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Deer; rabbits, bald eagles. golden eagles, turkey vultures, deer, geese swans, raccoons, coyotes, foxes, mink, beavers (rare), pheasants, deer falcons, hawks, muskrat, deer, more deer, ducks of various kinds (fish: Musky, walleye, perch, bass of different types, chubb (we call them silver bass) carp, pike, sturgeon, salmon (only in one of the great lakes as far as I know, bluegill, sunfish, croppie, and sometimes you will see deer swimming so they are kind of fish too). Deer are all over the place. They are a constant problem. (Hooray hunting season is almost here - I do not hunt but I like the population control aspect of it). Some other thing that is like a mink but is not a mink. stoat maybe?
That is basically my yard or at least the island we live on. If we go up north there may also be bears (black not grizzlies), wolves, elk, some kind of wild pigs occasionally, and even more deer, also supposedly moose and cougars but I have not seen one and know no one who has.
On my way home from work I have to dodge deer in the roads more often than kids.
Another wonderful thread...lucky you to have such differing places to enjoy
Tree rats?? Oh my...
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Clark Fork Fantast
As long as the skies are not cloudy all day!
What a lovely thread. It's past midnight, and I'm actually too tired to make a comprehensive list, but we're part-time North Idahoans and (still) SoCal residents. Wildlife all over both places, but so different! We're on a canyon in East San Diego County, and coyotes come up to our fence, taunting our dogs. We've got bobcats, racoons, foxes (haven't seen any, but I've smelled them!), skunks (seen and smelled them), possums, tree rats, and lots of birds including hawks, and an occasional visit from beautiful white-tailed kites. I had a thread going about the kites a few years back. Lots of lizards, even huge ones. Mountain lions up in the hills, and even in suburbia. And then of course the snakes--good snakes, and ra
ttlesnakes. As much as they are part of the environment, I can't move beyond the fact that our dog was killed by a rattler three years ago...And then we have termites, and ants, tiny horrors that live everywhere, in the ground, under the house, in the walls..I'm beginning to think that all of SoCal is one gigantic ant colony. Tarantulas are having a great year down here.
In North Idaho there are no rattlers to threaten our dogs, but on the other hand we have wolves, mountain lions and black bears! In our neighborhood, and passing through our property on a regular basis. And moose, probably the worst threat to dogs, because moose aren't afraid of anything, they're too stupid. Plus elk and deer, and bighorn sheep and mountain goats up in the Cabinet Mountains. Grizzlies, too. And coyotes, of course, because they are ubiquitous. If I were into fishing, I could tell you about all the wonderful fish we have in the lakes and rivers, but all I know is that it is a fisherman's and -woman's paradise. And it's just neat to know that the waterways are alive with beautiful fish. We have golden eagles circling over our property, and bald eagles on the shores of Lake Pend Oreille and Lake Coeur d'Alene, plus ospreys anywhere there is room for a nest. Turkey buzzards seem to be a recent addition to the bird population. And then we have lots and lots of spiders...
QUOTE=Coldjensens;49725572]Deer; rabbits, bald eagles. golden eagles, turkey vultures, deer, geese swans, raccoons, coyotes, foxes, mink, beavers (rare), pheasants, deer falcons, hawks, muskrat, deer, more deer, ducks of various kinds (fish: Musky, walleye, perch, bass of different types, chubb (we call them silver bass) carp, pike, sturgeon, salmon (only in one of the great lakes as far as I know, bluegill, sunfish, croppie, and sometimes you will see deer swimming so they are kind of fish too). Deer are all over the place. They are a constant problem. (Hooray hunting season is almost here - I do not hunt but I like the population control aspect of it). Some other thing that is like a mink but is not a mink. stoat maybe?
That is basically my yard or at least the island we live on. If we go up north there may also be bears (black not grizzlies), wolves, elk, some kind of wild pigs occasionally, and even more deer, also supposedly moose and cougars but I have not seen one and know no one who has.
On my way home from work I have to dodge deer in the roads more often than kids.[/quote]
I live in the San Francisco Bay Area, northern Marin County, California.
In my own back yard and around it I have seen coyotes, our native gray fox, bobcat, Western gray squirrels, voles, Raccoon, Striped and Spotted skunks, bats, wild turkeys (they are a non-native here, but are common now) Columbia blacktail deer, king snakes, garter snakes, vultures, American kestrels, White tailed kites, Acorn, Downey, Pileated, Nuttall's and Hairy woodpeckers, sapsuckers, Scrub jays, American and lesser goldfinches, crows and ravens, many kinds of sparrows, Bewick's wrens, flickers, chickadees, Oak titmice, Orange crested kinglets, many warblers, hummingbirds (Anna's, Allen's, Rufous, and once a Calliope), Mourning doves, American robins, Cedar waxwings, Black and Say's phoebes, California and Spotted towhees, hawks (red-tailed, sharp-shinned, cooper's, red shouldered), Great horned and Western screech owls, several kinds of swallows, Vaux swifts.
