Cap'n Bob & the Damsel

Critters

Spring Song

This 10 second video is of a Curve-Billed Thrasher singing what sounds like a mating call. It’s not the usual loud “weee-weet-tweet” that we hear during other times of the year. Could it be that we’re getting an early spring about four weeks ahead of schedule? The forecast for our part of Arizona calls for 80° temperatures by the weekend.

AS you can see from the video, holding the camera steady at 250mm zoom is difficult without a bi- or tripod. I made this video today with my Canon EOS Rebel SL3 and the EF 55-250mm lens. I am still experimenting with and getting used to making videos with the Canon camera.

19 Feb 2025 by Arizona Critters Notions Photography Technobabble 2

Finches

This is a photo of one of the Nyjer Seed feeders in the back yard intended to attract Finches. You can see it was doing its job this morning when I snapped the photo.

On the left side of the feeder (stage right) is a House Finch, the male of the species. House Finches are commonly seen throughout the U.S. and Mexico, with some excursions north of the U.S. border.

The smaller Lesser Goldfinches are seen on the right and bottom of the feeder. This variety of Goldfinch ranges across much of the Southwest U.S. and Mexico. They seem to be permanent residents here in the Sonoran Deserts of Arizona.

Both species of finch like to snack on the Nyjer seeds. The oily content of the seeds seems to be nutritious for the birds. We buy Nyjer seeds for the Finches and a mixed seed variety for the other birds that hang out here. Nyjer is quite a bit more expensive than the other seed mixes, but we think it is worth the investment in order to keep the finches coming around.

Click on the image to enlarge in the viewer.

10 Feb 2025 by Arizona Critters Photography 4

Cardinalis Cardinalis

I took my Canon EOS Rebel SL3 camera with me on my morning walk, when this Cardinal lit atop the anti-squirrel cone on the bird feeder crook. Zoom lens set to 250mm in the camera’s “program” mode, which is the setting for automatically adjusting aperture, shutter speed and ISO speed. Clickable image.

It is a nice, sunny morning here with temperatures in the 50s F. The forecast is for possible rain over night and for the next few days. We need it.

UPDATE: [02/05/25] In the interest of being fair and balanced, I took an image of the Female of the Cardinalis species in a mesquite tree out back near the birdfeeders. Click to open the image viewer.

26 Jan 2025 by Arizona Critters Environment Home & Garden Notions Photography 2

New Camera Working Well

This won’t be a very long post about the new camera in use here, but I wanted to display this photo of a Gila Woodpecker that perched on a backyard Mesquite tree this morning; the new camera seems to be doing an excellent job of delivering crisp and graphic photos of our fauna and flora, as well as astronomical objects, people and so forth.

Gila Woodpecker in Mesquite tree. Click to open the Image Viewer.

There will be more images down the blog as time and energy permit.

22 Jan 2025 by Arizona Critters Photography

Second Spring

The weather outlook in our little patch of Arizona looks to be cooling off somewhat; that is, high temps of less than 100°F. In our experience, this indicates not autumn, but our “second spring” for the next few weeks. As you can see in the image above, cactus flowers are now appearing on our “Devil’s Tongue” (ferocactus latispinus).

My camera caught some other interesting things as seen below . . .

This is a Black Hawk which soared above our place yesterday. They look similar to turkey buzzards, but they lack the bright red head the buzzards are known to have.

And, as fall advances, the fruit on our lemon tree are beginning to ripen. We will be making Limoncello around year’s end.

Some of the most commonly seen birds in the area are doves. This Mourning Dove perched in the mesquite tree where we place bird feeders year around.

Click on any image to enlarge.

14 Sep 2024 by Arizona Critters Environment Flowers

Mesquite Tree Bean Pods

This morning, while walking the dogs, I photographed them inspecting the myriad of bean pods recently fallen from the Mesquite tree in front of our house. You can get an idea of how numerous the pods are under this and other trees in the area from the (clickable) image above.

During the spring and summer months, the Mesquites produce these pods, which are said to have been a staple food source among the native Indians and this area’s early settlers.

From American Outdoor:

The yellow pods were once used by all the indigenous inhabitants of the desert regions, usually ground into a flour and eaten. The ripe pods are sweet, and when ground into flour, can be used to make a variety of tasty and nutritious dishes.

This shrub, or one of its close relatives, can be found throughout the deserts of Southern California, southern Nevada, parts of Utah, in Arizona along the full lengths of both the Colorado and Gila Rivers, southwestern New Mexico, and even east to Texas along the Rio Grande River.

There is no point in attempting to clean up the pods since the desert critters and other conditions do it eventually for us. Moreover, it is too warm to be handling a rake in the 105+ degree daytime temperatures here.

By the way, Cabela (on the right above) will celebrate her SIXTEENTH birthday tomorrow. Other than partial blindness due to cataracts, she is still going strong. We expect that she’ll be with us for quite a while longer.

02 Aug 2024 by Critters Home & Garden Notions Photography

July 11th – 7/11

Today’s date reminded me of the dice game “craps” which is popular in casinos worldwide. We are not particularly gamblers, especially at our advanced ages, but reminisce occasionally about things we did in the past which we thank God that we’re now over those days and urges.

Anyhow, here a couple of notes about the goings-on in our world on July 11th of 2024:

The (clickable) image above shows one of the several mesquite trees around the house which are all fully endowed with green foliage and numerous bean pods. Not shown in the image is the ground beneath the tree covered with more bean pods. The desert critters and other phenomena eventually clean up the pods, so there is no labor involved, which is good since daytime temperatures here are in the 105-115° range during pod season.

These deciduous trees lose all the green (well, most of it) during the colder months, but have lots of bipinnate leaves providing shade during the warmer months. We’re thankful to have these around the property.

We have had Cabela, our Min-Pin, for almost fourteen years now, and she was estimated to be about two years old when we adopted her in August of 2010. In the (clickable) photo, you can see that she has cataracts in both of her eyes, the right eye completely blind now and the left one not far behind. She does OK in bright light, but tends to not see very well in darker conditions. She also seems not to be able to see things close up and her depth perception is certainly impaired judging from her reaction to things around her.

In spite of her vision problems, she is physically able to get around and prances like the little puppy still going inside of her. We worry when she runs around, since she tends to collide with objects from time to time.

This particular breed of miniature pinscher (not related to Doberman Pinschers) has skin problems resulting in bumps and growths on the surface of her (almost) hairless body. These aren’t a significant problem since they are benign and if she doesn’t scratch them and make them bleed, they don’t seem to affect her.

So, we will continue to baby her as long as she remains healthy and spry. Naturally, we dread the day that eventually will come when we lose her. Dog lovers everywhere know the pain of that.

11 Jul 2024 by Arizona Critters Notions Retirement

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