bluebird81's Favorites

This guy sure was a surprise! He(or she) turned up in the tiiiiiny creek in my yard, a couple hundred yards, a small cliff and a busy road away from the nearest pond, which I have seen snappers in recently. While I didn't measure it, the shell was about a foot long. We left him alone and he was gone a few hours later to who knows where. Perhaps a male in search of females and or new territory?

in the absence of a trunk or stone to lean on, a capybara may be an option;
I have observed these two individuals do this twice;

see also
https://www.inaturalist.org/journal/nelson_wisnik/21258-the-friendly-capybara

Is it a fish? Is it a slug? Is it a fishy anemone? I do not have a clue what this is!

It is about 30mm long and there were a few of them in the sand - outgoing tide nearly on the turn. Most were buried and only the "fan fin" was showing.

Resting on the wet sand, when the sand collapsed it arched it's face upwards (2nd and third photos) and seem to spawn capsule from somewhere - there are 2 floating in the 4th pic.

Totally hypnotic, by the time my sister-in-law and I carried on the brother had walked 2kms away from us!

I was out collecting insects for my school project on my grandparents’ farm, and I stumbled across a rotten log to what I think was a Wild Cherry Tree. I split the log open, and to my surprise, I found this beautiful Eastern Eyed Click Beetle! It’s the first one I’ve ever found! I decided to keep the beetle alive as a pet and am feeding it halved grapes.

White-throated Swift hit the reflective window of my office. After hearing it hit, I went outside and discovered it upside down on the ground. After holding it for about 10 minutes, it flew off on its own from my hand, shaken but not broken. Video of the encounter here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/71649753@N07/42656018871/in/dateposted-public/

This is a young melanistic White-tailed Deer which has been around my property for nearly 2 and a half months now. He/she is still doing fine. I have posted previous records of this same individual back to June 1. The animal was born in late May.
http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/1648629
http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/1612771
http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/1575337
The temps have been 100 to 103 F in the afternoons the past week or so and bone dry since mid June. I have a 100 gallon tub of water in the yard that the deer drink from each night. This dark fawn and some of the adults tolerate me to some extent in the late evenings.

I was very surprised to see a black colored White-tailed Deer fawn this evening behind my house. I have seen some very dark White-tailed Deer in this area in the past:
http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/816864
but not one like this. These are just quick shots, taken against the light and as the deer were rapidly moving away, but this black fawn can be seen in company with normally colored fawns. I will be trying to get more and better shots in the next few days.