Saturday, February 19, 2011

Critters

I didn't get a chance to show some critter activity the last part of January, when we were having cold temps, and I'm thinking, these were from days school was closed due to the snow and cold.

After the last winter critter photos I took, Larry asked me if I'd taken one of the place the opossum, we assume, dug out the entrance to its home under our deck. 


I tried taking some photos of the inside.  Is that a dead mouse to the left?  (Larry thinks it's a rock.) One of the photos had some fur, which was about the same color of Heidi's, so maybe the wind blew it there.  I really would like to see what it looks like under there.
 

The next ones were taken a few days after the previous ones.  A lot of snow had melted, and there were mud tracks.


I'll have to look up opossum mud prints like I did critter prints in the snow.


We had some very cold temps in January.  I felt sorry for the critters.


Can you see it was 5 degrees here?  I really like the dark-eyed juncos.


I finally got some photos of the woodpecker.  There was no red on this one.
 

I've seen a few cardinals, but they fly off too fast for me to get a photo.


I tossed some bird seeds on the sidewalk out the back door so I could get some photos.  We have lots of sparrows.
 

The blue jays were wary of me watching from the house, but stuck around long enough for a few snapshots through two door windows, like most of these were.



The woodpecker was still around later when I took more photos.


At supper Thursday, I spotted my first robin of the year out the window.  I had noticed one of my Facebook friends from my city had already seen one, and I was a bit jealous.


The rest of the photos were taken Friday.  This is the feeder that squirrels had gotten down to the ground so they could eat the sunflowers Larry had put in it.  He had to wait until the temps got above 32 to put it back up.  I had gotten the mixed seed for it, but Larry didn't know that, and put the safflower seeds in it.  I wasn't sure if the black capped chickadees would eat it, but was pleased to see them back after it had been up a few days.  There was also a beautiful red male cardinal, but it flew off as I was slowly moving my hand to my camera.



Heidi has been eating some of the seeds we put on the sidewalk, so Larry put some corn for the squirrels up higher.  I added some bird seed to see if I could get some bird photos.  Sure enough, the sparrows showed up.  The dark-eyed juncos came, too, but I didn't get them in a photo.




Heidi knows there are critters under the deck, and where the main entrance is.  I have planted clematis in that area, but the critters clear the area and the plants don't survive.
 

It didn't take long for a squirrel to find the bird seed.  Hey, squirrel, you are supposed to be eating the corn!


I was spotted, and scolded a bit, but stood my ground inside the door, taking a few more photos.



Well, it's not just opossums that live under the deck.  After the squirrel took over the spot with the seeds, I put a few on the ground in this one spot by the herb garden.  I watched this mouse RUN back and forth, getting a seed, then taking it under the deck.  It was very hard to get a photo, because it moved so fast, and didn't really stop as it was picking things up.  I have been wanting to take the deck down because it is so huge, and takes up so much of the back yard.  This gives me some incentive to do it as soon as we can.  Plus, it will be in need of repair soon if we keep it.  The yard isn't level, though, so I'm not sure how much of the work we could do, and how much it would cost.  I'm thinking I'd like a covered gazebo of some kind, and a brick patio under it. 


How common is it to have mice in one's yard?  I suppose most of you with larger properties have cats to keep the population down.  We had mice in the house a few years ago, but we haven't seen any signs of them for a number of years.  I wonder if they will come in if we take the deck down.  Anyone know about these things?

I am going to link in to Misty Dawn's Camera Critters.  Her link is in the sidebar.

16 comments:

  1. Great critter photos! I especially like the squirrel photographs.

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  2. I think mice are pretty common. We used to get lots of them at our house in Massachusetts, when we lived there, especially in winter. They like to go where it's warm. Our outdoor cats used to hunt them outside, but for some strange reason, if they encountered them inside the house, it didn't incite the same hunting instinct.

    Love the cardinal photo! I have lots of pictures like that too. We've been getting a lot of varied thrushes here in the back garden, I keep trying to get a good photo, but they are very skittish of movement.

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  3. You may have two varieties living under the deck.

    Would mice even leave a print? They are so tiny .

    Great pictures of the critters. We have had no squirrels this winter.

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  4. Great captures of those critters, Sue! Less than a month 'til Spring...I can hardly wait!

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  5. Wonderful pictures of birds!!
    Last year mice invaded our compost container.
    They looked actually very cute but Maximus, our cat took care of the invaders.
    Greetings from Ontario, Canada.
    Found your blog on Q's blog.

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  6. You certainly have a lot of activity round your house. Do your robins start to emerge in the spring? Ours are most prominent in autumn and winter.

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  7. I haven't seen too much wildlife in my yard this winter- so nice to see the pictures you took. Thanks!

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  8. Thanks again for such a lovely post, Sue! I love your pics of the Bluejays...makes me realize how much I miss them - noisy, pushy little things that they are!

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  9. Your one lonely robin was a great shot. He really did look the first of his kind to arrive. And your little mouse was cute, but I doubt very welcomed.

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  10. I was interested in seeing the bird inside the "squirrel-proof" feeder. I've tried those, and the birds won't go inside for me. Maybe I should try again, I get tired of watching teh squirrels chow down at my feeders!

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  11. Great photos. I can't believe the winter we've had. One day here it was negative 17F. Then, the other day, it was 80F. Strange weather and poor critters indeed.~~Dee

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  12. Sue, the verification words also make me smile sometimes.

    You sure are good to all your critters. Luv the little flash of red that made it into the cardinal photo.

    Happy rest of the week to you. We had 12" of snow in the last 24 hours. Not fun and certainly no robins like you have.

    donna

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  13. I love your photos of all the little ones. It sounds like your deck is filled with party critters that like the viddles that you put out for the birds. Hubby and I have the same problems, but since we love the birds and some of the little ones, we will keep putting out the viddles.

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  14. so many beautiful birds in your winter wonderland. I got rats and they are truly a pest here foraging from garbage bins and breeds under the drain passage ways.
    Once you get them, its difficult to get rid of them.

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