Just to follow this up, I'm sat outside tonight (amazing stitch of a new moon just above the horizon) and there's a symphony of stag beetles buzzing and clattering across the purpling sky - maybe 4 or 5 different specimens and they're such awful fliers, like helicopters in a hurricane. They keep crashing into the back door, or landing in the hosters - each time throttling the wings and sounding entirely confused about the whole endeavour. What a daft, magnificent creature.
― Vanishing Point (Chinaski), Monday, 25 May 2020 20:57 (three years ago) link
brings me back to my youth scampering about nature reserves :) i didn't know they were that endangered! but like greenfinches or frogs i guess there's a reason i rarely see them nowadays
― imago, Tuesday, 26 May 2020 10:24 (three years ago) link
today i saw a couple turkeys in a park where i had never seen them before. they were running too fast to get pictures, and one of them took flight before i lost sight of it. they definitely seem more like small dinosaurs than most birds do.
― circles, Saturday, 1 May 2021 23:54 (two years ago) link
https://i.imgur.com/b9ccrWY.jpg
Mottled Tortoise Beetle
Does anyone fuck with the iNaturalist app? I just started in the last week or so and haven't totally got the hang of it. But it's like having a Pokedex in your pocket - does automated lookups of pictures that you upload. It isn't always correct, but then there's a social component where other users can check out your pics and suggest identifications.
― peace, man, Sunday, 6 June 2021 18:21 (two years ago) link
This little guy, a northern water snake. They are common around here and frequently confused with copperheads, but are totally harmless.
Also, learned that "totally harmless" isn't the best descriptor for northern water snakes, since they are pretty aggressive and will bite if you fuck with them. But they are non-venomous.
― peace, man, Sunday, 6 June 2021 18:24 (two years ago) link
hummingbird hawk moth yesterday
https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/sites/default/files/styles/node_hero_default/public/2018-01/Hummingbird%20Hawkmoth%202%20%28c%29%20Derek%20Moore.jpg
(not my pic)
― At Easter I had a fall. I don't know whether to laugh or cry (ledge), Tuesday, 20 July 2021 09:09 (two years ago) link
Sweet! I saw one of those once - was very confusing, like looking at a platypus.
― peace, man, Tuesday, 20 July 2021 10:42 (two years ago) link
Jealous of you both, having just learned of the existence of hummingbird moths a few weeks ago.
― Vaguely Threatening CAPTCHAs, Tuesday, 20 July 2021 14:00 (two years ago) link
Ha saw hummingbird moth for first time ever few weeks ago. In Creed CO. Got a great "live" pic of it feeding on flowers. Didn't know that's what it was til now.
― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 13 October 2021 17:48 (two years ago) link
Creede
1st one came and drank and fed on spilled bird seed and left. 1/2 hour later came back with a friend!https://imgur.com/a/SLtB6ViPeccaries aka javelinas
― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 13 October 2021 17:50 (two years ago) link
Cool! I saw a snowberry clearwing this summer (on a trip to Six Flags, of all places).
https://static.inaturalist.org/photos/150726474/original.jpeg?1628965535
― peace, man, Wednesday, 13 October 2021 18:10 (two years ago) link
Hacking away at some neighbours bamboo that was encroaching on our property, I was alarmed by a rather agitated and forceful flapping. I looked up to see I'd exposed a wood pigeon and her large adult son or daughter sitting in their nest. Not the most expressive of birds, they carried on sitting there mutely while i showed them to my daughter. Then we saw two ladybirds having sex on the slide.
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Monday, 9 May 2022 14:37 (one year ago) link
nature dogging
― Ste, Monday, 9 May 2022 14:57 (one year ago) link
not a sighting, because lol nocturnal, but i heard great horned owls in my neighborhood last week!! and also back in march! in march there were 2 hooting to each other, this last time just 1 i think. did you know that the pointy bits on top of their heads are called PLUMICORNS and their eyes are CONICAL instead of spheres like ours?!?! so much love 4 owls, the loveliest fowls
― Society for the Preservation of (cat), Sunday, 15 May 2022 01:44 (one year ago) link
I did not know that owls had conical eyes! Last week I learned that - for tawny owls at least - the females go 'twit' and the males go 'to-woo'.
On the basis that mundane back garden nature sightings are better than none:
Saw the mum and baby fat teenage pigeon from above sitting on our fence. The mum flew off to another bit of fence and her child followed her, nuzzling up and presumably saying 'gimme some food'. The mum flew off again, got followed again. And again. And again. Very much like the current relationship between my wife and our youngest daughter. At one point, intentionally or otherwise, the baby flapped her wing over mum's back so it looked like she was giving her a cuddle.
