Animals

We have all had the best time watching for wildlife. The animals are very different here than back home, and seem to be very abundant where we live. We have seen many lizards, which are very common, but still fascinate us. They love our back wall and one has even made a home in the flower pot that houses Mae's lemon tree. She now says she has a pet lizard! The other day we saw a baby javelina on the side of the road. We stopped to take a closer look at him. He was the cutest thing. I said, "He's so cute, we should take him home." John Russel quickly reminded me that his mother was probably nearby and she might get angry and get us! (Wow! He is learning something from all those nature shows he loves to watch.) The same day we went to the post office and there was this little rabbit outside the window. He was right below it. The kids loved watching him. We have since gone back and he is still there. I guess that's his little home. We have seen a coyote scurrying through the desert as we rode down the road. It was nice to actually see what we had been hearing howling at the moon on many nights. To Mae's delight we have also seen a roadrunner running across the street. Rusty has seen jack rabbits and quail on the golf course, and we all have seen many ground squirrels. The ground squirrels look like little meercats, which the kids love because they love to watch Meercat Manor. They are very cute as they stand up on their hind legs and look around. We also saw what we believe was a pack rat at the park. We were walking along the park path one day and this little mouse like thing ran in front of us. I screamed! It then climbed on one of the cacti and just peered over at us like, "Hi! This is my little home." We couldn't wait to get home to look him up on the computer to see exactly what kind of mouse/rat he was. Then there are the humming birds. They are everywhere. My neighbor has a hummingbird feeder, and we love to watch them at their house, so we decided to get one. We all have loved watching them feed right outside our breakfast room window. But, by far the funniest thing that we've encountered isn't very foreign to any of us. One night we were sitting on our back patio enjoying the cool weather and we heard this strange but familiar sound. Rusty and I look at each other and both realized it was a cow! Now, this wasn't from some distant pasture. It was right outside our back fence. The neighbor's dog was going crazy! See, our neighborhood is in the middle of an open cattle range. We thought it was hilarious.

All this wildlife, although very common to most, is so interesting to us. It's amazing all of the adaptations these animals have made to live in the desert. We will keep on looking and adding to our memories all of these creatures that we find so unique. Pretty soon we will be able to make our own nature show!