos.
Cardinal getting territorial with itself in this mirror. It was doing the same thing last week too. It spends a not-insignificant amount of time battling itself.
Note to identifiers: Don't be too quick to call this a Red-tailed. There is definitely something odd with this individual and I'm currently getting feedback from raptor experts.
The goat was sitting in the snow and sun. When he became aware of us watching him, he got up and crossed the gully, but was not in a hurry.
Blue 328
Male, hatched April 2004
Also known as the Merriam's ground squirrel (Urocitellus canus). This species was split from Townsend's.
Help with this please spotted on one of the trails quite high up we took several pics and was at least 100 plus yards away don't know if it's a black puma as it was quite visible from a distance away much thanks
NUMBER: 20130121
SPECIES: Panther, Puma concolor (Linnaeus, 1758)
SUBSPECIES: North American Panther, Puma concolor couguar Kerr, 1792 [formerly Florida Panther, Puma concolor coryi Bangs, 1899]. Only 1 subspecies is recognized in North America; however, it has been extirpated in eastern North America, except Florida.
DISTINCTIONS: Long, thick tail, large head, deep (not fat body), very muscular legs.
SIZE, DEVELOPMENT: body ~1.0-1.2 m (3.5-4 ft) long (estimated), immature
DATE, TIME, DURATION: 21 January 2013, early morning, 2-3 minutes
LOCALITY: near John Prince Park, Lake Osborne in Lake Worth, Florida (USA)
LATITUDE, LONGITUDE: 35°35’30.12” N, 80°4’40.44” W (26.5917, -80.0779)
HABITAT: in open field near woods
REPORTED TO: Florida Panther Project, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. They said the specimen was a Domestic Cat, Felis catus Linnaeus, 1758, and did not investigate. Obviously, it was not a Domestic Cat. The tail is too thick and held in the wrong position. The head is too large and the wrong shape. This animal was known, as a mystery, to local residents. They did not believe it was a feral Domestic Cat.
DATA REPORT: iNaturalist #35790675 [also see iNaturalist #35778168 & ???]
BEHAVIOR: laying in open field. Stood up, stretched, and walked slowly into some woods.
PHOTOGRAPHER: Michael Skinner ~23 m (~75 ft) away
BLACK BOBCAT: Coleman (2007) documented 14 black (melanistic) Bobcats in south- and south-central Florida (1939-2007). He stated no Florida records of documented black Panthers exist. Apparently, no confirmed record of any North American black Panther exists. REW thought the cat was a Panther. The Figure shows a large, black cat with a thick, long tail. This was not a Bobcat.
IMPORTANCE: Possible first record of a North American black Panther
BLACK LEOPARD: Coincidentally, LBW and EHW observed and photographed a rare black Sri Lankan Leopard, Panthera pardus kotiya Deraniyagala, 1956, 14 July 2010, in Horton Plains National Park, Nuwara Eliya, Siri Lanka [see iNaturalist #???].
OBSERVERS: Dr. Ernest H. Williams, Jr.[1,2,4,5] Dr. Raymond E. Waldner [7] and Dr. Lucy Bunkley-Williams[1,3,4,6]
AFILIATIONS, ADDRESSES: [1]Extraordinary Professors, Potchefstroom Campus, North-West University, South Africa; Adjunct Professors, Research Field Station, Florida Gulf Coast University, 5164 Bonita Beach Road, Bonita Springs, FL 34134; [2]Dept. Marine Sciences, University of Puerto Rico (retired); [3]Dept. Biology, UPR (retired); [4]920 St. Andrews Blvd, Naples, FL 34113-8943; [5]e-mail ermest.williams1@upr.edu; cell 239-227-3645, ORCID 0000-0003-0913-3013; [6]Cell 787-467-2179, e-mail lucy.williams1@upr.edu, ORCID 0000-0003-1390-911x; [7] Professor of Biology and Associate Dean of Sciences, Palm Beach Atlantic University, 901 S. Flagler Drive, West Palm Beach, Fl 33410.
REFERENCES:
<>Coleman, L. 2007. Melanistic Bobcat caught. Cryptomundo News, https://cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/07blk-bobcat/
<>NBC. 2007. Lynx on the rise, breeding with bobcats in N.B. CBS News, posted 5 February 2007, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/lynx-on-the-rise-breeding-with-bobcats-in-n-b-1.685497
<>Williams, E. H., Jr., R. E. Waldner, and L. Bunkley-Williams. 2019. First confirmed report of a black (melanistic) Panther in North America? Research Quality Report, iNaturalist #35790675, 17 November (open access) [443]
Eating an Innkeeper Worm