A month or so ago we got a garden pond - v small, 50cm across. Finally saw a frog! And some tiny - barely 2mm long - fish or fish-like creatures. My question is, how did they get there? Where did they come from and how did they travel?
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, 20 May 2022 07:47 (one year ago) link
Have you put plants in the pond? maybe eggs attached to the plants?
― Ste, Friday, 20 May 2022 12:07 (one year ago) link
Could they be tadpoles?
― Vaguely Threatening CAPTCHAs, Friday, 20 May 2022 12:19 (one year ago) link
Way too small for tadpoles - I think they might be gnat or midge or mosquito larvae :( will see if I can get a closer look at some. (Yes there are plants in the pond.)
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Friday, 20 May 2022 12:30 (one year ago) link
Saw a Heron fly between me and a Swan's nest in town.Saw loads of overgrown undergrowth I fought my way through to get to a part of the woods i hadn't been in. Thought about the local woods non well trodden areas versus a place in the forestry wood plantations in mayo I saw 10 years ago and wondered if I was remembering clearly or if the situation was significantly different that different things would be growing. I just got knocked out by that stuff in Mayo and was less surprised by the local stuff. May be more traffic in the area. Not sure if that's an influence.
Anyway seeing trees that have been allowed to grow for years and in weird forms. Undergrowth, and fun things like that.
― Stevolende, Friday, 20 May 2022 12:59 (one year ago) link
mosquito larvae are pretty distinctive ledge. They hang upside down just below the surface and come up regularly to get air from a breathing tube at the end of the abdomen
midge larvae basically look like little worms (often red) and typically stick to the bottom of ponds
signed, someone with a container pond who has disposed of untold numbers of the tenacious little feckers
― Number None, Saturday, 21 May 2022 13:18 (one year ago) link
Definitely mosquito larvae. how much of a problem are they? I found one site which said you just need to wait for something bigger that will eat them to come along.We went pond dipping in a bigger pond this morning, I caught a newt and two tadpoles. Then in a stream we found lots of freshwater shrimp, water slaters and mayfly larvae, and flatworms and/or leeches - all identified thanks to an educational sheet someone had.
― buffalo tomozzarella (ledge), Saturday, 21 May 2022 13:35 (one year ago) link
"Come on up, and I'll show you my caligraphy..."
https://i.imgur.com/srtKhUF.jpg
Margined caligrapher flies
― peace, man, Friday, 10 June 2022 18:36 (one year ago) link
ππ½ ππΆ ππΆ
― (ΚΙΙ) o (cat), Saturday, 11 June 2022 03:59 (one year ago) link
I highly recommend the Seek app for plant/bug/bird/ identification (if you can get the bugs or birds to stay still long enough). It can pinpoint a species almost instantly if you can get a good shot of it. Only downside is that I have been meaning to take my phone out less, not more, especially outdoors & with the kids around.
― dear confusion the catastrophe waitress (ledge), Monday, 13 June 2022 09:08 (one year ago) link
Ooh, that'd prove handy for bugs and plants. I prefer to flex my skillz for birds (but I could probably do with a call identification app, of which there are many)
― imago, Monday, 13 June 2022 09:11 (one year ago) link
BirdNet is the call ID app I've been using for the past few years
At this point I can pretty much identify anything you're likely to hear in a Dublin garden by ear. It really is one of the most satisfying things you can learn
― Number None, Monday, 13 June 2022 10:18 (one year ago) link
I'll definitely give that a try.
― dear confusion the catastrophe waitress (ledge), Monday, 13 June 2022 11:15 (one year ago) link
I've learned it all by ear over the years and a combination of transliterations in books (which, jeez) and https://xeno-canto.org. I can manage all the garden birds and a fair chunk of the rest of the woodland/farmland birds (wildfowl is another story).
Seek looks good. Thanks for the heads up.
― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Monday, 13 June 2022 11:21 (one year ago) link
transliterations in books (which, jeez)
yeah, these never even sound remotely like what I'm hearing
― Number None, Monday, 13 June 2022 12:26 (one year ago) link
I highly recommend the Seek app for plant/bug/bird/ identification (if you can get the bugs or birds to stay still long enough).
I use the iNaturalist app. My wife found a similar app for rocks and minerals last week, but I haven't checked it out yet myself.
And yes, staying still for long enough is a problem with insects, for sure. I now almost exclusively refer to butterflies as "damned butterflies" because they are such a pain to photograph. I don't take many bird pics - they are usually too far away for my cell phone camera to get a good picture of. Either that or they're conveniently backlit by the sun.
― peace, man, Monday, 13 June 2022 13:17 (one year ago) link
Saw some American Goldfinches yesterday. Although they're not rare or anything, they're still kinda an uncommon treat for me.
