Post by FWS on Jun 25, 2014 16:29:29 GMT -6
On a Bronx Street, a Long-Absent Weasel Returns to the City
By ANDY NEWMAN
New York Times
June 25, 2014
A fisher walks the streets of the Bronx.Derek LenartA fisher walks the streets of the Bronx.
An unfamiliar creature is slinking through the streets of the Bronx.
It’s called a fisher, an oversized member of the weasel family, and according to a zoologist who has been tracking fishers for years, it is the first one seen in New York City in modern times.
Fishers are black and lushly furry; the males can weigh up to 13 pounds. They were hunted and trapped to extirpation in the city hundreds of years ago.
At dawn on April 15, a city police officer, Derek Lenart, was on patrol near Bronx Community College in University Heights when when he saw an animal dart in front of him on the road and run beneath parked cars.
Before it disappeared up a driveway and into a backyard, Officer Lenart snapped a picture. The zoologist, Roland Kays, who wrote a series for The Times about his work with fishers near Albany, identified it from the photo.
People have nothing to fear from fishers, but rats and squirrels do: They are keen predators and agile climbers. (Fishers are also widely reputed to kill cats. Dr. Kays is skeptical about this, but federal wildlife officials concluded that they at least kill lynxes — see page 10 of this report.)
Dr. Kays told the story of the Bronx fisher in a blog post for the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, his current employer.
He writes:
This fisher was probably looking for a place to hide for the day, either down a hole or up a big tree. Judging from the picture this a male fisher, likely a dispersing animal looking for a female and a new place to settle down. If he can find a place to sleep and something to eat he might stick around. Bronx squirrels would make good fisher prey, but things could get really interesting if fishers start hunting rats in New York.
By ANDY NEWMAN
New York Times
June 25, 2014
A fisher walks the streets of the Bronx.Derek LenartA fisher walks the streets of the Bronx.
An unfamiliar creature is slinking through the streets of the Bronx.
It’s called a fisher, an oversized member of the weasel family, and according to a zoologist who has been tracking fishers for years, it is the first one seen in New York City in modern times.
Fishers are black and lushly furry; the males can weigh up to 13 pounds. They were hunted and trapped to extirpation in the city hundreds of years ago.
At dawn on April 15, a city police officer, Derek Lenart, was on patrol near Bronx Community College in University Heights when when he saw an animal dart in front of him on the road and run beneath parked cars.
Before it disappeared up a driveway and into a backyard, Officer Lenart snapped a picture. The zoologist, Roland Kays, who wrote a series for The Times about his work with fishers near Albany, identified it from the photo.
People have nothing to fear from fishers, but rats and squirrels do: They are keen predators and agile climbers. (Fishers are also widely reputed to kill cats. Dr. Kays is skeptical about this, but federal wildlife officials concluded that they at least kill lynxes — see page 10 of this report.)
Dr. Kays told the story of the Bronx fisher in a blog post for the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, his current employer.
He writes:
This fisher was probably looking for a place to hide for the day, either down a hole or up a big tree. Judging from the picture this a male fisher, likely a dispersing animal looking for a female and a new place to settle down. If he can find a place to sleep and something to eat he might stick around. Bronx squirrels would make good fisher prey, but things could get really interesting if fishers start hunting rats in New York.