Animal Sightings

Well, it'd be hard to feed 'em at a park since they're nectar eaters, but it's pretty easy to get 'em with a nectar feeder or a garden with a lot of flowers in it. My parents' house has a big patch of beebalm in the front yard which gets staked out by a Ruby-throat most summers.

 

My parents put up feeders for them (they live in WA and get rufous and Anna's hummingbirds) and so all summer is just Hummingbird Fight Club. They'll fight each other, they'll fight you, they'll sit on the deer fencing and keep everyone away from the feeders, they'll fight the bumblebees that try to go to the feeders, they'll fight the dragonflies.....

 

The closest I've been to hummingbirds is hawk/sphinx moths, which have a collective local name of 'hummingbird moths' :P

 

I love those moths! My parents got a summer lilac in the garden and it's always covered in them!

 

The five-spots love the four o'clocks out front, on any given evening between june and september you can find 'em swarming, it's gr8
(unless you are a Heathen who Dislikes the Lorge Moth Friends)

 

I love a big moth

 

Ooh I'll go dig up the pic of the Lorge Cecropia(?) Moth we got in like 2006 or something

It hung out near our porch light for several days, being stylish

 

Every time I drive a certain friend somewhere, I see a fox on the way home. In different places, sometimes-- closer to her house half an hour away, or just before the turn into my driveway, or various points between-- but there's always a fox Somewhere.

Tonight they were crossing from the veterinary hospital to the pasture across the road. Yay? Hello to you too, fellow late-night traveller.

 

Black-headed grosbeak at the birbfeeder this morning :> I've been seeing So Many Birbs lately but didn't get pics of any

Spoiler: lorge birb pic

 

Spoiler

Snail!

 

Other recent birb highlights include two burrowing owls (!!!), a Lewis's woodpecker, so many kinds of ducks, several kinds of warblers, eared grebes, a black-crowned night heron, a bittern, black-necked stilts, American avocets, a bunch of hawks, great horned owls (including adorably awkward adolescent owlets!), sandhill cranes,long-billed curlews, willets, JUST SO MANY BIRBS OK (these were all at the nearby marsh or at the Malheur wildlife refuge)

 

I was gonna ask if you lived next to a swamp or something.

 

I'm taking an ornithology course and we have weekly trips to the marsh (and the weekend trip to Malheur)! :>
OH and I forgot to mention the lazuli bunting!

 

Lucky!

 

A few days ago my bf and I were walking to our flat from the car park, which is below the apartment complex. There was a fox sat next to the bin area. It looked like it wasn't fully grown, but it wasn't a baby. It seemed to have no fear of humans. It was just sat there, ears pricked, watching us. We walked by slowly, with the fox about 8 feet away from us. It watched us go by, calm as you please. I felt quite honoured that it didn't immediately flee.

Also, we've had our bedroom window open for the past few days because it's been getting warmer. The other night, around 3am, I swear I heard a bunch of bats fly past. There was a weird chittering noise, and the sound of small wings beating wildly, and then it was gone.

 

spotted at the Lufkin zoo today:

Spoiler: hippo booty

Spoiler: lemme smash

Go away, Ron.

 

So we've had some blackbird babies visiting our garden lately!

Spoiler: birbs

Snoozy baby!


A tasty mealworm feast!

Also a bonus borb

Also saw my first cockchafer of the year last night!

Spoiler: literally my favourite bugs of all time

She was stuck in the greenhouse so we rescued her and gave her a drink of water. (Also I learned that you can tell whether they're male or female by the size and number of their antenna fronds??? Which is just. super cute to me?? help I love these bugs so much)

 

I SAW A BB BLACKBIRD A FEW DAYS AGO TOO :D I love them, they look so grumpy.

Also I've seen a dunnock making (her?) nest in our hedge. She is very studious and I wish her the best on her motherhood adventure XD

 

Queen bumblebee!! Think she's probably trying to find a good nest site, it's the right time of year.



Eta: didn't realize you can hear my dumb voice, haha

 

Not my sighting, but the talk about hummingbirds reminded me of this video: