The General Chat Thread (2023)

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My cats are strictly indoors-only. Besides the fact that I live in the city and there’s traffic, we also have coyotoes, foxes, and other assorted wild critters. Outdoor cats are also devastating to songbird populations, and I love birds and want to keep them safe.

We had a mother fox and 5 babies living in my backyard in the summer of 2020. They were adorable, but also absolute killing machines. I’d wake up in the morning and see bits of dead animals strewn around the yard; they went for bunnies, squirrels, birds, duckings, rats. They always came back and cleaned up after themselves at least.
 
Here’s mama fox giving me a look.
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caseydog said:
We have some hawks around, but with a 3,300 acre ranch a few blocks away, they have plenty of rats and other small critters to pick from, with no trees in the way... and no humans around.

My backyard is small, and has a huge Live Oak canopy. A hawk COULD swoop down, but there are lots of things to crash into. Not to mention, Trixie is a fat dog, so a hawk might not be able to take off with her. :laugh:

We also have coyotes, but a coyote can't really get into my backyard. Bobcats can go over a six foot fence, if they want to.

BTW, the Texas State bird is the Mockingbird, and we have a lot of them. I've seen them attacking hawks many times. They are mean little birds.

CD
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We had a huge avocado tree plus a huge bougainvillea in the opposite corner, like 10 feet tall and 15 feet wide. The reason I noticed it was apparently the hawk either didn't get it the first strike or on the upstroke hit either the tree or the bush and dropped the squirrel because it took a couple of bounces to reacquire the squirrel. I happened to be in the kitchen and all the flapping activity just outside the sliding glass doors caught my eye.

We lived less than a mile from the eastern edge of the Everglades and 1/4 mile from a mitigation area, plus lived on a lake so we had all kinds of wildlife around. Craig found a baby possum in our bushes when he was doing yardwork. Somehow a huge snapping turtle managed to get inside our fence and couldn't get out. We had herons, that would also stalk and eat the ducklings, ibis, anhingas, a flock of green parrots, all kinds of lizards, snakes, etc. We even had a pair of eagles that nested within walking distance. I always worried about a gator being in the lake, especially after one was found sitting on a concrete pad at the elementary school a few blocks away.

Raptors are opportunistic. Something that's in a confined space is easy prey.
 
medtran49 said:
We had a huge avocado tree plus a huge bougainvillea in the opposite corner, like 10 feet tall and 15 feet wide. The reason I noticed it was apparently the hawk either didn't get it the first strike or on the upstroke hit either the tree or the bush and dropped the squirrel because it took a couple of bounces to reacquire the squirrel. I happened to be in the kitchen and all the flapping activity just outside the sliding glass doors caught my eye.

We lived less than a mile from the eastern edge of the Everglades and 1/4 mile from a mitigation area, plus lived on a lake so we had all kinds of wildlife around. Craig found a baby possum in our bushes when he was doing yardwork. Somehow a huge snapping turtle managed to get inside our fence and couldn't get out. We had herons, that would also stalk and eat the ducklings, ibis, anhingas, a flock of green parrots, all kinds of lizards, snakes, etc. We even had a pair of eagles that nested within walking distance. I always worried about a gator being in the lake, especially after one was found sitting on a concrete pad at the elementary school a few blocks away.

Raptors are opportunistic. Something that's in a confined space is easy prey.
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As far as I know, the only Raptors we have near me are the one's made by Ford. :laugh:

CD
 
We spotted an owl on our track last night coming home from our meal out.

We've narrowed it down to one of two possibilities, a Southern Boobook or a Barking owl. We know we've got the boobook because we've identified those from their call previously and we can definitely say we've not heard the barking owl call in our area before now. However the colouring and size would suggest the Barking Owl, but that has such a distinctive call, I'm certain we'd have commented on it if we'd heard it before now.

Southern Boobook | BIRDS in BACKYARDS
 
Lullabelle said:
Torrential rain here at the moment
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We are still behind on our annual rainfall here, and there is no rain in the forecast over the next several days. However, I have a new smoker, and seven pounds of meat to cook on my new smoker on NYD, so rain could happen. My car is dirty, and I'm not even going to think about washing it until my BBQ is cooked. I am not going to tempt the gods any more than I already am.

CD
 
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