Felidae Conservation Fund uses research to advocate for the conservation of bobcats and Mountain Lions in the Bay Area. I volunteer one day a month to hike up the mountain and retrieve data cards from remote field cameras, and replenish batteries.
Infrared Cameras are able to capture images of wildlife at night, and provide opportunity to identify individuals from their unique spot patterns. That's right, individuals all have unique patterns so scientists are able to tell them apart.
Only in the past 5 years have we seen a huge push in the scientific community to set up, and monitor, hundreds of trail cameras to better understand the wildlife distribution on Mount Tamalpias. With cameras becoming more affordable and a huge fleet of volunteers scanning images we can find valuable information to help direct conservation efforts.
One Tam published some findings, after just a couple years of monitoring cameras, that showed trails with regulations that allowed dogs had significant decrease in wild animal traffic. As a dog lover, I see this as a good reminder as to why not all trails are open for me a my little partners use.
