Urban Wildlife

Go away, lady, I’m hungry!

I didn’t get any shots of hummingbirds at the Hummingbird Sanctuary in my last post~I didn’t even see any. But I see plenty in our yard and got these photos today. Not my best hummer shots (these and these are) but they do mean I won’t be blog post-less today.

I saw some gorgeous orange butterflies in the yard, too, but they moved way too fast and never seemed to light. They seemed too orange to be monarchs but I definitely have never photographed these kind before so I hope they stick around and slow down.

We promise we won’t go after the pretty butterflies, Mom!

Bonus Urban Wildlife Pictures!!!!

If you read my blog much, you know we live in central Phoenix, in a very urban area, surrounded by busy streets so earlier this year, after 18 years in this house, we were surprised to hear there were coyotes on our street and hawks in a tree down the alley! We were not at all happy about the coyotes because we have many outdoor cats and I definitely didn’t want them to be snacks. However (knock on wood), they disappeared from our area after a few days and no pets in the neighborhood were harmed. One of our neighbors saw a coyote in our carport~where the cats sleep and congregate~one night about 11pm but I guess they weren’t hungry. I know that coyotes have large territories so they could be back someday but I hope not. The hawks hung around longer but have now also left. I wasn’t quite as worried about them in relation to the cats as hawks seldom go for grown cats.

But I was really surprised the other night, at about midnight, when I looked out the back window and saw what I thought was a new cat eating out of the food bowl in a little covered alcove we have (the “catcove”). The striped bushy tail looked a lot like Google’s but as he turned his head, I saw a black mask. Raccoons in central Phoenix?!?!? One of the cats was sitting next to him watching him eat.

I went out to see him better and he ran off. I was shocked and read about them the next day. Others in Phoenix have had them. Once again, I was worried about the cats, although everything I read said they will only attack if they feel threatened and they often co-exist with cats. But I know they can be destructive and try to break into attics to live.

I’m not sure Tony entirely believed me about Rocky Raccoon but the next night around 11pm, he heard a thud on the roof, a bigger thud than the cats make. Once again, I looked out the same window a little later and there he was again! I got Tony up and we watched Rocky wash the cat food in the water bowl before eating it. Two of the little cats came and chased him so we went out back and Tony spotted him on the roof and we got these shots.

He has not been back for the last 3 nights~I can tell because the water in the water bowl would be all dirty from him washing his food and there would be kibble laying around as there was the 2 nights he was here. He either didn’t like being chased by cats, camera flashes, or decided the food wasn’t that great.

He’s cute but we don’t really want him around. I hope he’s safe and that no one harms him but we prefer that he has moved on to a better place so we don’t have to worry about his safety, the cats’ safety, the attic’s safety, etc. I think it’s very sad that so many of these animals have been displaced by humans from their natural environments. However, in all the reading I’ve done the past few months, I know raccoons and coyotes have adapted to urban life. In Phoenix, the urban coyotes are in their 10th generation and urban raccoons often do not survive if relocated to the wild. As it is, neither AZ Game and Fish, nor Maricopa County Animal Control, nor the AZ Humane Society will help with relocating these animals. Citizens are on their own to trap, relocate, or dissuade these animals from their neighborhoods.

We really hope Rocky will be okay but that he won’t be living around us.

H-Bird Sanctuary

I love the look of the rocks against the cor-ten and vines. The other day while looking for signs of fall, I found a little park that I have been looking for half-heartedly for quite awhile. It’s embarrassing how close it is to where I work in Scottsdale and yet I just couldn’t seem to find it.

I looked on Google maps around the area, found it on the map, and then finally found it in person. It’s small and kind of gets lost in the surrounding buildings.

It’s got 5 of these steel trumpet flowers, designed after real trumpet flowers.

A couple are almost bare and the other 3 are in various stages of being covered with hummingbird-attractive vines.

It’s been there for 17 years, I must have driven past it countless times! Another local blogger, John Romeo Alpha, blogged about it over 2 years ago, but I still couldn’t find it.

After over 3.5 years of blogging, it’s always fun to find a new-to-me place to blog about and photograph. Incidentally, most of the photos in my last post were also taken here, including those of the 2-headed butterfly.

In Search of…

…traces of…signs of…autumn in Phoenix.

As we head into the equinox, it would be nice to see some lovely fall images like I see on other blogs…

But fall in Phoenix isn’t like most other places in North America…

In Phoenix,

Spring comes early,
Summer lasts forever,
Fall comes late,
And Winter doesn’t really happen.

Here it will be 107 on the equinox…yet we have cooler nights and mornings now, down into the upper 70s, lower 80s…and that brings the promise of sweatshirts, jackets, firepits, and the scent of mesquite in the air…

Here, it’s the quality of light that is the most distinctive measure of autumn and we have that.

