What’s the right thing?

Al Denelsbeck

So it was a bit of an amphibious day yesterday, meaning that’s what I was finding around Walkabout Estates Plus. We’ll start with the greenhouse:

odd muddy markings on side of greenhouse, likely from a treefrog
While, as I said before, the property is absolutely overrun with anoles, they tend to be dry and not leave any evidence of their passing, so while I have found nothing conclusive within these strange, faintly muddy markings on the sides of the new greenhouse, I’m inclined to say that they were made by a treefrog – perhaps more than one, because really, they were literally covering several of the panes, and this was on the outside, so not any that got trapped within. I checked, last night and tonight, but didn’t find any frogs around the greenhouse.

I did find one, a tiny one, on the liriope along the front walk, though.

juvenile Copes grey treefrog Dryophytes chrysoscelis perched on liriope
While the green patch is bright and obvious, this is instead a Copes grey treefrog (Dryophytes chrysoscelis,) and a little one at that, probably just a few weeks out of tadpole stage – the key identifier for the grey treefrogs is the pale patch under the eye, and while there is another species with the same patch (the common grey treefrog,) they’re almost unheard of in North Carolina. The green will disappear as it gets older and begins to hide on trunks rather than leaves.

As I came out the front door yesterday, I saw a tiny black thing hopping across the bricks and quickly stooped to grab it, then sought The Girlfriend out so she could hold it for pics. She watched my cupped-hand approach with some trepidation, not knowing if I had something cute (like a frog) or creepy (like a snake,) but agreed to hold this guy once she saw it.

unidentified tiny black frog with gold markings, in The Girlfriend's hand for scale
The thing is, I don’t know what species this is at all; it’s likely a juvenile, especially since it resembles none of the chorus frogs that might be found in the area, but the guides that I have all show adult specimens. I’m vaguely suspicious that it’s a young narrowmouth toad, from the dark skin and snout shape, but that’s the best I can offer right now.

old nylon webbing that had ensnared a spadefoot toadYesterday as we went past a patch of bare earth, I spotted something moving and realized that it was a toad trying to bury itself, but it soon ceased any movement as we drew close. I’m a guy, so I took a small handful of sandy soil and deposited it onto the back of the toad, to protect it from the hot sun, and continued on with our tree-transplanting tasks. Today, I stopped by the same spot and could still see it there, so I went to scoop it up for a closer examination, because I rarely saw toads that dark. Only, it wasn’t coming up, and appeared to be anchored by a leg (I was not tugging with any force at all – I’m circumspect.) Eventually I determined that one hind leg was wrapped tightly with something well-anchored in the soil, and with some digging I freed this, finding it to be a scrap of old nylon webbing; what I had taken the day before to be efforts to bury itself were actually efforts to free itself from this tourniquet. That meant that it had been there at least a full day, and the hind leg was angled badly and discolored. Wanting to evaluate the condition as well as get some detailed pics, I brought the toad inside and eventually set it up in a makeshift terrarium, since all of my decent options for housing are still two hours away. But you need to see these eyes at least.

eastern spadefoot Scaphiopus holbrookii showing vertical slit pupils
This is an eastern spadefoot (Scaphiopus holbrookii,) a toad not to be found in our old area of central NC, but closer to the coast the conditions are more conducive to them since they prefer sandier soils. Spadefoots are also one of the few species of toad with vertical pupils, and the irises are not always this green; let’s have a closer look:

closeup of eye of eastern spadefoot Scaphiopus holbrookii
Those are perhaps the best-looking eyes of any species I’ve photographed, and they get even better from the front:

portrait view of eastern spadefoot Scaphiopus holbrookii showing almost-confusing eyes
I wouldn’t be surprised if this is where the writers of Futurama got the inspiration for the hypnotoad, and certainly, once I saw this perspective I knew that I needed a pic. You can see the right hind leg sitting out at an awkward angle, but here’s a better view:

injured leg of eastern spadefoot Scaphiopus holbrookii, still showing dark ridge for digging that inspired the common name
The dark ridge along the back edge of the foot is what gives the species its common name, and helps them dig backwards into their burrows, where they spend much of their time. But it shouldn’t be sitting out at this angle, and even after several hours of recovery time, the toad shows no signs of being able to use it, so I fear the worst. You can even make out the groove that the nylon webbing left, right where the coloration changes going up the leg.

