Early visitor

Air temperature 8 F, wind southwest about 5 mph, sunny. Foraging morning, appointment afternoon. Something dark and low came bounding toward the house in the predawn dark, size and width suggest either cat or raccoon. No white stripe down the back. I may check tracks later. Or not.

Bounding beast I.D.?

Checked out the tracks across our snow. Four toes showing, no obvious claw prints, spacing, placement of front and rear paws nearly in the same spot. I *think* it may have been a marten. Fisher shows five toes, raccoons don't bound, cats may bound but they place their feet differently. Size fits the dark blob I saw.

On the other hand, what we have isn't great tracking snow.

(no subject)

Mourning Steve Miller.