Wildlife & Nature Guide
Wildlife
Some mornings the deer beat you awake. Rabbits move quick through the grass. Turkeys wander slow beneath the pines. Hawks circle high once the air starts to warm.
The ranch is home to an abundance of Colorado wildlife and the kind of quiet you only find deep in the mountains. Meadows, timber, a stream and high ground shaped long before any fences went up. There are tracks everywhere if you slow down enough to notice them… coyote, mountain lion, bobcat, bear. Most you’ll never see. That’s part of it. Spring brings green hillsides and wildflowers. Summer stays cool after dark. Aspens turn gold come fall. Winter gets quiet. Whether walking the 505, or sitting still in the Road House long enough to hear the wind move through the trees, the ranch has a way of reminding you this land still belongs to the wildlife first.
Not much traffic up here. Mostly wildlife.
Black Bear
the ranch’s namesake and its most quietly famous resident. Black bears move up from the canyon in early summer after hibernation and again in the long golden weeks before first snow, nosing through wild raspberries and oak brush, flipping deadwood for grubs. you’re more likely to find a paw print in the soft dirt along our trails than to lay eyes on one — and that’s the way they prefer it. the ones we’ve seen around the ranch are cinnamon bears, reflecting an orange-brown coat rather. than a pure black coat. regardless of color, it’s always a good idea to carry along your bear spray when hiking around the ranch.
Mountain Lion
The ghost of these hills. Lions are out there — the deer numbers say so, and now and then a track shows up along a sandy wash — but actually seeing one is a lottery ticket most folks never cash. They hunt at dusk and dawn, follow the deer, and give people a wide berth. Hike with company, keep small kids and dogs close near the brushy draws, and trust that the cat saw you long before you’d ever see it.
Bobcat
The lion’s smaller, scrappier cousin. Bobcats slip through the piñon and scrub like rumors — short tail, tufted ears, the size of a stout farm dog. They favor the rocky breaks above the creek and the brush piles along old fence lines, hunting cottontail and ground squirrel. Catch one in the headlights some night and you’ll remember it.
Wild Turkey
Loud, bossy, and unbothered. Flocks of Merriam’s turkeys work the meadows and oak draws in noisy little parades, gobbling at sunrise and roosting high in the ponderosas at dusk. Spring toms strut full-fan in the open parks; summer hens lead lines of poults single-file across the two-tracks. They are, frankly, hard to miss.
Red Tail Hawk
The voice of the open sky above the ranch. That long, rasping cry you hear when the canyon goes still — that’s a red-tail riding the thermal up the south face. Watch for the brick-red tail flashing in the afternoon light as they hunt the meadow edges for ground squirrel and rabbit. Reliable company on every trail.
Mountain Cottontail
Our mountain cottontails are smaller and have shorter ears than snowshoe hares and jackrabbits, and they don’t change color in the winter. You’ll see them at the edges of the lawn at first light and last, freezing stone-still when they think you’ve spotted them. Tracks in fresh snow tell you who’s been making the rounds overnight.
Mule Deer
The neighbors. Big-eared and unhurried, mule deer drift through the pastures and across the access roads in small bands — does and fawns most of the year, bucks keeping their own counsel until the fall rut puts them on the move. They’ll let you walk surprisingly close before that springy four-footed bounce — a “stot” — carries them up the slope and out of sight.
Coyote
The soundtrack. You may go a whole stay without seeing one, but you will hear them — that wild, layered chorus that opens up after dark and answers itself across the canyon. Singles trot the ranch roads in the early morning, all business, scanning the meadows for voles. Smart, adaptable, and very much at home here.
Fox
A flash of rust at the edge of the trees. Red foxes work the meadow margins at dawn and dusk, hunting mice with that high, stiff-legged pounce that looks half-cat, half-rocking horse. Keep an eye out along the creek bottom in winter — fresh fox tracks lay down a tidy straight line in the snow, like someone walked through with a dotted ruler.