Psst…wanna see something weird? You might have to take my word for this because I don’t have a very long telephoto and I couldn’t get real close.

See that butterfly on the pretty fairy duster? It looks like it has 2 heads!!!! So I googled it and it’s a hairstreak (not sure of the exact subspecies of hairstreak). They have “fake” heads on the backs of their wings in order to fool predators as their tails are expendable but, obviously, their heads are not.

At first, I thought it was two butterflies but I saw it flying and wondered if it was some mutant. But, no, I found other photos of hairstreaks. I’m so excited I got to see one and get some (crappy) photos.

Here are a couple of photos where you can see this strange (to me) phenomenon~1,2. It is referred to as “protective mimicry” here. Here’s another one I found on Flickr where you can distinctly see the “fake” head and antenna. Bizarre and fascinating, isn’t it? A whole new butterfly type for me.

Scottsdale Art Mystery

Ever since my cousin, Deborah, and I read Nancy Drew books and pretended we were the Dana Girls when we were young, I’ve loved a good mystery. I have a need to know the facts on just about everything and the research is the best part.

So this house in the Old Town section of Scottsdale has intrigued me for years. I drive by it almost every day on my way to and from work. And I blogged about the art in the yard in January 2010. Back then, it looked like this:

It has changed a little over the last couple years. Those pennants or flags were replaced with different, more orange-y and earth-tone ones.

A couple of weeks ago, I was dismayed when I drove by and saw a man out in the yard who appeared to be cutting the tree down. Fortunately, over the next couple of days, I realized that was not the case.

Click to enlarge for a better view.

It seems as though the already dead tree sustained some further damage and broke off. This tree must have some major significance to the homeowners because it has now evolved into an even more unusual, more elaborate, more artistic work.

The rebar (?) is even more ornate now as is the stone work. Who would think a broken, dead tree could look so cool?

I took my camera to work with me the other day, determined to get some shots on my way home. As I got there, I saw that the man was out mowing the lawn. I almost chickened out and kept driving but I really wanted to know the story of the art. You can’t park right on this street so I had to go around the corner to park. By the time I got back, he had moved into the back yard with his lawnmower. So I still felt I had to sneak my shots. 😦

I don’t know the exact answers yet. But I do know (thanks to all the online county assessor records) that the house is only 792 square feet on a lot that is 13,561 square feet~leaving lots of room for unique art and a lush park-type setting. It’s owned by the trust of a woman who was Scottsdale’s oldest native at the time of her death in 2007. Thelma and her sister and other members of their family were prominent in early Scottsdale, when it was a smaller, more “western,” much different town than it is now. They formed the Scottsdale Historical Society. She developed a reputation as the city’s “watchdog,” making certain that the public was well-informed on city happenings and she worked hard to preserve Scottsdale’s history.

I think the artist is her son, George, who is in the Arizona Artists Guild. He has also now added a few other pieces of art to the yard, incorporating more dead trees, and other objects. I guess he may just be preserving his childhood home and these trees have a sentimental or historic value to him.

It makes me sad that when we had 2 dead trees cut down in our yard over the last few years, all we did was have them chopped up and carted away.

*If I ever get information from the artist himself, I’ll post an update.

Swap and Hop

I’ve posted this above photo before but I used it recently in the Liberate Your Art postcard swap in which I participated. I affixed an “official” postcard backing to it and mailed 5 of them to Kat Sloma along with stamps and address labels. In return, I got 6 postcards myself (5 from other participants and one from Kat).

I thought I would show you the postcards I received and give the blog addresses of the artists so, if you’re interested, you can check out their blogs.

The blog hop is sort of the finale of the swap and there will be a link at the end of this post so you can visit other participants who also blogged about the swap.

Here are the postcards in the order I received them.

This is from Karen Isaacson.

This is from Judi Shipley. I don’t have a blog address for her.

The above one is from Dana Strickland.

And from Germany, Katrin Klink.

Stephanie Mull sent this one (above).

And the person who put the swap together and mailed out (6 each for all entered) postcards to 193 participants, Kat Sloma, did the postcard above. She does the swap every year so keep it in mind for yourself next year. This is Kat’s post about the blog hop with a video showing all the art.

Aren’t they all gorgeous? I used to do mail art for almost 10 years…sending and receiving a lot of art during that time…so it was fun to experience that again. All the postcards I received seemed to be professionally done whereas my own just had a postcard backing. I was surprised that everyone seems to have “real” postcards. Maybe I’ll get some myself…

This is the link to the blog hop so you can what other participants have to say about it and see what they received: