Sunday, March 8, 2009

Animals at the Eno

Today I hiked the Eagle Trail alongside the Eno River from Guess Road towards Roxboro and wanted to share the photos of the animals (and evidence of animals) I encountered. Enjoy!

First, raccoon (?) prints in the infamous Black Meadow Ridge parcel:

Next, a deer that was running in my direction as it was being chased by a dog, and it froze in its tracks when it saw me. Can you spot it below? Hint: it's right in the center!
I'm guessing beavers were here ...
It was Turtle Day -- I must've seen 40, most of which were much quicker than I was and dove into the water at my approach. I guess they were loving the warm weather too!
And the best for last -- a crayfish! It might be the crayfish featured on this Eno T-shirt a few years back. If so, it's the Carolina Ladle Crayfish whose scientific name is Cambarus davidi. It was named for a 16 year old, David Cooper, who first discovered it in Raleigh in 1993.

5 comments:

Durham Bull Pen said...

Beautiful pics. I especially love the colorful crayfish. Thanks for sharing this. :)

Marsosudiro said...

Awesome post. Love the turtle pic and was tickled to read about the recent species discovery.

Steve Jones said...

Thanks to both of you! I was inspired by DBP's post yesterday at the quarry (which I've never been to but now will).

Xan said...

Nice pics. I saw a claw like that at Hyco Lake on Saturday. I guess it was all that remained after some predator had a crayfish snack.

Anonymous said...

That's a Cambarus of the sub genus depressicambarus, instead of the sub-genus cambarus, which davidi belongs to. You can tell by the two rows of bumps on the mesial surface of the palm (side facing inward) of the claw. Its probably a hobbsorum or a reduncus. The color would probably indicate hobbsorum, though the rostrum makes me lean towards reduncus. davidi are usually brown, and drab in color. Awesome picture by the way. Quite the photographer.