Sierra Mountain Times

Story by Thomas Atkins and photos courtesy of CSERC

An exotic looking ringtail found within the mid-elevations of the Stanislaus National Forest. 

The Stanislaus National Forest contains some of the most wild and beautiful terrain in the state and provides homes for an abundance of wildlife within its spacious 900,000-acre span. Yet unfortunately, over time, some of the species that were once common to this vast and diverse region have become extremely rare or have disappeared from this forest paradise. The Sierra Nevada red fox, the wolverine and the fisher are three of these animals native to this area that haven’t been detected in the Stanislaus National Forest in decades (although people do report sightings from time to time). In hopes of discovering that these elusive animals still exist in this area, Central Sierra Environmental Resource Center (CSERC) biologists have been faithfully heading to the hills to try and document these rare forest furbearers. In fact, for the last eleven years various CSERC biologists have maintained camera detection wildlife stations within the Stanislaus National Forest in search of these carnivores. And although dozens and dozens of rolls of film have been developed, there has been no photographic evidence of these three missing mammals. So the search continues.

Surprisingly, the grey fox is an excellent tree climber.

“A few weeks ago the Forest Service stated that there are no more fishers left in the Stanislaus National Forest,” said John Buckley, Executive Director of CSERC, a local non-profit conservation group based out of Twain Harte. “That is a bold statement because so much of the forest really hasn’t been looked at and carefully examined. There are thousands of acres of forest out there!”

A bobcat climbing toward the bait.

With this optimistic outlook, John, along with CSERC biologist Brenda Whited (CSERC’s only other full time employee), continue to maintain the two to four wildlife stations they have constantly set up within the forest.

“Our main goal is to get information about rare furbearers to share with the Department of Fish and Game and the Forest Service and let them know where good sightings are, and at the same time we can warn them about potential effects of certain projects taking place,” said John, who has worked for CSERC since its inception in 1990. “So far there has been no fisher, red fox or wolverines that have been attracted to the cameras. Those are the three species that are native here and should be out there in the forest. It’s an example of the changes that we have made to the forest, and those species have either been extirpated or they are in such low numbers that they don’t randomly come to the bait that we have set up in a particular acre in the midst of those thousands of acres. Some of them, like the fisher, have what they call large home range areas, and it may have two or three thousand acres that it goes across. It may take a month or weeks to go through that, so if you put the bait over in a corner and it doesn’t happen to come through that area – even if it happens to have that as its home range – it still might not stumble across it during the month we have it out there.”

A black bear attracted to the chicken.

Yet, although the fisher and its elusive partners have failed to make their appearance, there have been plenty of other curious wildlife captured by the cameras – including extraordinary images of animals that most people will never get a chance to see in real life, such as an American marten, a spotted skunk, a flying squirrel, a mountain lion or a ringtail. Although I spend as much time as I can in the forest, so far I have never had the pleasure of witnessing any of these animals. However, I was able to browse through photo albums full of hundreds of pictures of these fascinating creatures in the CSERC office in the Twain Harte shopping center.

Just this year alone, CSERC has captured pictures of grey squirrels, mice, Stellar ’s jays, spotted skunks, martens, coyotes, black bears, grey fox, flying squirrels, ravens, ringtails, deer, chipmunks, bobcats and raccoons – and in previous years they have even had the elusive mountain lion visit the stations. Sorry…still no Big Foot – although there have been several pictures taken of unaware hunters wandering through the forest. However, out of all these images, it is the pictures of the American marten that brings the most excitement to the CSERC crew.

The elusive American marten guards its bait.

“Getting a marten is very valuable because it means that the Forest Service will potentially designate a furbearer territory around that detection,” said Brenda, who has been working for CSERC for a little over a year. “Once we detect one, we will submit that information to the Forest Service and it is at their discretion what they will do. But having that furbearer territory is great, because it means that the Forest Service may maintain a higher percent of canopy cover and will leave up 50 percent of the trees instead of 40 percent when they do their logging treatment in the area.”

However, John hopes that someday the martens will receive more protection.

“These furbearer territories so far have had very general restrictions, they haven’t yet led to strong, clear protection,” he said. “But as long as we just show there is a marten out there, it is more difficult for them to be aggressive – although they can still do a lot of disturbance in the area.”

