It’s Trail Camera Season!
April 1, 2024
Spring is here and it’s officially Trail Camera season! Don and I have been putting trail cameras up since the summer of 2017, and every time we put cameras up and go check them, it’s like Christmas morning! When we capture something really cool, it makes all the effort of scouting, hiking, camping, four-wheeling, researching, guessing, buying supplies, and then checking cameras worth it! Back in February we chose a spot out in the wilderness west of Kremmling to place 7 cameras. We were very hopeful to catch wolves on the cameras, since this is near the area the first group of wolves were released back in December of 2023. We may have had really high hopes for wolves, but we did capture thousands of images and videos of wolf food- deer and elk! We even had some surprise visitors you’ll want to see a little later…
When we first went out in February, we had to snowshoe to get to the trail camera locations. There was a base of at least a foot or 2 of snow! When we went back this time, the snow had melted in nearly all the places we had hung cameras. The mud had taken over! And although the ground was quite muddy, there were still snow-capped peaks all around us, with areas of deep snow in the shade. The first thing we saw while hiking out was a nice big herd of elk! There must have been over 100 spread out in a vast area. They all looked so healthy and I was excited to see them on our cameras.
We made it to the first two cameras and were relieved to see they made it through the last 6 weeks unscathed. Our usual protocol when we get to the cameras is to unlock them, turn them off, check the memory cards, check the battery power, and then reposition or move them. We were pleased to see that the cameras had picked up a lot of deer and elk activity and the batteries were still full! Now to move onto the next camera!
I forged ahead to the next camera while Don took his time behind me. He called out, and I stopped and turned and saw what he was pointing to - our very first Mule Deer antler shed! Not only did we see our first shed (that we officially will not collect until shed season starts on May 1, which you can read more about here), but we also had a fun video of Snowshoe hares on the cameras!
A pair of snowshoe hares on the trail camera!
We continued hiking on to check the rest of the cameras and were once again glad to see they all made it through the last several weeks without incident. There are a couple clips of deer and elk checking the cameras out and giving them some licks, which is always fun to see. We were getting such great footage and photos that we decided to leave the cameras up in the same place they have been. We’ll be looking forward to seeing what shows up over the next several weeks!
Now enjoy a couple of my favorite clips (narrowed down from several thousand)!
A lone daytime coyote surveys the area
A trio of coyotes on the hunt
Deer and elk sharing the same area for food and shelter
Always a thrill to get a mountain lion on the cameras!
After we checked all our cameras, we decided to walk the area looking for more clues about wildlife in the area and see if we could find any other sheds to come back for on May 1. We didn’t see any more sheds, but we did come across a few areas of old bones. We also kept hearing birds calling, then all of sudden got bombarded with 4 different species all around us calling! We got to see a Clark’s Nutcracker calling, a big flock of Pinyon Jays flying about, calling, and eating. We picked up the call of a Juniper Titmouse (a new species for me!), and a Northern Flicker flew through too! Not much later, a Mountain Chickadee started calling as well. It was really fun to be in the middle of all the birds and add a new species to the list. Check out some photos and video of the moments below!
Clark’s Nutcracker calling (with Pinyon Jay in the background
Pinyon Jays calling
After a successful day checking cameras and getting in some good nature and bird sightings, we stopped off at Vail Brewing Company for some tasty craft beers!
Stay tuned for more trail camera updates in a few weeks!
