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Unidentified Droppings... what creature?

16 years ago

For the past week or so, some critter has been leaving these droppings on our gravel driveway. I've researched the 'net for hours but cannot figure out what type of animal is lurking about. The one definitive answer I found was that mammal scat does not have this kind of white cap. I'm concerned for our cats if it turns out to be some sort of predator.

I've uploaded a picture to my web site.

Any info or ideas would be much appreciated.

Thank you,

Helen

Here is a link that might be useful: {{!gwi}}

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Comments (7)

suzq_07
16 years ago
Could be an owl. Where do you live?
chuckr30
16 years ago
It does look birdlike, and a nocturnal bird it sounds like. Birds often have white stuff in their feces as they don't have a separate urethra. Their kidneys empty right into their colon. I've seen one type of owl droppings and they are round, like deer, not textured, like this.

Do a search on Google images for "owl droppings", "owl pellets" or "owl scat" and see what you find.
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chuckr30
16 years ago
Wow. I actually found they make guides to animal droppings. Here's are a few links.

Here is a link that might be useful: Google images search
tdhall56
16 years ago
HI, I found a book called Bird Tracks & Signs and on Google books you can read parts of it. I think I am going to order a copy. Anyway, one thing I read was that "pileated woodpeckers leave tubes of carpenter ants dipped in white at one end", often found at the base of trees beneath excavations with wood chips on the ground. Counldn't tell from your picture what kind of food this critter had been eating. The tube appearance and white on the end sounded like your picture and a pileated woodpecker seems large enough to make a dropping the size those you found.
tdhall56
16 years ago
Check out the post on this forum with the subject "Big ol black bird eating my trees" It is a picture of a pileated woodpecker in the poster's tree. Maybe you could write them and see if they have similar droppings under that tree.
ravenlady
12 years ago
I would love to find out what kind of droppings these are....looked at the picture and the one I found next to our birdfeeder is exactly like the picture--with the white cap and everything......please, info!
suzq_07
12 years ago
You are correct that this is not mammal scat. Birds excrete urine and feces at the same time. The urea is what produces the white cap. Scats of predatory birds contain hair and bone fragments, which your picures don't indicate. If these are not concentrated under or around trees and you haven't found hair tufts or pieces of animal remains in the are of the scat, it is highly unlikely that these scat are from any type of raptor. Although I'm not sure where you live, I'm fairly certain these are wild turkey scat.

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