The toad is otherwise alert and responsive, and can move around despite the hindrance of this leg, but I’m certain that it’s at a distinct disadvantage in avoiding predators, capturing meals, and even maintaining its burrow. Spadefoots spend most of their time underground, and often “forage” by simply coming to the mouth of their burrow and waiting for food (spiders, crickets, ants) to happen past. So the chances are that this guy would simply die quickly in the wild from being unable to function properly, if complications from that leg injury don’t accomplish this faster. I’m not a fan of keeping wild animals as captives, but I’m thinking this might be the best thing for this guy, provided I can give it enough of a habitat to be comfortable. Or I may contact the university the next city over (about a half-hour away) and see if their biology department wants to tackle this. Even if the leg could be ‘set,” I doubt any veterinarian in the area would know how to, saying nothing of course of what they’d charge me. Even the licensed wildlife rehabilitators within an hour of here only take small mammals.

So, I’m undecided right now, but I’ll settle on something within a day or so, and let you know where it’s going.

Just once, part 43

Al Denelsbeck

I find it a little amusing right now that, during the house closing thing when I knew we’d be busy, I set up several posts ahead of time to prevent any noticeable lapses in my posting “schedule,” but for the past month or so have had almost nothing to continue filling in, naively (or is that naïvely?) thinking that I’d be able to fill in here and there. It is to laugh. Seriously, I’m wondering when we’ll be done with all of this moving horseshit and I’ll be able to get back into a routine.

Also, for amusement, I’ll remind you that, almost two years ago, I’d speculated that we’d reach the 3,000th post by late September of this year; we are quite far from that mark and, unless things do a serious change for the better (which is not something to hope for when fall is settling in and the critters becoming less active,) we’re not going to hit that mark by the end of the year either. However, I might be able to squeeze out another podcast – I’ve had one stewing in my brain at least.

For now, we turn to the Just Once subject for this week, with the caveat that it might not have appeared just once anyway.

yellow rat snake Pantherophis obsoleta quadrivittata digesting baby bluebirds within nest box
This is from four years ago, a yellow rat snake (Pantherophis obsoleta quadrivittata) – or at least, it was. Since that time, or somewhere near it anyway, biologists have changed the species – now it’s potentially considered a subspecies of the eastern rat snake, which itself has changed, and is thus Pantherophis alleghaniensis quadrivittata. Seriously, the number of times the scientific names of these related species have changed just since I started the blog is disturbing.

yellow rat snake Pantherophis obsoleta quadrivittata in author's hands, showing bulges from consuming baby bluebirds, by The Girlfriend's Sprog
This session did mark the first time that I’d photographed (and handled) a yellow rat snake, however, having pulled it from a bluebird nest box at our friends’ house, where you can see that it had consumed several baby bluebirds. Our friend was not happy about this, but this is how nature works; rat snakes are really good about climbing things and detecting the scent of birds’ nests (and, naturally, of rodents as well,) and bluebirds have clutches of multiple young, sometimes twice a year. Natural selection keeps them working their own angles to survive.

A year later, we have the first (and so far only) example of the new nomenclature – maybe.

yellow eastern rat snake Pantherophis alleghaniensis quadrivittata not as threatened anymore
Quite a bit different in appearance, isn’t it? While I’m quite sure that it’s a variant of eastern rat snake, I’m not 100% sure that it’s the yellow subspecies, due to this coloration. The main species of eastern rat snake used to be called the black rat snake, which is more appropriate, and this is neither black nor yellow. I’ve heard that the two subspecies can cross-breed, which this might be an example of, or it might simply be a wider color variant of the yellow – snakes, many reptiles and amphibians actually, can have a lot of variation in their colors, meaning little. Since this was found on an island (albeit not a remote or significantly isolated one,) there remains a chance this is an island variant, able to be found only on Topsail Island, but I admit this is unlikely.

