The stamens and anthers of the first reminds me of the bottlebrush. It’s always cool when one species is made lovely by something normally overlooked in others.
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I haven’t been doing much photography lately, but I did buy a new lens recently – it’s been a while since I had a long lens. A red-tailed hawk was kind enough to set up shop on a telephone pole in front of our house, a spot that gave it a good view of our backyard bird feeder and the attendant squirrels and chipmunks. I saw it take a couple of passes by the feeder about six feet off the ground, and on a later pass it must have nabbed a squirrel. The neighborhood birds and chipmunks were in an uproar the whole time.
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Is the smaller bird in the last frame the same one being smacked on in the photos above it? That is one bold little bird.
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No, it’s a squirrel being snacked on. The smaller bird was trying to drive away the hawk; it’s nesting season and they don’t like having birds of prey around. No mob formed, though, just occasional solo runs by individuals. I think it was a robin, but the lighting was not good and it was maybe 50 feet away so I’m not sure. At this point the hawk was full of squirrel and not interested in moving.
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Looks like a Blue Jay to me.
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Found these pictures in a old photo album today. They are from when I was a kid. The horse is a wild mustang named Comet and the dog was named Oreo. Both my pets. Brought back a lot of memories. Use to ride and break in wild horses when I was 12. Though was trying when I was 10 lol. Use to wake up at 430am and watch “Tales from the Crypt” the cartoon version and by 5am I was saddling up my horse and riding him. When I was a kid my county was still predominantly farm land and dirt roads. Would ride for an hour or two every morning and then come back to ride the school bus. But then I started ditching school all the time and riding my horses and playing in the rivers. I was actually finally moved to home schooling because of that. When I was 11 one time I placed a rope on my horse Comet and we walked 7 miles in one day without me telling anyone and the next day i was found in the next town over smashing watermelons in a field to eat them and feed them to my horse lol. When I was 14 I use to ride my horse and take that dog with me and plenty of food for us in backpacks and camp for 2-3 weeks at a time.
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That is a pretty different childhood. A bit on the wild side.
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Amazing story. You learned a lot.
A family of Western screech owls has taken up residence in the cottonwood tree beside our deck. Adult on top, juvenile on bottom. There are five in all – a mating pair and three hatchlings. We thought they were gone when they disappeared for a couple of days, but they returned yesterday.
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From a few days ago. Almost all from the same 10 foot area. Really hot. 101°f. 70% humidity. But in a month or two it will be 100°f on average during the day.
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Beautiful! My 7 year old daughter has had bad dreams and sleepless nights, worrying about spiders, lately. This might have helped her, and I will show them to her. Thankfully, she just read a book-Science Comics on spider, and it seems to have helped. I wonder where the science is now on evolved human responses to spiders and snakes. We try to help the kids not be afraid of them, and be geeked about their coolness.
It sounds pretty hot there right now. We have it down in the 40s-60s right now.
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My daughter just looked at them, and said “wow!” I guess she’s cured. 
Thanks
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Where’s @LM77 when you need him. 
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From what I gather he will be on sometime towards when we are all asleep lol. Or closer to it anyways.
It can definitely be challenging to help kids be less fearful of things like spiders and snakes. There is also always the fear of parents that if their child stops fearing snakes and spiders and begin to handle them they will handle the wrong one and get bitten by something potentially harmful. But I believe that you can raise a kid to be less fearful of them and still learn which ones to stay away from.
My niece who is 12 likes spiders and snakes. I tried to find the pictures but can’t. But I have a few of her handling snakes and spiders. Though she knows to not handle snakes unless I’m there at this time.
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It’s difficult to get a feel for the depth or the area in a 2D photo with other foliage in the foreground, but a whitetail deer has been bedding down between the two trumpet vine bushes, accessed from the side facing away from the house. It’s barely 30 ft from the window, and it includes a day lily in the bedroom.
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It looks like he has an aesthetic taste. I don’t think I have any deer bedding down that close to my house. Do you have both mule deer and whitetails?
We have white tails here, only, but I know there are elk in the northern lower peninsula. That’s not very far away, but I’ve never seen them. Do you have them where you are? Or pronghorn?
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No mule deer, but the very rare errant elk or moose. When one strays our way, it’s front page news. One every ten years or so?
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