I joined the Wilton Senior Citizen Scientists group a while ago, but have been what one would term “an inactive member.”
The simplest explanation is that I never seem to have my camera with me at opportune times, and I’m a complete Luddite when it comes to taking photos on my phone and then getting them to somewhere they can be viewed. So when I do spot something in nature worth recording, without a visual record of what I’ve seen, I’ve neglected to make any record at all. But I do have a head filled with memorable visual experiences of Wilton’s wildlife living comfortably within our community.
One night, around 3 a.m., when I was unable to sleep, I stood at our front bedroom window and saw a lumbering black bear climb over our stonewall that borders Isaac Frye Highway. He, or maybe she, slowly skirted my new herb garden and walked through our backyard heading to the woods behind the house.
I’ve seen bears in our neighborhood during the day. Although I’ve never witnessed their nocturnal ramblings, I have experienced the results of those late-night excursions. The next morning, I would find the bird feeders on our former deck knocked askew and raided for the seeds inside, even though this meant climbing a steep 14 steps up to the deck to get to them. We later decided to hang the feeders from an overhead bower that supported masses of wisteria above the deck, and that pretty much took care of the bear’s ability to scavenger birdseed. Of course, this meant the squirrels now had a better chance of feasting on our offerings.
It was upon that deck that we had our first experience with a fisher. We spied one of our cats rushing up the back stairs and then leaping from deck to rail to tall plant stand and then to the sloped roof, just out of reach of the fisher that was following closely behind her. When it realized its prey was out of reach, it turned to look at us, sizing us up as a potential meal. This was all done with no sign of any fear whatsoever; then it turned slowly and climbed back down the stairs.
At our former house, winters always meant our yard would be periodically filled with a small herd of deer that came to feed off the spruce that grew along the stone wall demarcating the edge of the valley below. I always found it picture-perfect when they appeared during a snowfall. I would be mesmerized by the scene as I viewed them from my art studio windows. Sometimes winter cardinals would appear at the same time, giving a splash of red to the color-muted, peaceful world outside.
I’ve followed weasel tracks on nearby trails, found a moose trail that was clearly visible as it wandered along a neighbor’s field and startled nesting turkeys while walking on other paths, not to mention the ones that often congregate on the lawn in front of Andy’s Summer Playhouse during the off-season.
I’ve seen more than one bobcat roaming neighborhood roads, and am no stranger to the foxes that scurry across Isaac Frye Highway. Recently, rabbits have made a comeback, and one has taken up residence in the bushes outside our garage. One December evening, I took down an eight-point buck on Route 101 across from Monadnock Springs Water, with my Honda CRV. As I sat there crying, my compassionate husband said, “Shotgun shells would be far more efficient and a lot cheaper.”
I recently watched a large hawk swoop across our front yard and grab a small finch from a branch on the maple tree in front of me. I’d been watching a cardinal on our front lawn, and the finch had just landed on a branch above and behind him. It happened so suddenly. All I had left as a reminder was that empty branch.
Almost daily, for the past few weeks, sometime between 5:30 and 7:30 p.m., we’ve had a visitor saunter down our driveway. I thought I knew raccoons. They’re cuddly-looking, scurrying jokesters who weigh somewhere between 10 and 20 pounds, or so I thought. But the one that slowly lumbers down our drive must be nearly three feet long and weighs something close to the weight of a mid-sized dog. His hump is pronounced, his tail a bushy, ringed glory, and his sturdy legs don’t move any faster than seems necessary, which isn’t very fast.
In the time it takes him to move maybe 30 feet, I can walk downstairs, move through a hall and several rooms to our foyer, through the garage and out to the drive and not be far behind him while he heads to the woods behind the house. I always first see him from the window near my computer. I’ll try to have my camera near me ready for the next time I see him passing.
Although I’ve never witnessed, but regularly hear the coyotes and their kits that live in the valleys and woods around Wilton Center, there is one other animal I have witnessed, but hesitate to broadcast. Three or so years ago, as I was walking our late dog, Maxwell, on Burns Hill Road one early evening, a large cat slowly crossed the road about 40 feet in front of us from the fire pond to the woods on the other side.
Many people I told said it must have been a bobcat, but I grew up in the West and know what a cougar looks like, and this was no bobcat. His long, single-colored tail, about as long as his body, was the feature that first gave me unease, followed by his feline head with no ruffs. He had the color and minimally the height and 70- to 90-pound weight of a golden Lab, but was not as compact.
After this experience, others in our neighborhood told me about having similar sightings while on the wooded trails on horseback or walking on a road in West Wilton. I’ve seen a photo online of a large bobcat spied on Burns Hill Road, but this was not that cat. That one’s ruff is pronounced, his dark-tipped tail much shorter than the one we encountered, his coat mottled and much less smooth and was nowhere the size of the cat we saw.
I know this is ripe for debate, and with no photograph to confirm what I saw, I only have my memories, but am a little more cautious when traipsing in the woods alone than I used to be