More Deer, and Other Critters

I moved my trail camera to a slightly different location on Sunday.  This new place appears to have a much better view of the night time wildlife activity.  Looks like the tidier areas of the Rose Field are quite the hang out spot!

Here are the images from early Monday morning and Monday night ...

... and here are Tuesday's critters:

The most awesome photo from this set of images is this one, from mid-morning on Tuesday.

Having a sneaky trail camera on duty gives me a whole different idea of who's the boss around here.  Not me, at least at night.  This place belongs to the critters ... and I'm totally okay with that.

Oh, Deer.

There are advantages to spending early mornings in the garden.  It's cooler in the morning, and I can sometimes catch a glimpse of some of the wildlife that shares the property with us.  

I saw this fawn today, sniffing around a tree in our back field.  It was about the same size as Ruby.

I was down-wind from it, and being very quiet as I slipped my phone out of my pocket and snapped this photo.  The scene was quickly disrupted when I sneezed and the little fawn bolted, its white tail raised in alarm, and it dashed toward the safety of our tree line.

Sunday Snapshot ... Checking on the Doves in the Greenhouse

Mr. and Mrs. Birdbrain Mourning Dove are the proud parents of twins!  I have been a good girl and I have left this nest completely alone since I noticed it last month ... it's been killing me, I tell ya.  The other day, curiosity got the better of me and I set up my ladder to take a quick peek.  This is what I saw:

Judging from their size, it's not going to be long before these babies leave the nest.  Mama and Papa have been going in and out of the greenhouse easily, so I have no reason to believe that it won't be the same for the babies when it's time for them to fly.  I will keep an eye out till then, just in case I need to perform another rescue .

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Sunday Snapshots are posts that are devoted to a moment in time that represents a slice of life in Hartwood, or wherever else I happen to be.

Sunday Snapshot ... Not Such a Bird Brain After All

Turns out, the Mourning Doves that were in my greenhouse last weekend weren't stuck in there after all.  (That post is HERE.)

They have built a nest in there, on top of one of the salvaged columns that I have leaning into one of the corners, way up near the ceiling.  He/She is up there, keeping an eye on me as I try to get a decent photo without frightening him/her.

The two of them have been easily spooked.  When they panic, they get disoriented and don't fly right out the open door like they should.  That's what must have happened last weekend, when it appeared that the one bird was stuck.  My only worry at this point is for when the babies are ready to fledge in a few weeks ... will the parents know well enough by then where the door is and how to reliably get out?  I guess we will see how it goes when that time comes.

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Sunday Snapshots are posts that are devoted to a moment in time that represents a slice of life in Hartwood, or wherever else I happen to be.

Sunday Snapshot ... What a Bird Brain!

I went outside early this morning to work in the garden.  As I walked past the greenhouse, I heard some commotion inside.  A Mourning Dove was stuck in there, flapping against the glass, stuck behind a cabinet on one of the benches, trying to get out.

He/She was easy to catch, and he/she didn't struggle when I pinned him/her into place and scooped him/her up ... didn't even flinch when I took my phone out of my pocket to capture a couple of images to record the rescue.  Then I opened my hand and he/she flew away.

He/She probably would have eventually figured out how to get out of the greenhouse on his/her own.  I wasn't taking a chance, choosing the direct rescue route to make sure that he/she would be okay.

(By the way, the gardens are beginning to look totally fabulous, and I can't wait to share them with you in a few weeks.)

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Sunday Snapshots are posts that are devoted to a moment in time that represents a slice of life in Hartwood, or wherever else I happen to be.

Persimmons and Possums

Last week, I showed you the huge amount of fruit on the wild Persimmon tree in the back corner of our pasture.

Each of these fruits is about two inches in diameter.

There are thousands of them weighing down the branches of the tree.

With a bounty like this, I imagined that my game camera would capture photos of all kinds of wild critters feasting on the fallen fruit.  That's not been the case so far ... all I have to show is one lone Opossum.

October 11, 11:27pm

October 13, 10:51PM

October 13, 2:07am

Not many photos and only one 'possum is pretty disappointing for two weeks of waiting, I'm sorry to say.  Since most of the fruit is still on the tree, I'm going to leave the camera in this spot for a little while longer.  We'll hope that more critters show up when more of the fruit falls to the ground.

Turkeys

Living out in the country like we do, we never know what's going to wander down the lane.  This time, it was three turkeys.

These look like hens to me ... not that I'm any great expert on turkeys, you understand.  They were loping along, pecking at the ground.  Turkeys are fairly wary, and I have never been able to get anywhere close to one.  (These photos were taken with my long lens, then cropped to enlarge them even more.)

The middle turkey must have heard something, and she started to run.  I don't think it was me that she heard, because I was sitting quietly on the deck ... the only noise I made was the clicking of my camera.  (and I was about 100 yards away.)

Then, all three of them ran.

They hot-footed it up the lane toward my neighbor's horse barn and disappeared from my view ... turkeys can run FAST.

(I figured I would share these with you, so you can see that we have wild critters around here besides those pesky groundhogs.)