The call came just a little after lunch. A woman concerned about a red fox that had been hanging around her neighborhood.

But the fox seems to be okay. No listlessness, or droopy ears that would suggest it was sick, and a concern for people or pets.

It just isn't afraid of people. Shows a kind of disdain for what humans do around it.

Like a cat.

So, probably no need for concern. But it might be best to let the dog bark at the thing when it gets close, just to keep it from getting too comfortable in civilization.

Throughout this conversation, the fact that this woman, and her neighborhood's fox, aren't even in my state did not come up.

So, I finished tallying up the numbers on the map I used in the first antelope count.

Two thousand, five hundred and eleven antelope.

Which is 1,727 fewer antelope than the pilot and I found in the same area three years ago. Knew there should be a decrease in numbers, because the fawn crops have been lousy. But this was more than what I expected.

Now, part of the difference has to be due to the different counting conditions. Three years ago, we had a wetter spring and green vegetation everywhere. Which makes antelope easy to spot. Not to mention, we actually got to fly in May, as we had hoped, when the antelope are still mostly in small groups.

Again, easier to spot and count.

This year, the country was green in April, and already turning brown by the third week of May. By the first of June, when we got most of the count done, a lot of basins and rocky hillsides were already brown.

Not to mention, we flew right at the peak of fawning, so a lot of does were off bedded down by themselves, giving birth or waiting to do so, and much harder to spot.

So yeah, I'm sure counting success was down. But still, we obviously got fewer antelope than we used to.

So, I then went through all the calculations to revise my estimate of herd size, and updated the herd database. And printed out the pages for the annual report that had been waiting for this count data.

That's when I saw it.

Entered automatically by the software.

Today's date.

16 June.

Awww crap. And I had the perfect opportunity to mention it when she called about the fox in her neighborhood. And I missed it.

So, Hi Sis.

Happy Birthday!