Team Shadows Bobcats, Coyotes in Santa Monicas

In the warm, still morning, a male bobcat is on the move in the Santa Monica Mountains near Thousand Oaks.

No one can see him. Just a few hundred feet away in one of the parking lots of the national recreation area, oblivious day hikers are coating themselves with sunscreen and picking out trailheads.

The tall grass doesn’t even stir as the bobcat slinks through it, hunting for breakfast.

But wildlife biologist Eric York knows where the bobcat is.

He adjusts the frequency on the radio receiver hanging over his shoulder and hoists the wooden handle of a three-pronged antenna aloft. As he swivels it in the air the receiver clicks and clucks at him, making soft, steady little noises.

Somewhere out there in the golden fields of Cheeseboro Canyon, a radio collar around the neck of a 20-pound bobcat is doing its job, sending signals back so York can locate his target.

Since March, York and a team of National Park Service biologists and student volunteers have been tagging and tailing bobcats and coyotes around the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, using radio telemetry to study the movements and habits of the animals.

It’s always been a guessing game in the past, figuring out how many animals roam the great expanse of the mountain range that stretches into Ventura and Los Angeles counties.

But through radio telemetry and photographic tracking, biologists hope to finally determine the actual population of various carnivores, particularly bobcats and coyotes.

More important, they believe this study--a collaborative effort of the National Park Service, UCLA, the University of Massachusetts and the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area--will show what the effects of encroaching development are on the species.

“This research program has been a top priority for the parks because we know if we’re going to lose animals in the Santa Monicas, it is going to be the large carnivores,” said project manager Ray Sauvajot.

As York sets off through the fields, drawn up a hillside by the hum of the receiver, he explains that this cat tends to range in lower Cheeseboro Canyon. The cat doesn’t venture farther west than the Calabasas landfill or south of the park’s boundaries. He hunts in the mornings and the evenings and now, just after 9 a.m., it is almost time for him to curl up under a sage bush and take a lengthy nap.

But before the cat settles down to sleep, York wants a glimpse of him.

With the antenna held out like a magic wand, the biologist crests a hill and spots his quarry.

“There he is,” he says, pointing out a pair of ears visible behind a sage bush. The cat takes off, turning occasionally to stare at the man chasing him. He ambles down to a creek bed, stops again and whisks his stumpy little tail a few times, annoyed by the disturbance. Then he disappears into the scrubby sage and a few crows wheel into the air to complain about his presence.

Most days, York rises well before dawn and accompanies the animals on their hunts. He usually follows them by truck, noting their bearings on a map. The three coyotes he has collared--two females, one male--specialize in suburban snacks.

The coyotes are social, hanging out in packs. Sometimes when York tracks them into developments he can simultaneously hear the radio signal and the collared coyote yelping at a companion. York watches as the coyotes pick a bush--sometimes right next to a house--to sleep in after the sun comes up. Coyotes are unfazed by roadways and he often sees them trotting down sidewalks at dawn, he said.

But bobcats are loners. York and his team have five of the cats collared, three males and two females. In March, one of the males and one of the females spent a day together. York thought they might have been mating, but the female showed no signs of being pregnant.

By January, the team hopes to have 15 of both species collared. Using foot traps that don’t harm the animals, the biologists tranquilize them, weigh them, measure them and attach the collar. In about an hour, the animal shakes off the effects of the drug and goes on its way.

Until some of the cubs and pups being raised now get a little bigger, the team will hold off on trapping more animals.

Sauvajot said the team would also like to study mountain lions, which are more scarce than the bobcats but also live in the Santa Monicas. Hikers and cyclists often mistake the smaller, short-tailed bobcats for the tawny mountain lions, which can be four feet long. An excited cyclist called Sauvajot a few weeks ago to report a “mountain lion cub” in Cheeseboro Canyon. More likely it was one of the collared bobcats, Sauvajot said.

The study, which also uses 50 automatically triggered cameras donated by Canon to keep a photographic record of the animals, is concentrated now in two Ventura County canyons. But eventually the scope will widen to encompass parklands on the southern side of the freeway.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Tracking Wildlife

Animals in the Santa Monica Mountains may soon find themselves unwitting participants in a photographic project designed to monitor their movements. About 50 cameras will be scattered throughout the Santa Monica Mountains Recreation Area.

* Camera: Sits a few feet off the ground in a protective box, camouflaged in mountain vegetation.

* Target animals: Coyotes, bobcats, foxes, badgers and mountain lions.

* Pressure plate: Connected to the camera by a cord. The weight of the animal lured to the plate by bait, scent lure or both releases the camera’s shutter.

Source: Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area