I have a brief video clip, too:

The scale of the first snake above is clear enough, but not this one, which was even bigger, pushing two meters in length. I had no qualms about handling it, but let it be, then regretted it when I discovered later on that I couldn’t find this color variant. I watched the same area for the next several days but saw no signs of it; I would have at least gotten a lot more detailed images of it, from all angles, underside included.

Well, I might’ve, anyway – The Girlfriend was the only other person available at that time, and she sure as hell would not have tried handling it, nor would she have gotten too close for nice detail shots either. I’ve done the one-handed thing with snakes for photos, and it’s quite challenging, to put it mildly. No, I don’t have any Xtreemkooldood head-mounted action cams or anything of that ilk, so that wasn’t an option either. But I would’ve found some way…

Just once, part 42

Al Denelsbeck

It’s been a while since we’ve had a mammal, hasn’t it? That’s because I have very few candidate mammals in the Just Once list, and too few mammals overall, really. But since the posts have been lean, we’ll have a video for this one.

Those are Asian small-clawed otters (Aonyx cinereus,) and were found at the NC Aquarium at Fort Fisher, a new brood that had hatched there two years back. They also represent the only species featured so far to have “Asian” in the name – a little surprising to me, but okay.

On our visit to Goose Creek State Park last year, a ranger alerted us to the presence of otters early that morning, though we were there in late morning and saw no signs of them; these would have been North American river otters instead, and I do have a handful of frames of those, from the wild even, but am always happy to have more/closer/better because that’s what nature photographers do – I still take photos of osprey and great blue herons even though I have thousands of frames of those. When we revisited the park a couple weeks back I thought we had found otter tracks, but now comparing the sizes, I’m fairly certain we’d found something else instead. Still, if they’re there, I’ll be after them – the biggest issue is that I can’t get very early access to the park unless I camp there overnight, and I hate camping.

“But Al,” you interject snarkily, “can’t you endure a little hardship if it’s for the cause? Are you sure you’re a real nature photographer” Though I admit I don’t know the definition of a real nature photographer but I suspect it involves garnering more income than this from it, so no, I’m probably not – which gives me a handy excuse. But it’s true that, if I have enough evidence that it won’t be wasted effort, I may set up a tent overnight, knowing full well that I won’t sleep worth a shit and will be tired and stiff as hell when I’m chasing pics. And given your comment, I’m sure you’ll be buying a print or five when I do, right?

Just once, part 41

Al Denelsbeck

Hmmmm, what do we have here? I was just about to do this week’s Just Once post and decided on the specimen below, in honor of Halloween (which is when it originally posted nine years ago):

jumping spider Habronattus pyrrithrix peering out of shadows
… which you gotta admit is a nice, ominous image, and as I said then, I wanted to do this in the yard some Halloween, or perhaps up on the rooftop. I never did get around to it, mostly because finding the raw materials in the size I wanted to do it wasn’t happening.

Though as I got ready to do this post, I searched BugGuide.net on the name (Habronattus pyrrithrix, I think) to be sure that it hadn’t changed and it still looked like a good match, because I’m anal in that regard, dog knows why. No change and it still looks like a match, but, one of the images shown on that site looked familiar, and so I compared it to the video I’d shot a few years ago, where I’d asked if anyone recognized the species:

I had a post just about finalized thinking that I’d found a match and thus this species hadn’t been featured Just Once, but then I looked closer and realized that the cephalothorax markings seemed inverted. Other pics of the same species all show distinct black markings along the sides, while the center dorsal markings are usually less distinct if not almost missing entirely – but they all have those side markings, which my video specimen does not have in the slightest.

So I thought I’d solved a mystery by finding the species of the video spider, but now it looks like I did not, and thus Habronattus pyrrithrix comes back into the lineup as a Just Once feature, and the video spider remains unidentified. So much drama…

Cut it out, brain!

