13 March 2011

This morning we awoke to another beautiful day in Paradise! There were a few passing clouds but mostly it was sunny. We captured 11 animals in 28 traps - two recaptures from previous expeditions and nine new individuals. We placed a blue tyvek necklace on a large male to help us identify him in the field.

Brad measuring a mongoose.

Addy and Deidre with an anesthetized mongoose.

Our trail camera recorded HD video clips of three mongoose - we don't know if they were different individuals - visiting the feeding station we established near trap #27. In all cases the animals approached the pile of chicken feet cautiously, nosed around in the pile of chicken feet, selected a foot, and then carried it away. It appears to be a common practice of small carnivores (and maybe large ones as well) to drag food from its source.

This evening Brad, Deidre, and Addy tracked a mongoose up into a tree about five feet off the ground where he disappeared into a hole in the trunk. So, it appears that they do climb trees although I have found no reference in the published literature to this behavior. However, Julian spoke with one local who claimed that he used to tie hot dogs in a tree so the tourists could watch the mongoose come out of a hole in the tree along a branch to get the hot dogs in Cane Bay. Brad and company also managed to capture two small black scorpions that glow green under a black light.

It also appears that mongoose are active at night as demonstrated by the video below captured with a Stealth Cam using IR light.