Great horned owl & sandhill cranes

I took the dog for a walk last night and saw a great horned owl - at the start of last winter I was seeing quite a few of these birds, but this is the first one I have seen so far this fall. I expect to see more as autumn passes on. I love it when they start hanging around, especially when they begin calling to one another. Last winter we had a nest not too far from the house; I hope we have another one this year. The deer near our house are also starting to follow their predictable autumn habits, and they're much more visible now during our dog walks. Sandhill cranes have taken up nearly full-time residency in a mowed barley field next door; I see them every morning on the way to work and in the evening on the way home. If we EVER get a storm they'll probably think about leaving, but the weather has been consistently sunny and warm, unlike last year when it was cold and even snowy by now. Personally I am ready for some inclement weather.
Trick or treat comes tomorrow. The time change on Sunday will be a shock when darkness falls by 5:30 pm or so, but having daylight earlier in the AM will be good for riding the bike to work.

Antics (& death of) a squirrel

The squirrel has managed to conquer the round PVC tubes hung on the clothesline and the plastic baffle that covers the small birdfeeder. Anybody who has squirrels in their yard will agree that these critters can be hilarious to watch, especially if you are a backyard bird food supplier (AKA bird-feeder). Back in her younger days, Caddy (dog) would do her best to catch them, which she sometimes did (see photo of Caddy with squirrel in her mouth). When we first got Caddy in 1995, I would be mad at her for an extended period whenever she killed an animal. She was such a great predator, even on a leash. While on a 25-foot-long retractable leash she has killed and consumed numerous rabbits of varying ages. Her lust for blood extended to mice, moles, birds, and stray cats that made the life-changing decision to unwittingly enter her yard.

Now in her advanced years of age 13+, she no longer as quickly pursues all the critters she used to, and the yard squirrels seem to know that she's not as dangerous as she was when we first moved here. But they should still be very careful......

First day of fall clean-up

And the dust is flying! The soil is so dry! No precipitation has fallen for a while. Every day is warm, sunny, and fairly warm (60'sF). I turned the compost in my Earth Machine composter, not quite ready to use. Maybe before the snow flies but I'll likely wait until next spring. Will write more later about more activities this past weekend. What a great day for gardening it was! Oh yeah, harvested my last two acorn squash on Saturday - the last items to come out of the garden.

Spider at the window!

I've become fascinated by a spider named Cat Face spider (Araneus gemmoides), called that because its abdomen resembles the face of a cat. I'd never seen this spider prior to moving the the San Luis Valley, and we're now hosting our second known Cat Face spider visitor on the outside of the house. The picture to the left is probably a female since it was fairly large - nothing to show its relative size, but its abdomen was probably at least the size of an average marble, or the upper part of my pinky finger. The one shown in the image I found in August 2006, when it was hanging out on the north side of the house in an sheltered area on a fence post. It came running out when I was preparing to work on the fence.

The second Cat Face spider visitor is now visible in the living room window that faces south, and has spun a big web covering much of the window (photo to right). Just this morning it caught a moth (or the moth stumbled into the web more likely) and is now wrapping it in silk. I guess next it'll make a meal of it and then dispose of the dried-up body.

Spiders are such interesting critters, but I always get the creeps when I imagine one of these guys crawling on me!

The URL below has some information on this particular type of spider. http://entomology.wsu.edu/insectoftheweek/CatFaceSpider.html