Al Denelsbeck

A bit over a week ago I guess, I woke up here at the new Walkabout Manor during the move-in process, which meant a fitful night on the air mattress while we waited for the trailer with most of our belongings to get delivered. Whether this had anything to do with it or not, I arose quite anxious, because I was acutely aware that I had to change the address on my business cards and get more ordered. This was important, or so my sleep-addled brain told me, and it forced me from a drowsy no-rush-on-anything state into full wakefulness because I had to get right on this.

Now, bear in mind that I give away one or two business cards a month at best, and haven’t even started soliciting new photo students within the area we now reside, mush less arranged for a gallery display or anything – getting new business cards is well down the list of things that Need To Be Done. I mean, can I even get Walkabout Studios set up first? But for reasons unknown, my brain chose to fixate on that with enough emphasis to force me awake and ready to jump on the computer. Granted, I have, what, eleven different card designs?, that all need to be changed, so it’s a longer task than you might have thought, but not that long, and not at all crucial.

[“Eleven? Al, what the hell?” you say, but they’re all different photo images, and I print a variety of them on each photo page and cut them apart myself, so at any given time the recipient gets a random choice.]

On the same day I ran across this post from The Bloggess, a neat coincidence. Not exactly the same thing, but likely the same effect, which is one’s brain attaching random importance and/or emotional reaction to some particular concept while we’re in that stage between sleep and awake. Most everyone is familiar with having some brilliant idea in that stage and then struggling to remember it afterward, in some cases actually writing it down only to find that it makes no sense in the light of day. Occasionally, it actually is an insight, but more often I think (at least in my experience,) it’s simply nonsense – it’s got nothing to do with the thought itself, only how the brain interprets it, which in that sleep state might be entirely random.

I sometimes wonder about the peculiar workings of the brain, especially because I’m prone to entering the free-association period as I’m falling asleep, following some particular line of thought until I suddenly realize that it makes no sense; the spacing of the lines on the roads have no relation whatsoever to donkeys, or some such rot. It’s bad enough that we can associate wildly disparate items because of some past experience, like that time we watched Krull while eating lime jello, but then our brains can make associations for no apparent reasons at times – and worse, the same brain wastes its time trying to figure out why. And now I have a memory of being anxious over the address on my business cards, when I know it’s totally inconsequential, but am I going to be able to selectively delete it and free up space for, like, the new neighbor’s names? Noooo…

Don’t move!

Al Denelsbeck

Seriously, don’t move; it’s a pain in the ass, takes forever, and results in far too many aches and pains. We’ve still got far too much to go, and Walkabout Studios is going to take a while to be in proper shape. So I haven’t much time to devote to posting, but I’ll slip in here and there as I have a few moments. And in like vein, I snag the occasional image here and there – strictly local, and more of the same ol’ stuff, but it’s not stacks of boxes, so your scenery is overall better than mine.

The new place has three elephant ear plants, but as yet I have not been able to determine the exact species (there are a lot of choices.) That, however, is not our present focus – another Carolina anole (Anolis carolinensis) is, as I came face-to-face with one while stooping down to photograph the bloom of the elephant ear.

Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis perched on leaf of undetermined elephant ear
There were a few days when we had rain four or five times a day, and this was early morning after one of those – the anole was a bit sluggish and didn’t seem too concerned with my presence, allowing me to stoop even further for a different perspective.

Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis perched on leaf of undetermined elephant ear, seen from below
It would have been nicer had it been a brighter morning, but ya work with what ya get – and have time to pursue.

My computer at present is set up at the edge of the living room, which gives me a view through the foyer and out the front door if it’s open, and the other day I caught a flash of movement out of the corner of my eye (how does a round thing have corners?) I looked up and watched a second deer pause directly on the front walk not ten meters away, then move on slowly. This was right at noon so a bit curious, but I called The Girlfriend over and we crept out the door to find a trio of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) – two fawns and a doe – right at the edge of the lawn, looking back at us cautiously. Two of them stayed in sight as I got the camera out.

white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus doe and fawn watching photographer curiously
Our experience has been that the deer are fairly spooky around here, so this was better than expected results. They were definitely wary, but we refrained from doing anything threatening. Nonetheless, the fawn gave a few warning flips of its tail as it moved forward.

white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus fawn flipping its tail in warning mode next to doe
The doe – I’m presuming the mama – wasn’t responding in kind so the fawn calmed down slightly, though they all decided that moving on was probably better and slowly vanished into the undergrowth. One of the fawns, however, paused to look back and I snagged a frame to show how well they disappear, even when they’re only twenty meters away.

white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus fawn nearly obscured in foliage and shadow
It’s right there in the center – look for the dark triangle of the tail – but yes, they know how to use shadows to their advantage.