― peace, man, Monday, 13 June 2022 13:19 (one year ago) link
My friends on their Lake District jaunt were highly impressed when I responded to their speculative WhatsApp recording with an instant 'Willow warbler' recently #braggin
The worst ever bird guide transliteration I've seen was my beloved childhood bird guide claiming that the Cetti's Warbler goes 'cetti! cetti!', which is just hilarious, it is more like 'cha! wurr-chacha-wurr-cha'
― imago, Monday, 13 June 2022 14:03 (one year ago) link
Cetti's are so explosive and acidic - and they always seem to be right there in your face, even when 30 yards away.
I'm convinced they use willow warblers as pretty much every 'bird' Foley effect on telly programmes - including the US programmes I catch (and often totally out of season). Anyone else noticed that?
― Shard-borne Beatles with their drowsy hums (Chinaski), Monday, 13 June 2022 18:16 (one year ago) link
Saw this wood louse infected with isopod iridescent virus, which turns them a bluish-purple color.
https://static.inaturalist.org/photos/206537054/large.jpeg
― peace, man, Thursday, 16 June 2022 13:43 (one year ago) link
Things you were shockingly old when you learned: sloe = blackthorn, and they are fairly abundant, though none of the ones near me seem to have fruited this year - except for a neighbours hedge, so I'm finally getting round to making sloe gin. On my quest to find sloes I found some people picking rosehips for rosehip and lemon gin so maybe I'll give that a go too.
― ledge, Tuesday, 11 October 2022 12:34 (one year ago) link
Oh I saw a heron on the towpath too:
https://i.imgur.com/jk2Mtb7.jpg
― ledge, Tuesday, 11 October 2022 15:09 (one year ago) link
it's big boy day
― Its big ball chunky time (Jimmy The Mod Awaits The Return Of His Beloved), Tuesday, 11 October 2022 15:39 (one year ago) link
Seen parakeets in Oxford recently, including one in our garden. They are clearly on their way up the Thames. I saw some in Old Windsor in 2018. Maybe they'll reach Cirencester before the decade's out.
And a very skittish egret in our local nature reserve.
The muntjacs in the woods behind our house are getting very brave. I find they quite often stand and stare at you like foxes do. Lockdown may be a contributory factor but I suspect one of my neighbours is giving them carrots.
― Grandpont Genie, Wednesday, 12 October 2022 06:26 (one year ago) link
heron watch #2 - went to a pond where in the summer we'd been pond dipping and caught newts and tadpoles. as i approached. with my 3 year old daughter on the back of my bike, i saw a heron. we stopped and looked at it through some long grass, it saw us and stalked away but only to the edge of the pond. it had something long and black in its mouth but i couldn't make out what it was. we walked slowly closer - i couldn't have been more visible in my red rain jacket, but it didn't fly away. it was maybe ten metres away, on the other side of the pond. whatever it had in its mouth it seemed to be repeatedly dipping into then lifting out of the water. finally i managed to make out, dangling either side of its beak and definitely kicking, the legs and feet of what was almost certainly a frog. a few seconds later it got swallowed.
― ledge, Saturday, 19 November 2022 22:02 (one year ago) link
Mother elk this past summer in Rocky Mountain National Park:
https://i.postimg.cc/4dpRZyCr/Elk.jpg
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Saturday, 19 November 2022 22:07 (one year ago) link
Nice!
― ledge, Saturday, 19 November 2022 22:23 (one year ago) link
egret in the slough next to where I work (Springfield OR)
two young foxes playing in the moonlight (Trinidad CA)
wild turkey just hanging out in the trees (Trinidad)
― sleeve, Saturday, 19 November 2022 22:27 (one year ago) link
absolute cacophony of frog song hereabouts, sheer amphibious pandemonium, good god you never heard such lovesick frogs
― (like scratching an inch) (cat), Wednesday, 17 May 2023 10:28 (ten months ago) link
That's my favorite harbinger of spring, the night all the peepers start peeping en masse.
― Hideous Lump, Wednesday, 17 May 2023 11:34 (ten months ago) link
it is pretty dang cute ππΈπ
tho they also remind me of the "honk if you're horny" tim robinson sketch
― (like scratching an inch) (cat), Wednesday, 17 May 2023 11:53 (ten months ago) link
the frog orgy has run its course, barring a few lonelyheart holdouts, so last night it was quiet enough to hear a pack of coyotes whooping it up! once i'd made sure they were coyotes and not people howling (omg do you remember the early covid howl-alongs?!) i went out hoping to get a better earful, but no joy. the crickets had a lot to say, though, and there was a recurrent fluttering flutey hoot like that of a screech owl, and creeks trickling silver in the moonlight, etc.
