Ferret Spotlighting In The Aubrey Valley Part 1

Hey Readers!

It's been a long time since my last post and between then and now, I have been pretty busy!  I finished my final year of high school last week and have since focused mainly on my college class and have also been planning to volunteer with the AZGFD.  I found out about a Black-footed Ferret Spotlighting Event that was being hosted by the Game and Fish from March 24-26.  The purpose of the event was to vaccinate ferrets and also to collect new information on wild-born individuals.  The dates didn't coincide with anything my family had going and my Dad was able to get the time off work to be with me! Fully motivated, I whipped up a target list of mammals and owls for the Aubrey Valley and gathered up my gear!

(Warning!  If you are easily disgusted by animal innards, then go no further!)

A clever sign which graced the front door of the AZGFD field house!

Now, here's a little background story...

Black-footed Ferrets are a species of large weasel that used to occupy large swaths of grassland in North America.  They heavily relied upon prairie dogs for food and once ranchers started to exterminate prairie dogs, the ferret populations fractured and experienced a steep decline.  In fact, until 1981, they were thought to be extinct!  That year, a woman from Wyoming found a dead ferret that her dog had killed!  Biologists then discovered a tiny population of Black-footed Ferrets in the area (only a few dozen) and captured all of them to launch an intensive captive breeding program.  That program was successful, and many ferrets have been reintroduced to several states including Arizona.

I developed a sore throat and bad congestion the morning of the day that we were to leave for the trip.  I caught the cold that had been going around the house.  I couldn't back out of the event at such short notice, so I grabbed a few boxes of tissue and braced myself for the long hours and the bitter cold...

 My Dad and I departed for Seligman, AZ from New River at 5pm to arrive by 7:45.  The AZGFD was holding a new volunteers' meeting at their field house in Seligman.  We arrived in plenty of time and completed all of the paperwork and the training workshop.  There were around 15 volunteers crammed into the tiny field house along with one fiesty kitten!

A plethora of posters and charts covered the walls of the field house!

After the hour-long meeting, we drove several miles west to Pica Camp in the Aubrey Valley.  On the shoulder of the highway, the AZGFD had set up a processing trailer where captured ferrets were to be immunized and examined by vets.  It was there that we were given the ferret traps, reflectors, map, and GPS that would be used if a ferret was found.

Excitedly, we drove out to the stretch of road which we were assigned by the biologists!  The road  extended several miles west of Pica Camp.  I used my favorite spotlight (an old Coleman model) to survey the sides of the road.

The sparse landscape that we surveyed.

From what I could see, the landscape didn't consist of much more than open grassland with the occasional yucca.  It wasn't long until I found my first wild animal of the night - a Desert Cottontail. Its eyes gleamed a soft pink color as it hopped around in confusion because of the bright light.  I went
on to see over 20 of these rabbits that night.  There were also a lot of Black-tailed Jackrabbits.  They are a large and lanky rabbit and were definitely created with speed and agility in mind!  The Jackrabbits went crazy every time I shined the spotlight on them.  They would run around in circles and sometimes even crouch down and flatten their big ears against their backs to hide!  Don't worry, I didn't harass them too much!  My highlight of the night was a beautiful Ord's Kangaroo Rat which swiftly scrambled into its burrow beneath a soaptree yucca before any photos could be taken. Of all of Arizona's mammals, the one that I most wanted to see was this species, my first Kangaroo Rat!

My Dad

After Ord's K-Rat, I didn't see much of anything until the early morning.  Then we got a call.  It was Jennifer Cordova, the project coordinator, and she was inviting us back to the processing trailer to meet the first ferret of the night!  My Dad drove quickly back to the trailer and we arrived just after they had finished anesthetizing and immunizing the ferret.  Inside the trailer sat the two biologists in charge and the proud captor of the ferret.  With a degree of reverence, we all watched intently as the ferret began to awaken from the anesthesia.  A few minutes later, another biologist and the volunteer who caught the ferret took the animal away to be released back into the burrow in which it was trapped.  The sad news is that it was the only ferret trapped during the two nights we attended.  Of course, we didn't know that and were destined to spend another harsh night out in the Aubrey Valley!

I avoided the use of flash so I wouldn't stress him.

After the ferret was long-gone, we returned to our previous location and got back in the groove of spotlighting.  Soon after arriving, we spied a flash of emerald green eyeshine in a ravine.  We drove up a little closer but eventually lost it.  I noticed that its head was halfway above ground and my Dad noticed that its eyes were wide apart.  This could only mean that it was an American Badger!  In fact, many people had seen them that same night.  The badger concluded my list of species for the first night.  

We returned to the trailer, exhausted, at 6am to turn in our time sheet.  I noticed two dead badgers in the bed of a warden's truck!  I asked what happened, and the biologist said that the warden had shot the badgers because populations have been too high and also because they have been know to prey upon ferrets.  One of the scientists then proceeded to conduct a full on autopsy on one of the Badgers to collect tissue samples.  Those samples would then be sent to a lab to be checked for Canine Distemper or Plague - two diseases which affect Black-footed Ferrets.

This animal's canine teeth were huge for its size!

Heather, an AZGFD biologist, examines the badger's claws.

Although we didn't find any ferrets that night, we both still thoroughly enjoyed the search.  It was a new experience and most importantly, my first time working with the Arizona Game and Fish Department!  My Dad and I then retreated to our little hotel room in Seligman and collapsed from exhaustion.  It is after then that the next and final chapter of this story will be told!

Godspeed and good birding to you all,

- Joshua Smith