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TRnews editors:
Roger Irwin
Tim Amsden
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Genghis & Sylvia Kahn
Alfred E. Neuman

     We welcome contributions. Please contact the editors.

Bark Beetles
(Posted 3-20-06) This is the critter that has infested some of our Ponderosas. Check this Forest Service site for some good information.

      If there is a spirit animal for this place, it is the raven. Ravens are bigger than life; they have an energy that demands attention. There are other animals with this kind of presence, but they tend to be large carnivores, such as cougars and bears. There are even some birds, like the eagle, which make themselves strongly felt. But none of them are as playful, intelligent, and brashly present as the raven.

      Ravens slide down snowy roofs, hang upside down from branches, and fly exuberant dances in the sky. They loop-the-loop and soar and drop and tumble; all, it seems, just for the fun of it. Especially in the spring, when they are dancing in the air with their mate (they pair for life), their aerial performances are glorious.

      They are opportunistic feeders - they'll eat almost anything - and they cache their food. They will take juicy bits of a carcass, for instance, and hide them in different places for later. They make a wide variety of sounds, from croaks to caws to clicking noises. People who have raised ravens as pets discover that they are complex, loyal, and demanding.

      There are a few crows here and they are smaller, less intelligent and less playful. The tails are a good way to tell a crow from a raven; ravens' tails end in a wedge shape, while the ends of crows' tails are straighter across.

      Next time you are out for a walk in Timberlake and spot a pair of ravens soaring along the cliff face or dancing on the winds above the lake, stop for awhile and just watch and listen. You are in the presence of wonderful creatures.

TARANTULA by Tim Amsden (Published in the Timberlake Times July 2001)

      Sometimes in early fall tarantulas suddenly appear, usually taking perilous walks across highways. Tarantulas - giant hairy spiders! Are they dangerous? What are they doing on the highway?

      No, they are not dangerous. Our relatively small tarantulas, with their slow walks and hairy bodies with a distinctive orange spot, are reclusive, nocturnal, and reluctant to bite. If somehow you do encourage one to bit you, it will not be as painful as a bee sting. Some people even keep them as pets. But they are definitely creepy. Like all spiders, they have eight separate eyes, two in the center of their face and six around them. Also like all spiders, they inject their prey with venom to liquefy their innards, so they can such them empty. And unlike most spiders, they have microscopic bristles on their abdomen, which break off easily and irritate the skin of small animals.

      Normally tarantulas are only active at night, and remain very close to their burrows where they hunt for insects and small animals to eat. They do not spin webs, and females can live for thirty years. The poor males on the other hand, rarely live beyond ten years of age. They are the ones we see wandering the highways in August and September, searching for the burrows of females. If they find a female and are lucky, they will mate and then die within a few weeks. If they are unlucky, they will find a female who would rather eat them than have their babies.

      When you see those male tarantulas wandering through the ends of their short and dangerous lives, wish them well. They might make your skin crawl a little, but not compared to the gigantic wasp known as the tarantula hawk. The tarantula hawk will capture and paralyze a tarantula with its stinger, drag it into its lair, then lay a single egg inside. When the egg hatches, the wasp larva eats the still-living body of the tarantula, consuming the vital heart and nervous system last.

Don't Kill Bears
     (Posted 11-7-05) We have a fairly good population of bears in the Timberlake area, and they dearly love to be fed, or to get into your garbage. The problem is that once they get a taste for people food, they learn to scavenge around residences. When that happens they become dangerous to people, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish is called, and they come out and trap the bear.
     The bear is tagged and moved to another area, even as far away as Mount Taylor, but even from that distance, they usually come back and forage around houses again. The third time they are caught, they are killed.
     If you don't want the bears to be killed, don't feed them and keep your garbage secure. This is a public service message brought to you by the spirit of Smoky Bear.

Whether you are camping, hiking, jogging or taking a walk, there are some basic DOs
and DON'Ts when encountering these animals.

Black Bears

1. Stop, stand still a moment, and stay calm.
2. If the animal is aware of you, help it to identify you as a human. Talk in low tones and slowly wave your arms. It may then leave.
3. Do NOT run from a bear unless you are sure you can reach a safe place.
4. Quietly walk back the way you came making sure to not pass between the animal and cubs.
5. If time and circumstances permit, try to scare the predator away with loud noises.
6. If a bear charges, many are bluffs and they'll often stop or veer to the side at the last minute. If physical contact appears unavoidable, you have two options: a) use pepper spray if you have any or shoot to kill if you have a gun; b) fight back - do not play dead - act aggressively - defend yourself. You may be able to poke out both of the bear's eyes with your thumbs. A blind bear can't attack you.
7. If you have the option to shoot, an accurate shot fired at close range has a greater chance of killing a bear and the first shot is the most important. Aim for the shoulder if the bear is broadside, or the back of the neck between the shoulders if the bear is facing you. Avoid head shots - they often fail to kill a bear. Do not stop shooting to check the results. Keep firing until the bear is completely still -a wounded bear is very dangerous.
8. Pepper spray (available from UDAP Industries www.udap.com) has been proven as an effective (but not perfect) bear deterrent. It will work on cougars too. Wear it on your belt. Don't hang around after you've sprayed a bear. Once the initial shock has worn off, bears have been known to ENJOY licking the pepper residue off themselves.
9. A "Bear Bell" tied to your boot or pack or dog collar may alert a bear or cougar to your presence before you accidentally surprise it. If these animals become aware of you, they'll usually leave the area without you ever seeing them.

