Open to All

I recently bought a hanging birdbath which I placed near some of my seed feeders outside my kitchen window. I wasn't sure if the birds would take to it but it seemed to meet with their approval rather quickly and has now become the avian equivalent of the water cooler.

One morning I looked out to see the birdbath was a lot fuller than usual but considerably less crowded..................

Happy Halloween

Here are this years selection for the Halloween theme. Of course, you know me, I don't think any of these beauties are scary or spooky. The only species I find to be the stuff of nightmares are homo sapiens and thankfully there aren't any of those in my yard (yours truly excepted, and hubby too!) 

What a Little Cutie

You know it is going to be a good day when you open the bedroom curtains and are greeted by this beautiful little face peeping back at you. What could be sweeter than a handsome Black-throated Sparrow wishing you good morning?

I am Not Looking at You So You Can't See Me.

Our Rock Squirrels are notoriously shy. This one was clearly not happy when I spotted it so it worked on the policy of 'if I ignore it, it will go away.' Which of course, I did, eventually, after taking some photos. 

Popping in for Lunch

This Black-headed Grosbeak has become a regular around the feeders but it prefers to wait underneath for food to fall.

Head to Tail

A couple of shots from our recent 'snake in a cage' visitor. 

Ears

Not much comment needed for this little beauty, the ears say it all.

Nelson

We have a resident Sonoran Desert Toad in our back yard. During the heat of the day he hunkers down in the shade, under the agaves.

And then at night, after the monsoon rains have passed through he comes out to hunt. If we are eating supper on the patio he often comes out to see what we are doing. He is very appreciative when we put the outside lights on as all he has to do is sit and wait for the bugs to be drawn in by the light.

However our backyard buddy has obviously been through at least one battle in his past. His left eye is quite a mess.

Judging by his girth, this is not limiting his ability to hunt and the wound is obviously old. Inevitably, he has become known as Nelson but thankfully he isn't missing an arm as well!

The Saga of the Snake in a Cage.

My husband has a packrat obsession. To a certain degree, I get it. They are extremely destructive and when we first bought our house they had invaded the roof space and caused no end of problems. But that was years ago and now they have been evicted and the house has been made rat proof. I just consider them to be part of the food chain on our land, they ensure we have a healthy population of bobcats, snakes and raptors, all of which I enjoy. However I don't think the war ever ended for my husband and whenever there is a new burrow, a new dropping, a new nibble on a cactus pad, he ignores all the other potential candidates and immediately accuses the hapless packrat. So, true to form, when we came home the other day to find a quite large excavation under our front step, my husband immediately stated the packrat was to blame. I expressed my doubts, saying that I thought the burrow was unusually large for a packrat but to no avail. One small concession I have achieved in the ongoing war is that we use 'have a heart' traps. They capture the animal without injuring it, thus allowing you to relocate it. So the traps were set outside the large burrow and we went to bed. The next morning I was woken at 5.50am (!) by my husband demanding that I come outside and 'sort this out.' So I stumbled out of the front door in t-shirt and flip-flops to be greeted by this....

I am trained to work with venomous snakes so my husband was not being entirely irrational in his request. It just wasn't quite how I had envisioned starting my morning. I went back inside and got myself more appropriately attired and grabbed my snake tools. The snake seemed quite relaxed, curled up in her 'nest.' There was no signs of aggression and she didn't rattle at all. I careful slid the door up and off the cage. Hubby suggested that I tip the cage up so that she would slide out but of course, snakes don't work like that.

She was very comfortable and wasn't going anywhere. I put the cage into a nearby flowerbed and left her in peace. I knew this wasn't going to be a quick process so went off and had breakfast.

Four hours later she finally decided that it was time to make a move and trundled slowly on her way.

She didn't seem to hold a grudge over her temporary confinement and allowed me to follow her progress and take numerous photos. (For future posts.)

Several hours later I happened to look out of the window and saw the true culprit emerging from the fresh excavations - a rock squirrel!

For once I am actually organised enough to link this post to Eileen's Saturday Critters. Please visit her great blog.

We Had Babies. Part Two

This one is not quite as cute as the other baby shot. I was rushing around one morning, filling bird feeders when I noticed this spider. I thought it would make a good shot at the entrance to its web. It wasn't until I looked at the pictures later on my computer that I noticed she was not alone!

A Summer Surprise

In my years working as a guide one thing I learnt was that no matter what the animal behaviour books said, there would always be an animal out there that would do the exact opposite from what the experts said they should do. And such was the case with this Gila Monster. They spend very little time above ground and, in theory, there is a very specific temperature and humidity window that they tolerate. We expect to see them (if at all) in April, May and September primarily so imagine my surprise when I looked out of the window to see this guy trundling across the yard in the full heat of summer in the middle of the day when the thermometer was reading 104 degrees!
I have checked my previous photos and I think this is the same individual I saw in April 2014. Their patterns are unique. I did a post about it, it was the first one of the double delight. Sorry to say, he still doesn't seem to have put on much weight though.

Sunset Serenade

This Thrasher decided to join me for sundowners. He perched atop the nearby dead saguaro and sang a beautiful song to celebrate the end of the day. I am so lucky to have such lovely neighbours.