There’s a purple crocus that blooms every year in the woods near our home. My gf had no idea how it got there. I saw it a few weeks ago.
Neighborhood hawk. Looks like he found him something yummy!
Cool picture! Is it a red shouldered hawk?
I think so - Florida has a very pale morph of the red-shouldered hawk, Buteo lineatus extimus.
Yep, that looks right!
Now that I’m home, I finally have a signal. This is Bolt. He took me on a ride through a red cedar forest on Wednesday.
Sweet! The park looked pretty nice too. Good weather?
Monday and Tuesday were chilly, but Wednesday and yesterday were quite pleasant. We had rented a pet friendly cabin, so the puppy-dog could come with us on our hikes, but not on the horse ride.
We have blackberry lilies (which are actually part of the iris family) that come up randomly in our yard.
Apparently they spread via both seed and rhizomes. It’s fun to see where they turn up next. I deliberately spread some of the seeds last year, so we’ll see if they come up where I put them.
I don’t think I’d want to ride a horse named Bolt, 
We have an ermine in our rock wall outside our bathroom. Awesome! We have serious gopher and vole issues. Bring it on, little guy.
I was walking our dogs in the woods near our home just now and I saw something off the trail that looked out of place. I walked over and picked up a peanut feeder, just like the ones we hand in the trees around our house.
Curious, I carried it home. It was around 1500 yards from our house. There aren’t any other homes closer to where I found it. I showed it to my gf and yep, some animal had carried it off a considerable distance.
A swallowtail already!
Gorgeous.
Sounds like Teddy Roosevelt.
I know some of y’all are not fond of grackles, but I have to say I think our expanding population of Great-tailed Grackles are neat. They’re just very handsome, showy birds.
I mean just look at this guy, he knows he is handsome.
And if you disagree he will devour your soul!
Yikes!
Mighty photos once again, @Tamerlane !
Today, taking a stroll through Priory Park in Reigate, we saw the albino grey squirrel again - third or fourth time, always in the same small group of trees. Photo at post 2771 - that was 18 Nov last year, so the little fella has survived these last five months OK. I tried to get a new photo but simply couldn’t - It’s a very wary animal and disappeared under some ivy when I got within about 20 meters - which is very unlike a typical park squirrel round here. Smart enough to stay safe, I guess.
j
You know he means business not just from the open Beak of Death but because he has both eyes focused directly on you. That means he’s calculating distances and trajectories, probably to your eyeballs or throat or both.
I like birds but every once in awhile they can remind you that they are the tough mofo’s who survived when T. Rex couldn’t.
Another owl! This one is a barred owl. I took this photo with my phone, couldn’t get it to zoom.
Then this one with my husband’s phone, zoomed too much! What a cutie, though.
Always very cool to see owls!