The property, so far anyway, does not seem to host as many green treefrogs (Dryophytes cinereus) as the old place, but it’s also late in the season so I won’t consider this definitive. We have seen three so far I think, including one not a week out of tadpole stage. A slightly larger one perched on the window this evening, and I went out to snag a few frames.

juvenile green treefrog Dryophytes cinereus perched on downspout
Now, in doing so, I inadvertently introduced an anole into the house, since I think it was snoozing on the edge of the door, and this required a little scrambling to get it back out before any of the cats realized it. After this was accomplished, the frog had moved from the glass onto the downspout, so a little coaxing convinced it to not face away from me and provide a brief action pose. Several minutes later though, I passed the same window and the frog had resumed its position in almost the exact same spot – the light was shining through brightly so likely the frog was waiting for insects attracted by that.

juvenile green treefrog Dryophytes cinereus perched on glass, seen from underneath
Overall length was roughly 30mm, so far from an adult, and it looked more like a leaf adhering to the glass from a short distance off. It’s still there as I type this, nearly two hours later, but it’s moved up and over a little bit, hopefully snagging some food.

More will be along as I get the time. It’s going to be a while before we’re “settled.”

Just once, part 40

Al Denelsbeck

cownose ray Rhinoptera bonasus Jorgeanne skimming bottom
While this week’s image was taken back in 2010, it wasn’t actually used until last year for one of the Profiles of Nature posts, which was actually the weekly topic for the previous year – I was just throwing more down as I felt like it. This is a cownose ray (Rhinoptera bonasus,) photographed at the NC Aquarium in Fort Fisher I believe – probably obvious because I had no ability to do underwater photography and I likely wouldn’t have caught one this close (and in this lighting,) much less while feeding. Now, I did see and photograph cownose rays while living in Florida, but always from above the surface and some distance off, so I never bothered featuring those shots here. Had I possessed the ability to do underwater photographs while living and snorkeling there – beyond using a little Kodak disposable film camera I mean, which I did attempt a couple of times – I likely wouldn’t have gotten much anyway due to the turbidity of the water: visibility was two meters at best, and not too many critters allowed that close of an approach. I know I tried it with a mother and calf manatee, slipping into the water quietly as they moved off about six meters away, but I never caught sight of them when I attempted to catch up.

That might have been the session where I fumbled the disposable camera while removing the snorkeling gear, watching it fall into a gap between the rocks and hearing it clatter down no small distance. I was quite distraught because I was pretty sure I had some cool shots on it, and no amount of maneuvering produced a glimpse of it; these were large rocks piled together to make the causeway, and so had countless gaps between the rocks. I shifted a few here and there, still never seeing the camera, a challenge in itself because my eyes were adjusted for the bright sunlight and I simply couldn’t see into the deep shadows under the rocks. I was on the verge of giving up when I climbed much lower and pulled out another one of the smaller rocks that I could actually move, and there sat the camera on the sand floor within this little cave, within arm’s reach even. I can remember the feeling that I’d recovered some potentially great photos (as great as they might be with a cheesy little plastic camera,) but honestly don’t know which of the negative pages holds those pics, or even what pics I thought I was losing. Memory’s a funny thing.