Thankfully, the wildlife stations provide irrefutable proof of CSERC’s discoveries.

“The great thing about what we do with this is that it’s not just us saying we saw a marten out there,” said John. “We have a photo of the marten and the tree. Every tree is slightly different and every set up is different, so if they ever have any doubts we could walk out there and show them. If they ever wanted to, they could go to the exact spot! We have the photos. We have the proof.”

The beautiful spotted skunk.

A few weeks ago I had the privilege to see how these proof-producing photos come into existence, when I joined Brenda on one of her weekly excursions into the forest to check on one of the wildlife stations.

Heading up Highway 108 into the high country, we parked near the border of the Carson Iceberg Wilderness, where I followed Brenda to the banks of the peaceful flowing Clarks Fork River. Crossing a fallen log we made our way up the steep slope on the opposite side of the canyon, following sticks Brenda had placed along the way to lead her in the direction of the hidden wildlife station.

“The stations in this area were actually set up in part because we received a phone call from a guy who was convinced he saw a wolverine in this section of forest,” said Brenda, as we continued up the pine needle covered slope. “But this area also contains undisturbed, older growth forest which is good habitat to find the species that we are looking for.”

We eventually reached the station where I witnessed the bait used to attract these elusive carnivores. Hanging about six feet up from the base of a towering pine tree was a raw chicken and an open can of cat food. Attached to a tree opposite of the bait was a motion sensor camera that would detect movement of animals going after the bait and snap a picture. While I dismantled the camera station and put in a new roll of film, Brenda refilled the cat food can (which had been licked clean). It was surprising that she didn’t have to replace the chicken as well, considering that last week’s roll of film from the station contained several pictures of black bears climbing around the bait.

CSERC biologist Brenda Whited attaching bait at a wildlife station.

“Most of the time when a bear visits a site the chicken is gone, no matter how rotten it is,” said Brenda. “So this is kind of strange.”

But bears are known to do strange things from time to time, and an intact chicken is better than a broken camera, which Brenda said they have done on a few occasions.

“Sometimes the noise and the light from the flash kind of bugs them so they check out the cameras,” she said. “The spring time is the worst time to have stations up because the bears are just coming out of hibernation and they are mean. They eat all the food and then in their angry hunger, they tear the station to pieces. You are supposed to be really careful with scent around stations, but there is only so much you can do.”

Before we left the site, Brenda added a different aroma to the forest by rubbing lanolin mixed with gusto (extracted skunk glands) on the bait tree and surrounding trees to send off an attractive scent to animals in the area.

“The lanolin helps the gusto stick the tree and sends a very strong scent,” she said. “It’s really smelly stuff, but it definitely attracts animals.”

On our hike back to the car Brenda explained the protocol for the stations.

“We operate these stations under a memorandum of understanding with the Forest Service and we follow a certain protocol that they follow, which is to help determine the presence or maybe absence of animals in an area,” said Brenda. “To do this you are supposed to put two stations up in a four square mile area at least a half mile apart and they are to be checked once a week and kept up for a minimum of thirty days.”

Although the Forest Service also has cameras up, CSERC’s objectives are a little different.

“The Forest Service does more of a full area sweep of the forest and wants to check every section of the forest while we tend to focus more on the better parts of the forest. We are really focused on detecting and protecting the rare wildlife species.”

Returning to the CSERC office after the refreshing outing, I discovered that protecting rare wildlife species is just one aspect of CSERC’s many missions.

“We work on the broad range of conservation issues – everything from water to wildlife to air quality to forest and wild places,” said John. “That is really the thing that sets us apart. Some groups focus on one section of an area, and we work on 40 to 50 to 60 different things. And we do the best we can with what we have.”

Because of their hard work and dedication, CSERC has effectively served as the foremost defender of more than 2,000,000 acres of forests, rivers, lakes, wetlands, roadless areas, old growth groves, scenic oak woodlands, and other precious areas within the central region of the Sierra Nevada. Hopefully with the continued support and protection of our wonderful national forest the red fox, fisher and wolverine will some day return to their long, lost home. Be on the lookout!

For more wildlife pictures and information on CSERC, visit www.cserc.org.