Hairy WoodpeckerAbout 50 seconds into Part 1 of Juliet's highlight video from a year ago today, at 1:05:55 AM, she hears a sound, moves her ear, and raises her head. She licks nervously. An animal is touching the den or is on it. The noises continue. Juliet ends up clacking her jaws followed by a lot of nervous licking, while the cubs continue to nurse. About 25 minutes later, Juliet lifts her head and looks and listens into the darkness with a narrowed, worried muzzle. We say darkness because we don’t think Juliet can see the infra-red light that lets us see her. The cubs (all 3 visible) are strangely silent. Are they contented after nursing, or was there something about Juliet’s breathing that spoke of danger? When we’re with bears, their breathing pattern tells us their first sign of anxiety. Are these cubs picking up on that already 16 days of age with their eyes still closed? With the temperature at 28 below zero F, one would think the cubs would protest more loudly about Juliet raising up for a prolonged period. There are always multiple interpretations for observations in the wild and it is hard to be certain. With Lily Fans watching with us for so long, we aren’t the only ones who notice unusual behaviors and wonder what they mean.
Part 1
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQERpj7i0lk
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/119068187
Worried Juliet - February 8, 2014In Part 2, also about 6 minutes long, Juliet and the cubs are active. Midway through the video (about 3:22 PM), Juliet approaches the camera to rake bedding and then backs up over the far edge of the bed to urinate or defecate. A cub gives a particularly high-pitched scream at 3:23:11 PM (15:23:11 at the top of the screen) as it tries to climb the edge of the bed without any contact with Juliet.
At 8 PM (20:00:00), a cub again finds itself on top of Juliet away from the warmth of Juliet’s underside and breath. The cub protests loudly. As it turned to take the right direction to warmth and security, we got our first glimpse of a tiny appendage that seems too far forward on the belly to be anything but a male.
Part 2
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3szO2c7QLeE
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/119068188
Archives: http://www.bearstudy.org/website/research/2014-juliet-archives.html
Cub climbing on Juliet - February 8, 2014At the WRI, woodpeckers particularly enjoyed fresh suet as this female hairy woodpecker showed.
Peter and Ryan will be back at work on Monday to show more of their handy work. Ryan will be bringing many special lights to show a new kind of magic after learning some tricks of lighting from Doug Hajicek on Friday. Lily Fans will remember Doug. He is the one who put the Lily’s Den Cam Team together in 2010 and then went on NBC Today twice to make Lily the number one search topic in the world on Google. Doug’s know-how was a big factor in bringing so many of us together. And he continues to help.
Along that line, I just heard from Martyn Stewart that he has the trickling water sounds we need to augment the “leak” in the beaver dam Peter and Ryan will be working on tomorrow.
So many people stepping up as needed.
Thank you for all you do.
Lynn Rogers, Biologist, Wildlife Research Institute and North American Bear Center
All photos taken today unless otherwise noted.