September toddles off

Al Denelsbeck

And so, we reach the end of September, or at least will in about 23 hours. This means we must, by tradition, leave it with an abstract image, though tradition has nothing to say about how abstract or what the exact definition of that word is, thank dog. Because that allows us to use things like this:

Spanish moss Tillandsia usneoides semi-backlit with sun ray breaking across
Obtained just two days ago, this was one of two contenders for this vaunted position from the entire month of… well, not shooting much at all. But everyone loves Spanish moss, right? Everyone that matters, anyway…

Yet, we find that we have another candidate, from the very beginning of the month. And that looks like this:

raindrop acting as lens on rose petal
We know, we know, we know, we’ve had quite enough rain and dew drop photos at the end of the month, but this one has been sitting here waiting for us to do a post around it, which we never got to, so we’re slamming it down defiantly here and daring anyone to comment. Seriously, the comment section does actually work. You don’t even have to trust me on this, and can call my bluff.

Today is also International Podcast Day, but this is not likely to happen, given that we should have a truck to start unloading and the microphone is two hours away regardless. Maybe we will fill in a few days hence. No promises, now…

Slow, but progress

Al Denelsbeck

scattered clouds across waterfront at sunrise
The function of getting established at the new Walkabout Estates is going much slower than intended, primarily not our fault – we’re still waiting for the truck with most of our belongings to arrive. Until that time, we’re bouncing back and forth between minor repairs/improvements and exploring the area, but this has included going down to the waterfront soon after sunrise on two separate occasions now, which is a nice way to start the day.

I had a faint concern that I’d be leaving behind my fertile environment for treefrogs and anoles, though with a pond out back it wasn’t a serious concern, and I’d spotted an anole even when we were first looking at The Manor. These concerns were completely eradicated within a few hours of starting the move-in; the Carolina anoles own The Manor, and are graciously allowing us to live here. They litter the property and can be found everywhere, including very often within the screened porch and once even within The Manor itself – luckily we discovered this before The Boogs did, and escorted the lizard back outside.

adult Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis sleeping awkwardly on metalwork of porch lamp
This was last night, on the light outside the back door – looks awkward, but the lizard seemed fine with it, and took its time this morning getting up and warming itself on the black dome on top. Another view:

adult Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis snoozing on lamp from another angle
Just doesn’t look comfortable, but it’s better than the one who chooses to sleep between the back door screen and the decorative framing, looking as though it got flattened within them, and that one has done it multiple nights.

Out front, a newborn had selected an oak tree sapling as its nighttime perch, much like the Japanese maple back at Old Walkabout Estates; on a previous night, it was so aligned with the shape of the leaf that it looked like a diseased section spreading from the middle, less so now that I finally got the camera in hand.

newborn Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis sleeping on leaf of oak tree sapling
This was early this morning, and the dew deserved a closer look of course:

closer look of newborn Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis drowsing on oak leaf, showing late night dew
We’d seen this one in the same general location both day and night, never seeming to wander more than a meter, though underneath is liriope that offers plenty of camouflage and shade, and presumably food as well. During the same photo session, I discovered that another of roughly the same age (this year’s brood) was sharing the same patch, about two meters off.

newborn Carolina anole Anolis carolinensis with truncated tail drowsing on greenbrier Smilax shoot
This one had chosen a small sprig of greenbrier (Smilax) that was erupting from the liriope. Helpfully, this one had docked its own tail so they could be distinguished from each other – so cooperative! No, I doubt this was an injury from a territorial dispute, because they’re too young and I don’t think they really get aggressive about that until mating season anyway – I’ve watched plenty of closer encounters among the adults in the past few days and they don’t seem inclined at all, just giving one another barely adequate space. Both the greenbrier and the oak sapling will be removed from the decorative patch, but possibly not until late fall now, once the anoles have gone into shelter for the winter – I mean, c’mon.

Cute, right? Okay then, you can’t complain as we switch subjects.

