Where the Wild Things Are

One of my favorite things about living here on Mountain Island Lake is the interesting wildlife we see in our backyard. While we certainly don't see the deer, wild turkeys and groundhogs as much as we did when we first moved in three plus years ago, there are still interesting critters that come by. 

We have had a lot of hawks hanging around. Hopefully they haven't eaten any more of the mourning doves, but I'm fine with them keeping the mice and squirrel populations in check. And they certainly are pretty predators.

hawk

juvenile hawk

Most days we see the white squirrel scampering around the yard. We named him Whitey Herzog after a winning St. Louis Cardinals baseball coach. It is still surprising to me that he manages to co-exist with the gray squirrels as I understand that squirrels are very territorial. Perhaps he is someone's grandpa and that's why he's accepted. I enjoy having him around as he is not one of the naughty ones who insist on climbing the pole to get to my bird feeder. 

white squirrel

"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin." ~William Shakespeare 

Sydney Day 4

Today was jam-packed with activities. We met our tour bus this morning at a nearby McDonald's for a 7:15 pickup. Or at least it was supposed to be 7:15. Apparently a couple of people overslept, making the driver late for our pickup location. That is so incredibly rude to inconvenience everyone else, not to mention that it impacted our schedule for the rest of the morning.

We drove in a small bus the 90 km to the Blue Mountains National Park, which is a World Heritage site. We stopped once about 45 minutes into the trip for a potty/coffee break. Once we arrived in the park we had time for a quick peak at the Three Sisters, a sandstone rock formation, before boarding the Scenic Skyway, a cable car with a glass floor that takes you 270 meters between the cliffs over the Jamison Valley. It is the highest cable car in Australia. Once across the valley, we entered the Scenic Cableway, Australia's biggest cable car. It can carry 84 people. Fortunately we only had about 30 on our  run.  The car took us 545 meters to the bottom of the valley.

Once at the bottom we walked on the Scenic Walkway, the longest elevated boardwalk in Australia. We learned about the temperate rainforest and the plant life, and also about the mining that had been done in the area. When that part of the tour ended, we climbed into the Scenic Railway. With a 52 degree incline, it is the steepest passenger train in the world. It took us back to the top where our bus met us to drive us to Echo Point Lookout. From there you have a grand view of the Three Sisters and the mountains in general. Several of us braved the intimidating steep, sloping staircase to go down to see the first "sister" up close. It was a rushed hike as the driver was trying to make up the lost time from the morning latecomers. We were scheduled to see an 11:30 aboriginal show, and Jim and I were a couple minutes late for that.

After the show we went to a nearby country club for lunch, consisting of baked chicken drumsticks, fried fish, salad, vegetables,  and a couple desserts. Then our driver took us to a surprise stop at Lincoln's Rock. The rock formation has no guardrails of any kind, and is a sheer drop off. It was gorgeous!

Last stop was at Featherdale Wildlife Park. Small by animal park standards, it is nevertheless home to  Australia' largest number of native wildlife. You can have your picture taken with a koala and also hand feed the kangaroos. We enjoyed the experience!

From there our driver Tim took us on a short drive through Olympic Village (from the 2000 Olympics) before dropping us off at the dock where we would caught a ferry for our return trip to Circular Quay in downtown Sydney. As we traveled down the Parramatta River on our way to Sydney Harbour, this was a different view of the city than we had seen before. Upon arriving we picked up dinner to go and brought it back to the room. We are tired!

What a Hoot!

Yesterday afternoon I was planting some of my annuals since it was a) not raining and b) there was no frost warning for the night. When I looked out our side window as I was filling the watering can I caught a glimpse of something in the shrub. At first I thought it was a cat, but as I looked closer I realized it was an owl. We have heard a male and female owl in the trees for several weeks now, but I had not seen one up close. Quickly grabbing my camera I tiptoed around the back of the house. The owl simply blinked his big black eyes at me. I crept even closer to him, and he made no move to fly away. He looked pretty young to me as his feathers appeared to be downy. I got some great pictures, but I guess I should have realized something was wrong with him as he was sitting fairly low in the tree. The next door neighbors came out to take a look, and we all marveled at being able to see an owl so clearly.

After supper I checked the shrub out the window and the owl was no longer sitting there. So Kirby and I went outside to do more planting (well, I went out to plant and he went out to pee on my plants) and there was the owl in the center of the sidewalk. The dog went crazy and the owl began to flap his wings and make a clacking noise with his beak. It took a while for me to corral Kirby and get him into the house, and I came back out with my camera. That's when I noticed the owl seemed to be limping, and when he would try to fly he could only get a few inches above the ground. By now the boy who lives in the house on the other side of me was in the yard watching with interest. The owl flapped and limped his way up the sidewalk, only to be trapped by the wooden fence. It was painful to see him flapping and trying to fit through the fence, but by God he made it. He ended up hopping into one of our small arborvitae trees. Alexander had gone home to get his mom and her boyfriend, and Barbara and her daughter from next door came over as well. The little owl was quite the pied piper!

I tried calling the wild animal rescue center and the wild bird sanctuary, but both of them had closed at 5:00. I put out a plea for help on Twitter, and received lots of advice from people. There was some debate about trying to scoot him into a large dog crate so he would be safe from predators for the night. I was concerned about giving him a heart attack, and I also had no desire to have my eyeballs scratched out. And then someone posted that it is illegal in Missouri to capture a bird of prey. So I decided to say a Bird of Pray and hope he made it through the night.

Of course I didn't sleep for crap last night, I was so worried about him. I went out as soon as it was light this morning, and the little guy was still safe on his perch. At 8:00, as soon as they opened, I called the Missouri Conservation Department and explained the situation. The lady gave me the cell number of the agent on duty and I quickly contacted him. Gary said he would stop by this morning and see what needed to be done. When I went back outside to check on Hootie, as I had dubbed him, the little scamp had gotten himself into a new tree. The arborvitae had great access and the bird would have been trapped between us and the fence. The new tree was between our utility shed and a pile of stepping stones and pavers left over from various landscaping projects. Not convenient at all!

When Gary arrived he confirmed that the owl was a juvenile and did not have the developed wing span to fly. We speculated that he had fallen from his nest, hence the limp, and wasn't quite ready to be on his own yet. Gary put on heavy gloves, and told me I would need to hold the white sack open after he grabbed the bird. Wait a minute - where are MY gloves? Plus this bag had about a 14 inch opening. What the heck - where is the BIG bag? So Gary squeezed by the shed and the owl began his clacking noise again. When I commented on that, Gary said "Yeah, that is his beak. He wants to bite me." Great! And I get to hold the sack...

He actually captured the bird pretty easily - I think the poor little guy was tired, hungry and thirsty - and he turned him upside down to stuff him in the sack I was reluctantly holding. Talk about trying to get a cat in a bag! But we got him in and tied the bag off to the sounds of a clacking, pissed off owl. Gary told me he was taking Hootie to the World Bird Sanctuary where they would evaluate him for injuries and determine if he needs to be held there for a while until he can fly. So there was a happy ending to the story, but tonight a large owl sat on the front peak of our porch. I couldn't help but wonder if it was Momma, looking for Hootie. No happy mother's day for her.