Today's Backyard Wildlife

[Gdurfey]

Is a 28 gauge with bird shot sufficient to take them out, or is more firepower needed?

Target load…….

 

[DLJeffs]

Australia has a spider called a "huntsman". It's in the wolf spider family, doesn't make a web, runs its prey down on foot. They grow about as big around as your hand spread apart. Their preferred place to watch for prey is up in the ceiling corners. Many Aussies like to have a hunstman around because they keep the house free on cockroaches, moths and other bugs you'd rather not have around.

And then they also have a spider called the "funnel web" spider which is an entirely different, very nasty spider.

 

[DLJeffs]

A buddy said he thought he saw a Eurasian widgeon on one of the ponds close by so this morning I went over with my long lens. Sure enough, he was there hanging out with about 50 - 60 other ducks, especially the American widgeons. They're a fairly unusual sight in north America, more often in the east with birds being blown over from Iceland. It's the one with the cinnamon color head, the other is an American widgeon.







and this is an American widgeon just for comparison....


and this northern flicker popped up in a bush next to where I was set up so I grabbed the shot. Flickers are tough to get close to.

 

[JR Parks]

Roadrunner with offering. Outside my hunting buddies office

 

[DLJeffs]

RAPTOR!! That's a very cool photo.

 

[Mike Hill]

The smaller reference has more to do with body size. In Maine, getting a 225-300 pound white tail is not unusual, but the rack is often no different than a 100 pound PA brush buck whitetail. So body wise, Texas deer are often smaller.

Depends on where you see them. There are so many, and in places with limited mast, they can certainly be smaller - lots smaller. Culling of your herd is a big thing in some places. However, in places where there is not such a big population, they can be rather large. The high brush country of West Texas is one place.

 

[Mike Hill]

I'm sure you're both right about them, but as a former "paper boy", I have a powerful dislike for spiders. Critters with more than 2 legs and more than 2 eyes just aren't right... add in projectile, barbed hair and I'm out altogether!

Same family as scorpions, Chuck... and ticks. I'd be fine they'd all gang up and kill off each other, but I'm not sparing one in hopes it controls another.

Snowflake! One year going to our hunting lease near Laredo, we must have timed our trip perfectly with some sort of massive, all tarantulas present migration march. They were all over the roads, and had gotten into the barn our camper was set up in and in the bunkhouse my uncles used. The camper was up on legs, so everybody spent the nights in the camper.

 

[Mike Hill]

Since we are talking about how childhood trauma creates lifelong phobias.....

We built a new house when I was 10 and I shared a bedroom with my older brother in the basement. We also had a family room in the basement and spent evenings watching TV there. And also watched the wolf spiders run back and forth across the floor all night long. And then go to bed in the same basement... Where every rustle of the sheets or blankets sounded just like wolf spiders running across you while you were trying to go to sleep. You never picked up a shoe without banging it on the floor to make sure a spider wasn't hiding in there waiting to bite you....

I still hate spiders, but at least I've gotten to the point where I don't immediately kill everyone I see. Still creep me out, but I can deal with them now and don't have nightmares about them anymore.

I guess we were all kinda weird in my college dorm. It had been built in 1928, so had seen it's better years. In fact, with all the very highly plastic and expansive clays it was built on, the foundation piers and such were suffering - badly. They tore it down a few years after I graduated. Where the pipes to supply the urinals and water closets penetrated the CMU wall, the holes were rather large, and big black spiders would live in the walls. First time or two when you were standing there doing your business and a big black spider would come out of hiding - it was kinda startling. Long story short, I built a wood cage with screen mesh surrounding it. We'd catch a spider and put it in the box, and then we'd go find a bumblebee/hornet/wasp and put it in the box. The one who lived, gained their freedom. There were a few bets on the outcome!

 

[DLJeffs]

I guess we were all kinda weird in my college dorm. It had been built in 1928, so had seen it's better years. In fact, with all the very highly plastic and expansive clays it was built on, the foundation piers and such were suffering - badly. They tore it down a few years after I graduated. Where the pipes to supply the urinals and water closets penetrated the CMU wall, the holes were rather large, and big black spiders would live in the walls. First time or two when you were standing there doing your business and a big black spider would come out of hiding - it was kinda startling. Long story short, I built a wood cage with screen mesh surrounding it. We'd catch a spider and put it in the box, and then we'd go find a bumblebee/hornet/wasp and put it in the box. The one who lived, gained their freedom. There were a few bets on the outcome!

Two guys in my dorm when I was in school bought two red eared turtles. We'd get a few guys and go to the pet shop and each buy one goldfish. We'd put them in the aquarium with the turtles and take bets which would be the last survivor. It was amazing how good those turtles were at catching fish.

 

[SENC]

Snowflake! One year going to our hunting lease near Laredo, we must have timed our trip perfectly with some sort of massive, all tarantulas present migration march. They were all over the roads, and had gotten into the barn our camper was set up in and in the bunkhouse my uncles used. The camper was up on legs, so everybody spent the nights in the camper.

I'd have been a snowflake with a flame thrower!

 

[Jonkou]

Been seeing them first thing in the morn lately, there are a bunch more turkeys out of the frame sometimes with deer too each doing their own thing.

 

[Mike Hill]

I enjoy seeing wildlife out my window. Mine is just songbirds, raccoons and possums. Ain't mentioning them @#%^&$# squirrels and wabbits. Have had one turkey several deer, and a fox over the years. AND I know it is kinda strange, but, I'm jonesing over those rocks. I see potential carvings. We don't have rocks like that!

 

[Nature Man]

Been seeing them first thing in the morn lately, there are a bunch more turkeys out of the frame sometimes with deer too each doing their own thing.

View attachment 287037

Coincidentally, yesterday our resident fox strolled through!

 

[DLJeffs]

Been seeing them first thing in the morn lately, there are a bunch more turkeys out of the frame sometimes with deer too each doing their own thing.

View attachment 287037

That's interesting the turkeys don't seem to bothered by the fox being so close. Or maybe it's the other way around - the fox doesn't seem to mind the turkeys as I suspect an angry turkey could run a fox off.