Janell concluded her Mama Squirrel nature study with a test of her hypothesis that Mama Squirrel would stuff an entire roll of toilet paper into her burrow. As background, Janell noted she had witnessed ground squirrels scavenging TP from the public bathrooms at the beach in the springtime. “I assume that they are lining their …
Author: Cat Urbigkit
Squirrel study, part I
My friend Janell has done it again. This week, her nature study involves Mama Squirrel. Enjoy! “Spring is here, spiders are making beautiful vaselike egg cases and squirrels are lining their burrows with … toilet paper. “At the beach, I have noticed the ground squirrels filching TP from the public bathrooms and bringing it into …
Bola spider
My friend Janell Cannon, a wonderful children’s book author and illustrator, sent me an email detailing her recent encounter of a bola spider in the apple tree on her property near Carlsbad, California. It was fantastic, so I asked, and received her permission to share. Janell loves to study animals, and was the friend who …
Livestock in the living room
Every year during lambing, I end up with orphan lambs (although husband Jim claims I am just as likely to steal a lamb as to wait for one to get lost). I love having bum lambs – they are lots of work, but it’s all good. If they are ewe lambs, I keep them and …
What’s wrong with this picture?
We don’t normally start lambing until May, but last fall, our four rams broke through two fences and went underneath the highway bridge so they could pay a visit to the ewe flock south of the highway. They were only in overnight, but so far I’ve had about a dozen ewes giving birth in the …
Light pronghorn
It’s been a long, busy day, since we are calving (as planned) and lambing (oops – not planned for another month). Anyway, things are going well, but we’ve got lots of new babies on the ground. Jim and I drove to Boulder, Wyoming, for lunch and a beer, and on the way back to the …
Spring transition
We’ve had three snowstorms hit in the last week here in Wyoming, shutting down thousands of miles of roads. These spring storms mean that we have slick, snow-covered roads with no visibility one minute, and within a few hours, the roads will be dry again. Yesterday, we had to haul hay from a farm in …
Ferrgs
On Saturday, Jim and I encountered a ferruginous hawk busy with nest-building. The nest we saw being constructed is located amid sea of sagebrush atop a rock outcrop adjacent to a highway. Unfortunately, it is just inside the highway fenceline, and a road upgrade project will reach it in the coming days. The nest is …
The buck stops here
After a busy morning of computer work, the other day I went for a walk in the afternoon with livestock guard dogs Rena and Rant, and herding dog Abe. It was about 40 degrees and we went up on the Mesa, watching the two bald eagles sitting on our fenceposts behind the house. There are …
No hen could resist this
Grouse leks are traditional breeding grounds that are fairly large open areas surrounded by sagebrush. Generation after generation of grouse use these traditional sites. This morning, I went to what is usually a very large sage grouse lek to find only about 60 birds on the vast breeding ground. Last year there were a few …