There was a tremendous, GIGANTIC storm last night. It was bad; at one point I thought that the bathroom window had been broken by the hail (it wasn't), but I was so preoccupied with the cat who'd run out into the night (who is fine) and worrying about our nesting birds in the storm that I didn't really think about the storm itself. It wasn't until I let the dogs out this a.m. before leaving for work that I realized HOW bad it had been. The outdoor furniture and recycling were blown all over the place, but worse was the tree where the woodpeckers nest—the top of it is gone! Just gone! Even so, I could hear the little birds within, and I saw both parents coming as usual with food (you can see one in the photo if you enlarge it). The cardinal nest is also intact, but I don't know about the porch-skull-nesting wrens; I didn't see the parent birds this morning or evening, and I can't hear the babies, and I cautiously nudged the wind-whipped skull slightly back into place tonight with no sign or sound from within. I was certain they were going to fledge any day now, so it's possible they did so this morning or sometime yesterday. I hope so. Tomorrow I am going to look into the nest...
The evening sky: gorgeous. Driving home, looking west, it was both beautiful and sort of creepily yellow, in the way that future storms sometimes appear; but then the light smoothed out into being just pretty and calm.
This tarantula was huddled into the intersection of steps and wall beneath the wrens' nest this morning. They always look so shy and scared. He was gone by the time I got home tonight.
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