Time travel: 2015
Wednesday, 22 November 2023
I went back to 2015 in the Great Photo Archive in The Cloud (GPATC), and found this lovely CanGoose image…since I took no (interesting) photographs today.
Musings
Spider-abyss
Tuesday, 3 October 2023
This spider is working the angles. Not only has it made a funnel, it put the web in a cactus to up the danger-danger. Me—I kept my distance, and just accumulated digits from afar.
Happy familly
Tuesday, 4 July 2023
Such a surprise to see a grouse on our road by our property…and she was “purring” to wee ones in the grass behind her. Safe travels!
Varmints and pests
Sunday, 4 June 2023
This morning I did some grass-whacking around this planting, and oh. my. heavens…the lovely lilac scent. It inspired and lulled me.
Varmit count: 1; one woodchuck…no sign of woodchucks before this afternoon visit. Go away! You are not wanted here.
Pest count: hundreds; scads of carpenter ants serially invading the porch. And removed in discreet (kinda) dustpan loads, at approximately half hour intervals. This is what we do for exercise. Heh.
Nature report
Saturday, 27 May 2023
We took an early evening stroll, and spotted both the East and West Herds. That’s what I’m calling them. White-tailed deer. This is the East Herd, numbering at least eleven. This specimen did a version of King of the Hill, although it may be a Queen or Princess; I do not have gender info. Posing, anyway.
Returning to our property, we found the first blooming lupine of the season—by that I mean with color, as there are buds everywhere. I think the earliest ones last year were in this same spot. Don’t know why…better exposure doesn’t work…perhaps to do with local soil conditions and moisture? Dunno.
(In the) lake life
Sunday, 21 May 2023
Looks like it might be a dead lake, but there’s a fine fishy…in the algae (pronounce fishy and algae to rhyme, plz). S/he’s toward the back, a horizontal grey shape with a dark shadow.
In which they venture north
Friday, 7 April 2023
First stop. No lie: this is John Sam Lake.
Snow geese migrating…although here they‘re hanging or wheeling.
Show daffodils.
Oyster nursery on Samish Bay.
A deer (!!) in Fairhaven.
A park on the shore at Bellingham. The ducks are buffleheads…or are they Barrow‘s goldeneye?
Fast, flower, slow
Sunday, 2 April 2023
My finger was descending to catch this rabbit in the grass, nice profile, when s/he realized there was a big dog across the road. Ah, well, this way, you get a better view of the cottony tail.
A bit of internet investigation…and I have learned that this is Ribes sanguineum, or red-flowering currant, and native to this area, although this specimen may be a nursery cultivar.
Watching rain come across Puget Sound. It’s slow moving. I’m typing this almost an hour later, and it still has about half the sound to cross to reach us.
Natural history
Thursday, 2 February 2023
Murky, rainy day…so this photo is from one year ago, on a much sunnier day…although you can’t quite tell that. Trust me.
I just read a NYTimes article reporting that bears rub up against trees so that the tree-bark resin/sap gets in their fur and acts as a tick repellant. These bears are I’m not sure where, but it seems rather northern, like Poland, and the trees include beech trees.
I hypothesize this model doesn’t work for southern bears, as leaning against southern trees (e.g., pines) is a good way to get chiggers. Now chiggers are not ticks, but, personally, I’ll take neither…critter infestations of the skin are…ick, yuck, and no thanks.
Article: “Bears May Rub Against Trees for Protection From Parasites” by Rebecca Dzombak, dated 1 Feb 2023.
Dinosaur removed
Tuesday, 8 November 2022
Somehow, an anole got into our bathroom. I managed to herd (I use that word loosely; anoles not only run, but hop and jump) the anole into this bucket. Then, I took the bucket to the balcony and let it go.
I decided not to think about how it got into the bathroom. Total mystery.
I’m also trying not to think too much about the early returns on today’s vote. Also rather a mystery.