Friday, July 30, 2010

Crittery Scenes from the Neighborhood

Having to get everywhere on foot most of the time has its upsides. You really get to know the neighborhood and its many resident critters very well. Here are a few I had the pleasure to say hello to in the past week:


I'm not familiar with the friendly Labrador pup who was hanging off the top of his owners' fence, so it was a bit startling when he kept waving his paws and barking his greetings from across the street during an evening hike. The sleepy cat in the window lives a couple of blocks away and never does anything more than blinking her sonambulic eyes at me as if to say, 'Here's lookin' at you, crab!'


Chula Vista is really quite a birdy place. A big change for me is the near absence of poopy pigeons. We have many different sorts of smart-alecky sparrows, though, and some more exotic species. These ones I've managed to capture on film are: 1. barn swallow (he is one of the clan who has built a nest right under my eave), 2. western scrub jay (close up shots are his worst nightmare, I'm afraid. The curious fellow actually looks a lot more handsome from a bit further away), 3. vermilion flycatcher (likes to bounce around the golf course like a flying red ping pong ball), 4. western bluebird (there are a bunch of them around along with some eastern bluebird counterparts. Those have white/gray belly instead of all blue), 5. red-tailed hawk (this one likes to perch on my neighbor's backyard fence overlooking Telegraph Canyon Rd), 6. acorn woodpecker (a whole family of them lives in this cottonwood tree on a golf course not far from my pad. I think the males are the red-headed).

Most of these are quite wild, though some, like this friendly little dove, aren't averse to creatures' comfort... apparently.

2 comments:

bereweber said...

ahhh mister Smorg, yeah!! we indeed have plenty of birds in San Diego, huh? it's nice!! but i must refute your comment on the western scrub jay, i think he's a very handsome guy, and like any handsome guy, he's very demanding!! i have two scrub jays that come every morning and scream for peanuts, remember from my blog??? i think they are pretty!!

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_mfq83D5U-UY/SsRXjaBQqfI/AAAAAAAACGA/VpJ3zFbatPk/s1600-h/misterBlueJayFeeder.jpg

and then again my taste in "guys" has always been a bit off, ha ha

http://bereweber.blogspot.com/2009/10/mister-blue-jay.html

so cool you are documenting on birds, i do spend some $$$ on seeds weekly! these guys and the mourning doves, and the about 20-member sparrow family that live by my alley do eat a lot!

Smorg said...

Hola Bere,

Whoa! Great shots of Mr. Jay and Sr. Hawk, matie. They must really like you to let you get that close. :oD I think the family of jays at my friend's house is still seizing me up (after all, I was last seen there in company with a cat... That is probably a strike in the avian community :oP ).

I guess I lucked out and caught one of the jays under bad lighting. The one on the wire really does look handsome. :o) I'd love to see the sort of birds that are demolishing your supply of seeds there in Normal Height indeed. Do you have to keep los gatos away when the birds are feeding?

Come to think of it... I wonder if the peanut-hunting jay there is related to the quacking jay here..

Hope you are having a good first week of August! :oD