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A pair of Cooper's hawks on my morning adventures

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I was short on time the other morning so I decided to visit an old haunt in the neighborhood: a ditch/arroyo/diversion channel. You absolutely have to take care when you are thinking of walking in any ditch. Every year we lose people who, for whatever reason, are in a ditch when it starts to rain. The rains can make ditches very hazardous in a just a few minutes, one minute you think you're safe, and the next minute you're being swept away by a torrent of water as it makes its way to the Rio Grande. In the past couple of weeks we have lost at least three people who drowned this way. After searching for them for several days (first as rescue, then as recovery) the rescue teams found all three bodies. On this particluar morning it was bright and sunny, so I was in no danger from fast moving currents. (I just had to watch for snakes!) While taking pictures, these two Cooper's hawks landed right in front of me, probably ten yards away. They were beautiful and were out hunting t...
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My daughter told me to watch out for this bird as it's time for them to show up, then the next day they did!

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Rufous hummingbirds are absolutely gorgeous little birds. The males usually have an orange reflective patch on their throats making them easy to identify. Rufous hummingbirds are very agressive; vigorously chasing away all intruders including larger birds. Getting a great picture can be a daunting task, however, as they don't sit still for long and are constantly chasing other hummers and other birds. They make for a great entertainment as they zip around everywhere. Their diet consists mostly of nectar and insects, and they tend to feed on red tubular flowers such as red columbines, scarlet sage and paintbrush, just to name a few. The males' courtship display flight traces a steep U or vertical oval, climbing high up, then diving steeply with whining and popping sounds at the bottom of the dive constantly buzzing the female. When I'm out birding in the mornings, the hummingbirds will complete their dives right in front of me often, but I can't raise the camera fast eno...
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Rufous hummingbirds 2, the perfect pose in picture number2

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Ive been gardening in our backyard for almost 30 years and I never....

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I installed a new bird feeder in our backyard and for three days we didn't see any birds on it. I wasn't too worried as I had read a couple of articles that indicated it might take up to two weeks for them to 'discover' it. The strange thing with the feeder was that birds flew in close proximity to it, but didn't land on it. The day before the black widow/bee event, I ventured outside to check on the bird feeder. Right in front of me was a snake; not huge but maybe three feet in length. Maybe the snake was the reason the birds weren't landing on the feeders. I've been putting my hands in all of these flowering bushes to weed them, and in the almost 30 years of living in this house I've never seen a snake in our backyard. Our yard is surrounded by a 6ft cement block wall, except for a gate (which has chicken wire on it).  So I'm really not sure how a snake got into our yard. My best guess is that it climbed a tree or some bushes that are in our neighb...
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The blackwidow and the bumblebee (#4 of 4)

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The black widow and the bumblebee (#3 of 4)

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The battle of the black widow and the bumblebee cont'd (#2 of 4)

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