Snow tracks, researchers and storms

I found a really fresh (3-6 hours) snow leopard track in the snow two weeks ago and just had to go get Jenny and Geir to show them. It’s a bit funny, don’t know if it is us Northmen (and women), the hunter instinct or if I am just old-school but I get really, really excited over a snow track. I try to gather as much information about the animal as possible, try to learn why it walks where it does, where it’s heading, try to understand why it makes the choices it do. Strange in a way, I mean we have trap cameras. GPS collars, DNA, the whole lot of advanced technologies. But still, there is something special with a snow track… 

And to be honest, if you want to trap a species, you can learn a lot by tracking it, especially if you try to picture what the animals have done and why.

The morning after Jenny and Geir left one of our traps was tripped. I strapped one of the backpacks to the back of the dirtbike, the blowpipe to the second backpack and tried to kick start the bike. It was quite cold and the bike refused to start at first and since I had my face mask and ski goggles on, the goggles fogged up from my body heat. When I got the bike running I had to take of the goggles to see something but tears started running from the cold wind and immediately froze in my eye lashes. There I was, bouncing around with little control of the bike heavily loaded, with a stupid Euro disco song in my headphones (I listen to my MP3 player to focus for the capture) when I come to think of an image of Gary Larson’s scientist and start laughing out loud. You know, the guys with white lab coats, hair in disorder and glasses way thicker than their biceps. Even though I am a researcher, I think that my appearance is as far from that guy as possibly can be. Though I am not sure which person that is the most amusing…

Yesterday I got a couple of emails from Bayara in UB saying that there is a really bad storm coming and that the authorities in South Gobi do not allow people to travel out of the villages. But Miji and Bo got a permission to leave Dalandzadgad. Well, if there is anyone who will make it through a storm in the Gobi that I know of I reckon that it is Bo. He is a super nice man and a typical biologist in many ways, specialized in conservation, butterflies and birds. He is also the only person I know who has fixed a gear box on a 4wd car with a Leatherman. That was the second time I was working for him in Kenya and our car broke down a couple of hours before our flight from Maasai Mara to Nairobi departed. Man, I’m happy if I’m able to figure out how to get the scissors out on the Leatherman, I have never really considered trying to fix something with it.

All 11 cameras are out. Yes, we have 11 again. Kim The one that Longtail tried to kill when we caught him has been repaired again. I will move two of the cameras but need to do some more fine-scale scouting of the area before I decide where to put them. I think that the new area looks very promising and I have snow tracks of two leopards in it!! I can’t say if it is two separate occasions or a pair of leopards and the snow is too patchy to get a good estimate of paw size. Still, it’s a good sign. Today was the first spring day, with 7 degrees above zero as the warmest record for 2009!