― Normal Jean (cat), Tuesday, 30 May 2023 12:04 (nine months ago) link
I'm jealous of the cricket noise and have been all my life, you'd have to go the snake food section of Pets At Home to hear them where I live and that isn't a very pleasant way to hear them.
― calzino, Tuesday, 30 May 2023 12:37 (nine months ago) link
I usually see about one snapping turtle a year in my neighborhood. This lady, however, chose a local playground as a less-than-ideal spot to lay her eggs. After several frantic early morning calls to wildlife rehabilitation experts, we just let her finish her egg-laying (as is required by law in MD). Then a neighbor and I hauled her back to the river. Apparently, they lay the eggs really deep (one rehabber described the egg hole as "like a Pringles can") so there's a chance the turtles will be okay. I'm to keep an eye on the spot in early August to see if any hatchlings need help making their way to water.
https://i.imgur.com/qMaBcFb.jpghttps://i.imgur.com/irjZnVd.jpg
― peace, man, Tuesday, 30 May 2023 13:06 (nine months ago) link
Also saw my first pileated woodpecker last week, at the same playground! I've wanted to see one of those since I was a little kid watching Woody Woodpecker. It was a majestic bird, but I frightened it off by pursuing it too eagerly in hopes of a photo.
― peace, man, Tuesday, 30 May 2023 17:52 (nine months ago) link
They're so adorable. I wish they didn't have such a problem with rabies.
Several years ago, I was chaperoning a group of 1st graders to a nature center field trip. I had a few braggadocious boys in my group who were claiming to have seen all sorts of animals. "I saw a bald eagle!" "I saw a deer!" "I saw a rattlesnake!" I'm 100% sure the wildest thing they saw was a squirrel. I know because we all stopped to look at it for like, 3 minutes.
After we sat down to lunch at some picnic tables, a girl told me in the quietest little voice "I saw a raccoon." And, absentmindedly passing out the lunch bags, I'm like "Oh where did you see it?" And she points, and quietly says "over there." And sure enough, the biggest chonker of a raccoon I've ever seen was popping out of a dumpster next to the picnic pavilion! So I gathered all my kids and we all hurried over to get a slightly closer look at this wildlife before it clambered up a tree. Her observation was the highlight of the field trip for all of us.
― peace, man, Saturday, 2 September 2023 15:02 (six months ago) link
Anyway, here's a crappy cell phone pic of a bald eagle I did see (ha! ha! first-grade boys) while kayaking the other day.
https://static.inaturalist.org/photos/316077341/original.jpeg
― peace, man, Saturday, 2 September 2023 15:17 (six months ago) link
wild turkey family
https://i.ibb.co/VpWf5s2/IMG-20230823-131146111-HDR-2.jpg
https://i.ibb.co/XSXfj4p/IMG-20230823-131152079-HDR-3.jpg
raccoons near 108th st in riverside park emerge from a crack in the wall every evening approx 5:30pm before an adoring audience bearing scraps. they are celebrities.
a racoon licked my shin once while i was drinking a glass of wine in my friend's backyard in the middle of the night. i was startled by it's sweet kiss and jumped, then looked under the table expecting to find a puppy.
― Deflatormouse, Saturday, 2 September 2023 18:03 (six months ago) link
A herd of between 12 and 20 deer, depending on the night, shows up in the field behind my apartment building pretty much every night. It's been a few weeks, maybe two months, so I've been able to watch them grow, which is pretty amazing.
― read-only (unperson), Saturday, 2 September 2023 18:35 (six months ago) link
heard squealing out the front and went to have a look and there were two urban foxes going through the binbags (only recycling so slim pickings). one wandered off, the other just curled up in the middle of the road (it's 02:30 and the end of the road's closed for water works so no traffic)
― koogs, Tuesday, 5 September 2023 01:40 (six months ago) link
Speaking of foxes and the middle of the road, we have had foxes in our neighborhood for years. It's been fun to catch an occasional glimpse of them at night dashing into someone's yard late at night. But this year, for some reason, they've started shitting in the street. You can tell it's fox scat rather than someone's dog because there are usually some visible berry seeds or the occasional tuft of fur.
― peace, man, Tuesday, 5 September 2023 09:01 (six months ago) link
Used to walking past foxes in the middle of the day now as they gingerly wait between two parked cars for you to pass by on the pavement just a couple of metres away so they can get back to that tasty binload.
― nashwan, Tuesday, 5 September 2023 09:10 (six months ago) link
a deer, less than ten metres away, watching us over a fence for a couple of minutes. I'm no deer expert but I think maybe it was a young roe, not a muntjac.also I've been hearing an owl at night, haven't seen it yet but someone on the street took a photo of it on sitting on a television aerial.
― lurch of england (ledge), Sunday, 24 September 2023 07:21 (five months ago) link