Cats and Dogs

The snow kept coming all week last week, blanketing most of Mac Forest. It's the most snow I remember getting since I've lived here. It'll be a few weeks at least before most of the trails and logging roads are clear. Mountain biking is probably out of the question for a while, but the snow didn't stop us from having a good long run Sunday morning.

At one point heading down a long hill I noticed we were following some awfully big tracks. Not knowing one track from another, I first figured they were dog tracks, though they seemed awfully big. And I realized we hadn't seen any human tracks (prior to ours) within a mile or so, so a dog seemed unlikely. So we decided they might be cougar tracks, and stopped to take a few pictures. The tracks were about 4 inches wide, and slightly wider than long. Later research confirms they're too big to be a bobcat or coyote, and any dog print would be longer than wide, so we're pretty sure they were cougar prints. We were glad to see, upon returning the same way later on, that there weren't any fresh cat tracks following our tracks.

My friend constantly worries about Cougars, but honestly I'm more afraid of dogs when I'm running or biking in the forest. Saturday afternoon I was out for run when a pair of good sized dogs came running around the corner, well ahead of their owner. One dog didn't much like the look of me, I guess, and proceeded to bark madly, bare his teeth, and pretty much let me know if I moved an inch he'd bite. I didn't move. Finally the owner caught up, and apologized, sort've, saying "sorry... but he's really very friendly!" Uhhh... no, he's not. Bad, bad owner!