Mountain Lions

1. Avoid walking near dense growth, rock outcroppings or under ledges especially during the hours from dusk to dawn. Mountain lions ordinarily either lie hidden, waiting for prey to approach beneath them, or approach unseen, and then attack and kill by a bite to the back of the neck that severs the spinal cord.
2. If you encounter one, do not act afraid, bend over, crouch, kneel, turn your back or run from it. Try to give it a way out.
3. Look a lion in the eye(s).
4. Make loud, firm noises even showing your teeth and making snarling sounds.
5. Make yourself look big by raising your coat, jacket, or any clothing with your arms, standing up straight and swelling your chest, or pulling a small child on your shoulders without kneeling.
6. Children with no adult should always be in a group and should bunch together or when with an adult, pulled in close to appear larger and to prevent them from running.
7. Aggressively defend your position. The idea is to deter their attack by making them think that it isn't going to be easy for them. Use anything available as a weapon if the lion displays aggression, but generally not if you must turn your back, crouch, kneel, or bend over to get one.
8. Carry pepper spray where you can easily reach it; use fists, sticks, rocks, tools, a pocket knife, a bicycle, whatever you can hit with, throw, and/or use as a shield; target an eye with your thumbs, fingers, or a weapon.
9. If you live in lion territory, don't leave pets outdoors, or feed them or other prey animals as both the food and the animals may attract lions.
10. If you want to virtually eliminate any mountain lion danger to yourself, don't walk, hike, or jog alone.

Mule Deer
Odocoileus Hemionus

    There are many interesting facts about the Mule Deer that we enjoy at Timberlake. They seem to be everywhere now as the vegetation begins to green and the lake is expanding to areas that have been dry for several years.

- Mule Deer have large ears that move constantly and independently, from whence they get their name, "Mule" or "Burro Deer." It carries its thin, black-tipped tail drooped, unlike the uplifted, bushy white tail of its cousin.

- Mule Deer range throughout the entire western United States, including the four deserts of the American Southwest. They weigh anywhere between 125-330 lbs, are 4 to 6 1/2 feet in length, 3 to 3 1/2 feet high at the shoulder and have a life span of a bout 10 years in the wild. They have lived in captivity up to 25 years. Mule Deer are not especially vocal, although young fawns bleat on occasion. Injured deer utter a startingly loud "blatt" or bawl. Its larger feet allows the Mule Deer to claw out water as much as two feet deep, which it detects with its keen sense of smell.

- One of the Mule Deer's best known characteristics is its bouncing gait which is known as "stotting" or pronking." When it stots a Mule Deer bounds and lands with all four legs simultaneously over distances up to 8 yards, so that it looks like it's using a pogo-stick. In this fashion, they can reach a speed of 45 m.p.h. for short periods. If necessary, they can turn or completely reverse direction in the course of a single bound. This animal also walks, trots, and gallops perfectly well. When disturbed, a retreating Mule Deer will often stop for a last look at whatever disturbed it before it disappears completely from view. They have great difficulty traveling through snow that is more than knee deep, so they are unable to occupy many high areas in the winter. To avoid the snow, they will migrate to lower elevations at the onset of winter.

- In regions where Mule Deer and the White-tailed Deer both occur, they do hybridize on occasion. Hybrid male offspring are sterile and although hybrid females are fertile, all hybrids seem to have higher mortality rates then the pure species, which may be why hybrids are rarely seen.

- Mule Deer are browsers and eat a great variety of vegetable matter, including fresh green leaves, twigs, lower branches of trees, and various grasses. They are particularly fond of blackberry and raspbery vines, grapes, mistletoe, mushrooms and ferns. They eat so carefully they can even consume the fruit of cactus. They have no canine teeth and, like the cow, have a multipart stomach, the first two chambers of which act as temporary storage bins. Food stored here can be digested later when the deer chews its cud.

- Mule Deer are active primarily in mornings, evenings and moonlit nights. The inactivity during the heat of the days is a behavioral adaptation to the desert environment that conserves water and keeps the body temperature within livable limits. Sweat glands and panting also provide evaporative cooling during hot periods. During the middle of the day, the Mule Deer beds down in a cool, secluded place and leave oval depressions in grass, moss, leaves or snow. It typically urinates upon rising. A doe usually steps to one side first, but a buck will urinate in the middle of the bed. The mature buck seems to prefer rocky ridges for bedding grounds, while the doe and fawn is more likely to bed down in the open.

-The mating season for Mule Deer reaches its peak in November and December, as antlered stags round up females and fight for their possession. A buck will find a suitable doe and they will often play chase games at breakneck speeds before mating. They will remain together for several days. Antlers are shed after the breeding season, from mid-January to about mid-April. Most mature bucks in good condition have lost theirs by the end of February; immature bucks generally lose them a little later. Males and females mix freely while traveling together in groups during winter months.- When antlers start growing again in the spring, the group breaks up. The females go off by themselves and eventually give birth and nurse their young. The males wander in friendly twosomes or small bands throughout the summer months as antlers grow. The antlers are high and branch forward, forking equally into 2 tines with a spread up to 4 feet.

- From April through June, after about 6 ½ to 7 months gestation period, the doe delivers 1 to 3 young (normally 2). Fawns are born in late May or early June. A doe will usually produce a single fawn the first year she gives birth and then produce twins in following years. The fawn, colored reddish with white spots, weighs about 6 pounds at birth. It must nurse within the first hour and stand within the first 12 hours. During early weeks of life, the fawn sees its mother only at mealtimes for feeding. Spots begin to fade by the end of the first month. Besides the camouflage spots, they are further protected by having little or no scent. Fawns are weaned when they are 4 to 5 months old and stay with the doe for the first full year. They become sexually mature at 18 months.