Right alongside the front door as I came inside from the anole photo session, we had someone else standing guard high on the wall.

female dark fishing spider Dolomedes tenebrosus hanging out on brickwork
It’s funny what I end up doing when I start writing posts, because I just went out and measured the width of the brick to give an idea of scale: they’re standard bricks so about 60mm in width, meaning her leg spread is slightly more than that, while the body is somewhere around 25mm in length. This is most likely a dark fishing spider (Dolomedes tenebrosus,) as indicated by that ‘mustache mark’ that doesn’t show too well at this resolution, but the double row of eyes pegs this as the fishing spider family – wolf spiders have the posterior lateral (back outside) eyes well offset to the rear and more sideways. She’s still there as I type this, but high enough to require a step stool for specific measurements, plus my calipers are sealed in a box on a truck someplace that is not here. And as big as she is, she’s notably smaller than the next specimen.

large adult female golden silk orbweaver Trichonephila clavipes in web over pond
That’s a golden silk orbweaver (Trichonephila clavipes) out over the pond, and her leg spread is at least half-again that of the fishing spider, but probably closer to double – she’s even harder to reach so specific measurements aren’t coming anytime soon, and this was shot with the long lens. My first attempt was thwarted by humidity and poor preparation, since the moment that I got the lens out the other day, it fogged over from the post-rain steaminess (having been stored in the air-conditioned house) and didn’t clear until the light was too crappy to proceed. I believe that direct sunlight hits this spot for a brief period in the afternoons, so I’ll try again another day.

But that takes us in the direction of the pond, so we go to a pair of pics captured while I was in the middle of writing this today.

great blue heron Ardea herodias in pond at Walkabout Estates
This one surprised me a little, because the trees crowd in around and throughout the pond and didn’t appear to allow the longer glide path that great blue herons (Ardea herodias) need to go in and out, but here we are. The green stuff on the water is duckweed and not algae, but yeah, the pond is more Louisiana bayou than a country swimming hole. Fine by me, as long as it keeps attracting visitors and residents like these – I spotted a green heron here during the home inspection, so I’m groovy.

trio of yellow-bellied sliders Trachemys scripta scripta on cypress hassock in pond on Walkabout Estates
Those are all yellow-bellied sliders (Trachemys scripta scripta) and we have plenty of them, but they’re quite spooky and have to be shot with the long lens. Earlier in the day we saw a much smaller one among the cluster on this same hassock. And here I have to admit to something: I had vowed, many years ago, that if we obtained property with the right wet conditions, I was going to plant a bald cypress tree (Taxodium distichum,) because I think they’re great, but they really do need boggy conditions. We lucked out immensely with this property, because it has half a dozen right at the edge of the yard, all old-growth monsters – the ‘knees’ are going to make mowing a chore though, but I’ll cope with it.

And finally, we close with some more cuteness.

young adult female white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus in back yard of Walkabout Estates
For two days in succession, we found a small herd of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) at the edge of the back yard, and they’re quite spooky; this doe was small, but still might have been the mother to the next, close by:

white-tailed deer Odocoileus virginianus fawn in back yard of Walkabout Estates, just losing its spots
You can see that this fawn is just old enough to be losing its spots, and while I was remaining silent, I was in plain sight up on the deck and the camera still makes noise, so they watched me warily for a few moments before electing to move off into the undergrowth that borders the back of the property where the pond doesn’t; this is really a slick area for wildlife, so I’ll be able to keep busy (to say nothing of the options within the surrounding region.) But, we’ll have to see how many new species I can add.

Things may go quiet again (I think the last six or eight posts were all written in advance to appear while we were busy with moving stuff, which isn’t even halfway done yet,) but I’ll sneak in the time when I can.

Just once, part 39

Al Denelsbeck

male yellow-bellied sapsucker Sphyrapicus varius on tree
This week’s only-seen-here-once-before image is from 19 months ago, February last year, and I couldn’t tell you why I’d never photographed a yellow-bellied sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius) before, or since, but here we are. I would have liked to have gotten closer, or a clearer view at least, but this guy disappeared before I could do much more, perhaps already aware that it had blown its cover. So yeah, it’s on the list of species to do a better job of, but I can even do this as a weekly topic because there are enough critters that evade my attention – I think I’ve eliminated just one potential appearance here because I snagged more frames of a particular species that was on my list of singular appearances when I started this topic. Let’s see if I can knock out any more before the end of the year.

And yes, I could go for several years decades with species that I’ve never photographed, but those would be boring posts, wouldn’t they? At least we have a pic for these…

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