Scratchings-and-Sniffings

Posted: 01 Oct 2009 08:35 AM PDT

I went on a three day bike trip with bunch of my crazy friends and one cool dog over the weekend. We rode about 250 miles through some of the prettiest country in both Arizona and New Mexico. The dog; Mabel, rode in the support truck with my buddy Jeff while Merriam, Mabel's mom, shared in the agony and ecstasy of the ride.

On the first night we were all sitting around the camp fire telling lies... I mean stories, when Mabel went kind of nuts and ran off into the trees. Mabel-the-dog

Our initial reaction was skunk and we went off to try to prevent one of those encounters. It's bad enough being around a bunch of smelly cyclists let alone a skunked dog.

Mabel was doing her best imitation of a coon hound at the base of a tree which got us all scouring the branches above to see what she had cornered.Well, up in the tree was one of the strangest critters I'd ever seen. I'd heard of Coatimundi's but I'd never seen one. If you can imagine a cross between a raccoon and a monkey, you'll get the picture.

The Coati is a member of the raccoon family and is native to only a small portion of the US. In fact only the Southwestern portions of NM and AZ along with SW Texas are home to Coatis. That's one of the cool things about living here in SW, NM. We are in a transition zone between different climates and ecosystems.

To our south is the Chihuahaun desert and to the north are the mountains. We share plants and animals that would be found in both Central America and the Northern Rockies.

While we only saw one, they often travel in large groups and can be very noisy when disturbed. They eat almost anything, including anything a roving troop of cyclists leave unattended, as we discovered. They have a reddish mask and a white nose making them look like bandits. They have long tails with rings on them and they can get up to 18 pounds making them the size of a large house cat with a very long tail.

They are not to be confused with Ring tailed cats. These raccoon relatives are much smaller, have a bigger range and tiny ears.

So, thanks to Mabel for treeing my first Coati. Without her I would not have seen this strange and wonderful creature.