I think it’s entirely intentional when Ranger “accidentally” drops her ball into the backyard water bowl. So when it happened this last time, instead of me dutifully retrieving the sopping sphere, I made it her responsibility. Ultimately, being the smart girl that she is, she figured out there was no getting it back without going …
… in the front yard. Specifically with alligator lizard No. 2 found sunning itself Saturday afternoon on the sidewalk in front of the garage door — magnificent even with just the replacement stub of the lost tail it had been born with (click for the bigger picture): It seemed pretty at ease and habituated, even …
At passing glance, what you’re looking at below might seem just a blobtacular mass of leaf litter caught up in a tree’s branches, but in reality it’s a marvel of engineering and camouflage; a pendulous dangling nest (its entrance at the upper right), constructed tirelessly by a tiny little bird called the bushtit — I …
A couple weeks ago I read an article in an issue of the LA Times that was thankfully without any ads for gas-powered leafblowers, and it detailed the L.A. County Museum of Natural History’s plans to enlist residents of the city to undertake a “backyard lizard census.” With a “Woo!” of surprise from Susan in …
Read more “And The Great Los Angeles Backyard Lizard Count Has Begun!”
Interesting goings-on this morning. First Susan spotted a large opossum heading next door, and later I encountered two large ones at the back of the house who at first seemed to have been startled (perhaps by me) and ran from their cover next door — one through an opening in the fence into our north …
I wouldn’t yet assign blame for the total structural failure to Chudo’s (nee Buster’s) hiding place to this morning’s 4.4 earthquake, but of course I would stop everything I’m doing and use whatever I have available — in this case a pair of small hinges — to put it back together so she can get …
It was in March of 2004 that the miracle with Buster the Russian Tortoise happened — and I don’t use the term “miracle” lightly. That’s what it was: a miracle. Trust me. You can read all about it here if you’d like. In a nutshell, while Susan and I were out and about running errands …