Buzz-Cut Finch

I think he is a moulting adult (as opposed to a newly-feathering junior).

Yes, It's Him Again: The Jumping Spider

It is going to be a while before I am tired of this spider, and besides, these most recent photos came out so very well.

The Cry of the Bobwhite

Our little bobwhite showed up in the tree outside the office window the other day. There were a lot of obstacles between him and me (window, window screen, tree, leaves, branches, sticks—I could go on) but I managed to get a few photos nonetheless. Let's call them "mood photos" and pretend that they are like this on purpose.

Finch at Window

This Weekend's Woodlet Photos

In honor of Father's Day, we highlight the Woodlet today! (Unlike all the other days, when we never focus on the woodlets.)

Beautiful Oriole

A Scott's oriole, he is.

Woodlet's Tongue

Saturday again. After the dad left, the woodlet stayed up there alone for a bit. He tried some pecking and some picking up of things with his tongue, which is there as big as day in the photo above. The tongue of the woodpecker is a very powerful thing! The Sibley Guide to Bird Life and Behavior says (slightly edited for length here):

Woodpecker tongues are barbed, sticky, and extremely long for the bird's head size. In some species, the tongue can extend as far as five inches out of the bill. In all birds, the tongue contains a set of bones, known collectively as the hyoid apparatus, that provides support, structure, and an attachment point for muscles that allow the birds to move their tongues and manipulate food. The hyoid apparatus ends in two elongated "horns" that sweep off the back of the tongue. In woodpeckers extreme tongue extension is possible because of exceptionally long hyoid horns, which wrap completely around the skull and are anchored near the nostril or around the eye, depending on the species.




Isn't he adorable?

Dad Feeds Woodlet

A little while after the woodlet was at the feeder alone on Saturday, I spotted it and its dad up in the corner of the trellis over the window. Dad was giving it a snack.

My Herringbone Spider

I looked up a moment ago to see a little spider high on the wall here in the office, and was happy to see that it was this guy (gal?) again! He (she?) keeps coming around. I first saw it in the kitchen on May 23d. Then about a week later, I found it in the kitchen again, but this time sort of fastened by webbing onto an old receipt that tucked into a bowl on the counter :


The spider was under the web, not on it, and it seemed quite immobile. I showed it to Hugh and then put it down on my desk, and later the spider was gone, only to be seen again later that same day over on Hugh's desk:


Its head is a little blurry, but you can see how the back section looks sort of rubbed off in the middle and more orange on the sides than it was before. It's such an unusual spider—I've never seen one before, unlike some kinds of jumping spiders which are all over the place—that I can only think it has been the same one every time. What was it doing under all that webbing?

The Western End of an Eastern-Facing Bunting

Woodlet at Birdfeeder

The parents and the woodlets are now appearing very regularly at the birdfeeders. This woodlet didn't actually eat much; it mostly stood there with its mouth open until a scrub jay swooped in and scared it away. "It" because we can't tell yet if it is male or female; its little baby head is devoid of color, except for a tiny, tiny bit of yellow beginning to show at the back of its head (just barely visible in the last photo).

Tarantula Hawk Bags Tarantula!

Hugh and I had just loaded the recycling into the truck this evening when he suddenly noticed and became very excited about something in the driveway. When I looked over, I thought at first that it was a hummingbird catching or being caught by something, but it was instead this giant bug walking backwards and dragging this tarantula along with it. I know now that the insect is a tarantula hawk, and Wikipedia has some fascinating things to say about them:

During the spiders's reproductive season male tarantulas are usually emaciated from ignoring food while searching for females. The tarantula hawks thus prefer female tarantulas and seek them in their burrows. They capture, sting, and paralyze the spider, then they either drag the spider back into her own burrow or transport their prey to a specially prepared nest where a single egg is laid on the spider's body, and the entrance is covered. The wasp larva, upon hatching, begins to suck the juices from the still-living spider. After the larva grows a bit, it plunges into the spider's body and feeds voraciously, avoiding vital organs for as long as possible to keep it fresh. The adult wasp emerges from the nest to continue the life cycle.


