Thread: Pets

(Left to right) here's Cheech (or Chong), Mr. Lister, Thor (or Frill), and a bit of Big Red:

Shelley, what a cute little nut-stealer! We seldom see squirrels around our place, although it's pine and oak forest - every now and then one wanders by but nothing at all to count on.

Teel, dang that makes me want a koi pond! I'm afraid the raccoons around here would eat 'em up as fast as I put them in there though.

Here are some cute pet pix I got in an e-mail.....I'll post more later!

(BTW-pretty fish! My cat would run them crazy chasing them!)

Teel, dang that makes me want a koi pond! I'm afraid the raccoons around here would eat 'em up as fast as I put them in there though.

Char, an egret actually wiped out most of my fancy goldfish (not koi, just fancy goldfish) last winter. I came home from a hike and found him in my patio garden:

He'd eaten all but 3 of the fish, but I didn't know that yet when I took the picture. I was so thrilled with the breathless beauty of the bird that I never considered the peril to the fish.

I discovered the fish missing about an hour after the pic. Even later, I noticed what looked like crumpled paper under the japanese maple. When I went to pick it up, I saw it was Big Red (about 8" long and 2 inches fat). I guess he was too big for the egret to swallow, so he spit him out. To make a long story short, Big Red miraculously survived that extended time out of water - so now I often call him Suuuupperrr Red!

There are ways to keep pond fish safe from predators (racoons and birds). One is to make a bigger, deeper pond. There are also net covers, decoys, and motion detect alarm/sprinklers. As egrets are territorial and unlikely to infringe on another's territory, I now have a cheesy egret decoy (CED) made from resin.

The gals in the veterans' forum came up with a name for him: Sir CEDrick Stilton:


Actually, all kinds of birds love the pond and enjoy bathing in the little waterfall.

Teel, how big is your pond? Deep??

I'm gonna talk to DH about doing something like that when we landscape the yard. Our biggest problem is we try to avoid hard surfaces as much as possible because they are such wonderful golf-ball deflectors - usually right back into a window! The sound of tinkling glass is NOT fun!

Char

My pond is on the small side for safey from predators - picture inverted pyramid that's about 4' wide x 5' long x 3.5 deep. Although it's small, it invites an amazing variety of wildlife for a small patio garden. There are a few rare Santa Cruz Mt. brown spotted salamanders that hangout near the pond; and they are surprisingly charming when I happen upon them.

My pond is rimmed with stone, but I don't see why one couldn't cover the edge with plantings (probably in containers) instead. Sunset (of course!) has a good pond design book.

Have you been to Jean de Luz antiques in Carmel Valley Village? (God, I love that place!). He has some nice water gardens in old fountains and raised stone planters. There's a restaurant nearby that has a waist-high raised pond in it's patio dining area. When we had lunch there, the koi swam up to watch us eating. It made me wonder about who was entertaining whom!

Here are some pics of today's pond visitor (must have taken 50 photos - these are my favorites):

I like this one for the butterfly shaped reflection just below the dragon fly.



And, coincidentally, the shadow from the tree on the right echoed the look of the dragonfly wing.


another view

Beautiful pictures, Terry! Oh, how I miss dragonflies. We see one only once in a blue moon here.

What wonderful dragonfly pics - thanks so much for sharing Teelbee - I love those creatures!

Oh Teel, great shots! More, More!!

Breathtaking!

I may have posted this before, but this is a pic of our beloved Fu-kitty and Danny-dog, both of which are no longer with us, but they sure gave us lots of love and wonderful memories
Fu-kitty would reach out and *touch* Dan on the nose, and she would leave her paw on his nose for several minutes. She didn't swat or box him, just a little furry love pat. LOL

Terry,
I meant to say, the dragonfly is spectacular. I don't think I 've ever seen a red one. Most of ours are cobalt blue and an occasional silvery gray. The dragonflies don't stand a chance when the Martins are here...they are the main course for the little baby martins!

Shelley

Aw...what a cool pic of Danny the Dog and Fu-kitty - it's nice to have remembrances, isn't it?

Char

Well, the same DragonFly came back and hung out again on the horsetail reed for a long, long time. I guess that makes her a real pet, LOL. If it's a she, I hope she is laying eggs here.

We had some cobalt blue damselflies visit last summer. They look like dragonflies in flight, but fold their wings when they alight.

This is a pic with the new camera, which I'm still figuring outl but you can see the better detail already.

Boy Teel that's beautiful!

We get a lot of damselflies here. I don't think I've seen any dragonflies in this yard though. It may not be warm enough for them here, dunno for sure.

What kind of camera are you using?