The possibility of Lake Elsman

Yesterday, while Mary Ann stopped by Elaine's house to pick up posters and supplies we talked about where Raven might be now. Mary Ann's theory was that she may have gone further south down towards Lake Elsman which is the first reservoir on Los Gatos creek, Lexington being the second. This made some sense to us, as Raven has to our knowledge not really left the creek system for very long and has generally made her way south in the six weeks she has been missing. We have no sightings for two weeks now, the last being over at the Lexington Elementary school, and while it is still perfectly possible that our girl is in the basin there or nearby, it is also possible she has migrated again. and if she was to migrate, south seems like the most likely possibility given that it is consistent with what she has done in the past. So we set out to look for Lake Elsman.

Basically we learned this - you can't get to Lake Elsman. The whole thing is on San Jose Water Company land and the only entrance is gated. We put posters on the gate hoping to alert the Water Company employees that Raven may be in the area.

We also learned that there are roads that you can take from Lexington Reservoir over to the Lake Elsman area if you are a dog. If you are a person you take Aldercroft Heights south from the southern base of Lexington Reservoir and it gets narrower and narrower and ultimately dead ends along the creek a few miles south. At the dead end is San Jose Water Company land and there is a gate and a dirt road that continues south behind the gate. So we cannot go there, but a dog certainly could. We figure the dirt road opens up again at the base of Wright Station road (off Morill, off Summit Rd) and then more or less dumps you back into Water Company land again. So it would not necessarily be bushwacking for Raven to go further south. Food might be a problem, but if she is hunting, maybe not.

If she has gone south via this route, there's hardly anyone there at all so there would be even fewer people available to see her and let us know. Nothing we can do about that if that is the case, except try to reach those few people who frequent that direction.

On Monday I will call the Water Company and try to alert them to the fact that my dog may be on their land. It would be good for their field crews to be aware of the possibility anyway.