All winter, I watched a flock of wild turkeys trot across my front yard on their way to my neighbor’s place, where she put out food for them. In March, I was lucky enough to witness the males perform their courtship rituals—flashing their tail feathers in front of the females. Then in April, when the snow began to melt, I noticed turkey feathers all over the yard but was puzzled as to how they got there: do turkeys molt in the spring?
But the story turned out to be sadder and more unexpected. One of the female turkeys, my neighbor told me, had some kind of disfigurement and was shunned by the others. As part of nature’s plan, a bobcat took advantage of her vulnerability. Her fate was written in the snow. My neighbor saw the bobcat tracks and the signs of something being dragged. Those feathers around my cabin were a testament of how nature works: predator and prey.
In March, I saw other evidence of nature’s seeming cruelty. All winter long, when most of the wildlife is hibernating, the rabbits were still out, hopping across the snow and leaving tracks by the front porch, under which they took refuge. But in March, the rabbits disappeared. I miss them, their softness and gentleness, but I know a bobcat had a meal that helped it to survive.
But the rabbits’ and turkey’s demise is easier to understand than the death of a moose calf a few weeks ago. When it was still alive, the young animal was photographed at Lily Lake, just down the road from me, and its picture appeared on the front cover of the local newspaper. (My photo of a moose calf, above, was taken several years ago at Lily Lake.) But a neighbor told me that she saw its dead body, a few days later, by the side of the road near the lake, presumably mowed down by a car.
I’ve driven that road many times, and people drive it fast, oblivious to the fact that wildlife lives alongside and cross it: deer, elk, chipmunks and other animals. Driving it once at dusk, I had a car on my bumper the whole time, and when I slowed because I saw a deer on the side of the road, the car started to pass me until I honked, and the driver stopped just in time to avoid hitting the deer when it stepped into the road.
It’s hard to see any animal die, but even harder to endure the obliviousness of humans to the animal world, especially when our need to get someplace fast comes before respect for their lives.
Luckily for river otters, their way of life keeps them from (mostly) having to cross paths with humans, although that wasn’t always true. Hunted in most states almost to extinction for their fur, they were reintroduced in Colorado decades ago and have slowly been making a comeback. I first saw one about eight years ago in Wild Basin, when it popped out of a hole in the ice and quickly dove back into the frigid water when it saw me.
But last week, I was not only lucky enough to see an otter again, but to witness the animal do something I had read about but never seen. Sitting at Copeland Falls in Wild Basin, out of the corner of my eye, I saw something move. I turned my head just in time to see the otter jump onto a snow bank and slide maybe 30 feet into the river. It looked like an act of pure joy, and after it spotted me watching it, the otter went farther downstream, where I followed it, and found another (shorter) snowbank to slide down. (I didn't move fast enough to get a picture of the sliding otter, but I did photograph the track it left behind, to the left of the waterfall.)
Although its survival was based on catching fish, it was having fun doing it. I watched the otter dive into the water over and over, although I never saw it catch its meal. More than anything, I wanted to be that otter, wanted to slide down the snowbank and become part of the river, make my way around the boulders and over the waterfalls, plunging over and over again into this creek. At that moment, I couldn’t imagine anything more fun.
In a world full of anger and loss, where often there is more pain than pleasure, it’s a treat to find pure joy. I envied the otter and its long leap into the river, where it’s at home among the boulders, waterfalls and deep pools. Unfortunately, I probably wouldn’t survive a swim in the river, but I might be able to find a good snowbank to slide down.
Stock photo above by Zachary Spears on Unsplash.
Thank you for your beautiful perspective. I really needed that image of that otter!
Posted by: shoney | May 27, 2022 at 09:36 AM