The winter crew arrived at squirrel camp on March 2: Claire, Josiane, Emily, Kyle, Jamie, Sara and myself. For most of the crew it was the end of two and half days of driving from Edmonton, while for Emily and I it marked the end of a full week of driving from Guelph. By far the best part of the drive was from Fort Nelson, BC to Whitehorse, YT, where we saw a lot of wildlife: moose, caribou, bison, a couple foxes, and an owl.

The snow is surprisingly deep around camp and on the grids. Most camp chores seem to involve shoveling snow, and it keeps snowing! On the positive side, the snow has made for some great sledding! During the peanut butter addition to the food experiment grids it seemed as if we were wading through snow. Even with snowshoes on we were sometimes up to our waists in the fluffy white stuff. There have been quite a few grouse sightings on the grids, and lots of lynx and moose tracks.

The new crew started their squirrel trapping and handling training after the peanut butter addition was completed. Training went well and now the new crew have been assigned to their own respective grids. Temperatures have been pretty cold lately, around -20C in the mornings, and warming up to around -15C during the day. There have been no nests yet, and only a handful of females caught so far are pregnant. This is quite the change from last year where we were finding squirrel pups in the buckets during the peanut butter addition in March.

Julia S.