13 October 2012 - Signs of Fall

According to David and his rain gauge we had ¾ inch of rain last night, it was great! We really need the rain. Jack had fertilized the lawns, yesterday, hoping for the overnight rain, and we were not disappointed. 
 
This morning, sitting at the computer and looking out, the sun is shining on a very clean world. Everything is sparkling with little drops of water.  The mountain tops are wreathed in low hanging clouds, and the colors are rain-washed and vibrant. 

While I was sitting here this morning, a flock of quail came scoodling across the lawn from the garage to the feeder. One at a time as always. Run, run , run…little legs moving as fast they can. This time, they were accompanied by a rabbit.

The poor quail are having a hard time. The blue jays are swooping very low over their heads trying to move them along, then a red squirrel showed up and was running headlong into the flock chasing them out from under the feeder. Then a second squirrel showed up to chase the first squirrel followed by a magpie who pecked both squirrels away.  It is a mighty entertaining world outside of my windows.  Oops!  Here is a big old rock squirrel up on the porch trying to chew up a piece of cardboard.  I think all the animals and birds are getting ready for winter. Wonder what they know? 

What I know is that we have moved from late summer to fall. The air is crisp, the hummingbirds have already moved south. We are starting to get occasional sightings of winter birds. We've seen a couple of juncos, a stellar's jay, the magpies, flickers and downies are showing up regularly and so are the deer. Oh yeah, way too many deer are showing up in the yard every evening at dusk. I've been spraying my favorite plants with deer repel, which smells absolutely vile, but works. 

We had a couple of evening grosbeaks stop by. Saw them for two days in a row and haven't seen them since. Guess they were moving south as well, but it is always a treat to see something new. 

Meanwhile, the squirrels are really busy stocking up on food. The red squirrels get huge mouthfuls of sunflower seeds then bury them in the lawn. the seeds are starting to sprout which pushes the turf up and reveals a silver dollar sized hole with 50 to 100 sprouts.  The rock squirrels are also storing food. They get their cheek pouches so full they look like they might burst. He reminds me of the kid in the Harry Potter movie that ate something from the Weasley's Skiving Snack Boxes, and his face grew really long.  The rock squirrels spend all day loading up and taking off for parts unknown. 


Fall is when we often see praying mantis. Came home to find this lady on our bags of fertilizer. I tried to get a close up portrait and she objected.  Had to go get another camera.