As a backyard naturalist, it’s the kind of thing you dream about.
You set up your trail cameras, experiment with locations, change the batteries and clear the memory cards. You spend months and years scrolling through thousands of photos. Mostly it’s wind or falling snow or deer. Occasionally you get a big creature like a bear or cougar to keep the addiction going.
But what you’re really hoping for is a glimpse at something extraordinary, something rare, or even something endangered.
Today was our huge payoff
Looking over this weekend’s footage a surprising creature made an appearance: a fisher.
When Jeff saw the shots he literally screamed with joy. Admittedly, on a small screen it looked like a wolverine, but still, a fisher is almost as cool for a number of reasons.
In Washington State fishers were wiped out by the mid 1900’s due to trapping for their lush pelts. The state has been working to reintroduce them, and there’s been much publicity around their reintroduction in the Olympic NP (2008-2010), North Cascade NP (2018) and near Mt. Rainier in the South Cascades (2015).
Our sighting is notable because it’s living proof that fishers have extended their range to the Central Cascades. These photos were taken near Plain, WA – which is about halfway between the North and South rehab areas.
And this critter looks very LARGE and healthy. Adults can weigh up to 25 pounds. This one looks pretty close to that.
These photos have been shared with biologists at the WA Department of Fish and Wildlife who’ve told us that 26 fishers were released this winter more than 45 miles away, and this one may be part of that group covering that distance in mere months. State officials are conducting flights to monitor the released fishers (they have sub-dermal radio transmitters) and sightings like this can help focus flight time to areas where fishers have been visually detected.
You can see the white blaze on the fisher’s belly in this shot
Stride length and print size
Fishers are awesome creatures. A few fun facts: 1. They’re a member of the weasel family and relatives of wolverines, otters and mink. 2. Contrary to their name, they don’t eat fish, but dine on small animals like snowshoe hare and squirrels (lots of those around here) 3. They are one of the few animals that can take down a porcupine (with a death blow to the head) 4. They are endangered in Washington State and being considered for protection nationally 5. They hunt on both the ground and among the trees (here’s a cool video of a fisher chasing a squirrel in a tree).
Oh, and we also caught this bobcat nearby on the same day. Pretty exciting, but given our gold strike with the fisher, it was simply icing on the cake.