If you go out to the mudflats and wetlands around the bay you can see many more kinds of water and shore birds, ducks, herons and egrets, White and Brown pelicans, as well as leopard sharks and bat rays in the bay. (I'm not listing the fish you can catch or the things you can see if you go snorkeling off shore.) I've also seen a muskrat and a packrat, (Norwegian rats, too, but I try not to see those.) Also Golden Eagle, several kinds of turtles. I once saw a Rubber boa snake out there, too. Going out to Point Reyes National Seashore, you can see Tule elk, Western blue birds, all kinds of sea life at the tide pools and the rocky inter-tidal zone. If you go up to the Marin Headlands, you can see many more types of hawks migrating. And if you try, and it is the right time of the year, you can see Humpback whales migrating off the shore.
I'm sure I've left a lot out. But there is a LOT to see, especially if you want to go out and find it. But even just sitting at home, there are lots of birds and animals. You can open the windows at night and hear the coyotes, the Great horned and Screech owls calling in the oak forest. As with many places, this is a natural wonderland, if you want to see it.
a few evenings after i moved to New Mexico, I decided to go outside and sit on my front porch. It was dark, so I turned on the porch light, the porch was covered something like this:
so i decided to relax indoors instead. they were all gone by morning.
i thought the roaches were big in New Orleans, until i moved to New Mexico. I got used to the 2" long roaches after a while, but it's still creepy at night to come across them in large bunches. my son's girlfriend from New York visited, and she has some sort of insect phobia, so we would have to take roundabout ways to get into my building at night, and sometimes cover her eyes, so she would not see them. she was a bit high strung, we could not even talk about them around her or she got upset.
I should have guessed big Texas had so many various species Nice bird list...
Have you seen a javelina? A porcupine?? Those are two I've never seen even in captivity.
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Yes, I’ve seen live porcupines, but only dead javelinas, which is fine with me! I wouldn’t want to meet a live one. They aren’t friendly.
I should have mentioned that rattlesnakes and coral snakes are common here. We also have a wide variety of non-venomous, beneficial snakes. (My husband is a snake-catcher in the community. People call him if they have a snake they want removed.J
Because Texas is so large has a diverse topography and ecology, encompassing desert, mountains, pine and hardwood forests, coastal areas and prairie, we have around 600 different birds here.
High desert of NM but within a few miles and several hundred feet above the Rio Grande and within sight of mountains. Within five miles we have few if any roaches...big ants instead. Scorpions and nasty centipedes. Various lizards, Coach whip snake, Desert Cottontail, Rock Squirrels, desert rats, mice. Hawks, crows, owls, Roadrunners, thrashers, finches, hummingbirds, doves, pigeons, Gambel's quail, Scaled quail. Coyotes, occasional mountain lions and black bear. Ringtail Cat and a stray Ocelot have been reported. Sandhill Cranes in the winter. I have had a raccoon because I have a 1500 gallon fish pond...he wouldn't normally come out in the desert miles from the river.
High desert of NM but within a few miles and several hundred feet above the Rio Grande and within sight of mountains. Within five miles we have few if any roaches...big ants instead. Scorpions and nasty centipedes. Various lizards, Coach whip snake, Desert Cottontail, Rock Squirrels, desert rats, mice. Hawks, crows, owls, Roadrunners, thrashers, finches, hummingbirds, doves, pigeons, Gambel's quail, Scaled quail. Coyotes, occasional mountain lions and black bear. Ringtail Cat and a stray Ocelot have been reported. Sandhill Cranes in the winter. I have had a raccoon because I have a 1500 gallon fish pond...he wouldn't normally come out in the desert miles from the river.
Very cool. My mom used to live in Tucson. I always loved going to visit her because it was a chance to get out into the desert to see all kinds of plants and animals I wouldn't see at home. Your list sounds very much like what I saw there, although I never saw a Ringtail cat or Ocelot except at the Desert Museum. (Also never saw a bear or mountain lion on my walks in the desert - but that's OK.)
Lizards... all shapes, all sizes, all colors, some I've mistaken for alligators.
Been in Boca Raton for 6-mos now & the local lizards, of all shapes & sizes, took this long to get used to... especially the 6' long variety. Apparently, there are millions that are all non-natives... brought over from S. Americans & let loose, so they overrun the area. Strangely, 2-days before Hurricane Irma, they disappeared. Haven't seen them since... only the tiny, newborn babies are about & very few. I used to see hundreds/day... now, less than 1/2-dozen. I wonder where they all went?
Also odd is I never see birds & only 1 squirrel seems to exist anywhere near my home. Locals told me that's because the lizards climb trees & eat bird eggs & baby squirrels... eww. I wonder if the lizards found other homes, were killed as most local trees fell (in & around my area) or they've moved onto other trees? Also, with bird migration coming up, I wonder if they'll come here, now that the lizards are gone?
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