Blog Sabbatical

I have temporarily lost the use of my right hand due to fractured bone...so no new posts for a while...

Rattlesnake Visits and Roadrunners Build Nest

this is as much of a Mohave Rattlesnake, know as a "Mohave Green" around here, as I could see, and I was grateful to see it as I was just about to step where it was resting...its flat diamond-shaped head is at the lower right, partially hidden by a branch of the rosemary bush it was emerging from under...it has two venoms, one a "regular rattlesnake venom" and the other a cobra-like paralyzer...there are few reports of its bites, apparently mostly from people messing with them...this one did not seem threatened by me;  when I quietly came back with my camera it did not coil or rattle, just stayed absolutely still...when I went out again to check on it 15 minutes later, it had disappeared...and I do not know if it went into the rosemary bush or departed...

...the other creature news of the day is that I discovered I now have TWO roadrunners roosting at night in the Caroline Jasmine vine, and I was able to get images of them just as they are about to go to roost, carrying little sticks...

LEMON, LIME & GRAPE           oil on canvas         20" x 16"

Mulberries are Delicious

caught a flash of orange and black and white through the window this morning and expected to find it was an oriole...it turned out to be a Black-Headed Grosbeak (almost as big as a robin), seen here with a just-starting-to-ripen mulberry in its thick beak...

here it has eaten most of it

the slightly beige color of the mulberry shows the ability of the birds to find them just before they are ready for human eating....so these birds gave me the signal that it is time to do something...

most of the berries are small and green like these

then along came a mockingbird who brought its treasure down to the ground to eat...and I realized it was time to save some for me, unlike last year when they ate them all...

reading historical fiction gave me an idea of what people used to do, which was to drape cloth over fruit tree branches to protect from bird eaters...so I am trying this...because mulberries are so delicious when they are purple/black ripe...and the birds can have the other 85%...

OPEN SPACES                oil on canvas            24" x 24"

A YELLOW SKY     oil on canvas  8" x 8"

INDIGO OCEAN               oil on canvas           10" x 10"