Bears & Birds

 Time for some wildlife sightings.

Bears have been visiting our wildlife camera on a regular basis lately.

Mama bear and cub. (October 24)

Dancing bear - the camera caught a running bear with all four feet off the ground. (November 7)

This may be the largest bear I've seen around here - prowling through the woods at midnight. Looks good and fat for the winter. (November 24)

Most likely the same bear, three days later at 8:30 AM - if not, there are two large bears running around the woods! (November 27)

In the meantime, our other camera caught a nice time sequence of crows.

Taken over the course of one minute: First there was just one crow, then two, then three, and finally four before they left the scene.

And lastly, a brilliant red cardinal - probably the same male that spends the entire day trying to get into our house banging into our windows and deck door.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get to my tripod, so the resulting photo is a bit blurry.

Allegheny Trail

Today the Monday Morning Hikers tackled a small section of the Allegheny Trail. We started at the Jerry's Run trailhead and turned around at the top of Allegheny Mountain - the Virginia-West Virginia state line and the Eastern Divide. We waited for cooler weather (for the required physical exertion) and leafless trees (for better views). For a summer view of this same trail, check out an earlier blog post.

The start of the trail. It's muzzle-loading season for deer, so blaze orange (or other bright colors) were recommended. We also noted that the trailhead kiosk had been repainted and notices updated. The day started cool, but an uphill hike required shedding layers pretty quickly.

Sometimes the trail blaze still works even if the tree has changed position.

Approaching the top.

At the top. The guidebook says that the sign was known to be there in 2017. We can now vouch for its existence in 2020.

On the way back down. As expected, the return trip took a good bit less time.

The view from the top of the trail is still obscured by a lot of trees.

For about half the hike, the trail follows a ridge that snakes up to the top.

A male Question Mark butterfly (Polygonia interrogationis). The eponymous question mark is apparently on the underside of the wing.