These wasps are relatively docile for a wasp and rarely sting without provocation though the sting, particularly of Pepsis Formosa, among the most painful of any insect. Commenting on his own experience, one researcher described the pain as "…immediate, excruciating pain that simply shuts down one's ability to do anything, except, perhaps, scream. Mental discipline simply does not work in these situations." In terms of scale, the wasp's sting is rated near the top of the Schmidt Sting Pain Index, second only to that of the bullet ant and is described by Schmidt as "blinding, fierce [and] shockingly electric". Because of their extremely large stingers, very few animals are able to eat them; one of the few animals that can is the roadrunner.


I believe that this is the mysterious and tantalizing purple and gold giant insect that I have been seeing flying around here, and which I've been trying to photograph, for the last five years. Except I haven't seen it that often, and I think only once before have I gotten a snap of it at all. Victory is mine! Though sadly, victory is not the tarantula's.

Spider and Beetle

I found these two under one of the drawers of my desk recently. It's perhaps one of the most beautiful spiders I've ever seen. I say that a lot, but it's always true!

The Cat Always Knows: Brown Recluse #1, 2009

Earlier tonight Loretta the cat was lying on top of Hugh's dresser, near where her food and water dishes are. I took her water to fill, and when I came back with the full glass, she was staring down at the floor to the side, at the base of the lamp. She sees all and knows all. She really does. The cats always do. If they are staring interestedly at something, it is bound to be a brown recluse or a scorpion. How do they know not to mess with them? Because they don't...they just watch.


A closeup of its 3 pairs of eyes, and its small pedipalps. Is it a female?






Note also that abdomen; are they always so large, dare I say swollen? Is it a female about to have a bunch of spider babies? One tidbit I have learned about recluses is that they are hunters, so don't build webs to catch prey; but they do build webs to have babies in. On. Whatever.

Woodlets and Parents

This evening I saw a woodlet on the woodpecker tree with its dad. They hung out for a while but Dad had gone to a nearby oak by the time I got the camera. I am so excited, though—this is the first time that I've really seen proof that the baby woodpeckers, once fledged, continue to hang out with the parents. I've seen Woodie and Woodina continue to come to the birdfeeder and fly away with mouths full of seed; but I haven't seen them with the little ones before.




All of the pictures above are of the woodlet. He/she stayed on the woodpecker tree a little longer, then also flew to the oak, and I followed the two of them with my camera to yet another tree. Then Dad flew to a phone pole, and a woodlet followed, and then another woodlet followed, and while all three were hanging out there, the other parent came and joined them! I wasn't quick enough to get a shot of that, but I did get Dad and the kids up there together.


This is Dad in the other oak tree

The baby on the woodpecker tree was very gray compared to its parent. The striped back is quite distinct, though gray & black rather than white & black; and its little head is still quite unmarked by color at all. It also still has the sort of spotty look that all new baby birds seem to have.


I wonder if the little ones go into the tree at night with the parent(s) to sleep. Each year after the fledging, the parents—especially the dad—continue to hang around the tree and go in the hole each night. Does the whole family sleep in there?


The juniors are the two lower birds

Tiny Mantises in Bedroom, Sunday Night

Actually, there has been a spate of tiny mantises all over, not just in the bedroom. They have also been spotted on the kitchen window screen, on the wall of the big room, and the front porch. This reminds me that I have a tiny dead mutant mantis that I saved to photograph; I think it was a nymph. Coming soon, I guess.


This is how tiny they are; it's on my chapstick. It loves Burt's Bees as much as I do, apparently.


Detail of the beautiful veining of its wings; rather dragony, don't you think?

Cardinal, Male, Singing

From Saturday. This cardinal dad has been singing, singing, singing lately; there must be new eggs or babies somewhere.

Dotted Moth, Monday Night

Little Nesting Wren

This is the little wren who is nesting in the skull on the porch. She had to keep scolding Fritz the cat, who kept sleeping nearby.