Due to the house fire i suffered back in may , i was forced to find a suitable rental house that the wife and i were BOTH happy with. Jackpot! Found the place on Air B&B actually. My primary house that is in Frankford, a few miles outside of Branchville is about 20 minutes south of my temp place. It is a small completely remodeled farm house on a few acres backing up to stokes and hp state park. I am about 5 miles to the milford bridge and around 10 miles from NY state line. I am the caretaker for the 70-80 chickens and ducks consisting of a large variety of different species. Thanks to two super generous members here i have two trail cams out and one is set up in a bottle neck coming from the big woods to to my property .Due too a perfect location (several trails come from all different directions and end up going to a single trail) essentially any critter that walks crawls, scurrys etc has to use this trail to keep a low prof making it an ideal spot to monitor the invnetory of critters. I have pics of yote, bear , red fox, grey fox, ground hog, bobcat and on and on. Regardless of the time the whole coop will explode with each different species of fowl making its own personal noise, needless to say its easy to hear when an umwanted guest is circling the perimeter of the enclosure. Two shifty characters showed up on cam and both had domestic bird on the menu. One was a rogue gang of weasels that can really do some damage when they get in. It reminds me of indians sneaking into a herd of buffalo to hunt. Haha. The ermine is absolutely crafty and nasty for its size. The other is fisher! These shifty assassins are slowly moving back into our state to there natural ranges. I believe fish and game has identified 12 breeding pairs living in the walpack suspected of crossing the delaware by way of one the few islanda that sit in the middle of the big D. Last winter i followed a set of fisher tracks for about 1/4 mile, at the end of the trail the owner of the tracks climbs up a HUGE old pine tree where a large hole could be seen that is warn almost bare on bottle of the hole from constant use. An important piece of the migration back to northern nj, if not the MOST important piece, is FOOD SOURCE. Porcupine is amajor factor to the bottomline and survival of the fisher. 5th grade science class, the simplest yet truest reasons animals pack a bag and head out into new territory, basic predator play relationship. Anyone who drives rt 206 from about jumboland north to the milford bridge can easily spot a half dozen dead porkys splattered on the road. Im fact seeing a porky in my area was almost non existent until recently ( past 2 years or so). Back to the coop and pinch point cam. I have few pics of fishers comin in to scope the birds. I have also been woken up by the frantic sounds of birds i distress and run out with the coop and spotted one tearing around back of coop. Very cool little animal and jist like any other species the state puts a protedtive status on, there WILL be a carrying capacity problen or habitat issue eventually. Im in no way saying we are even remotely close to be able to trap this critter but who knows what will happen if gone unchecked for the next 3, 5 or even 10 years? (Bobcat, Yote,BEAR). Anyone else see any? Find den? Tracks? Anything? Attached is a pic of a fisher who got whacked by car on Clove Rd in Montague.
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