Tom's Autumn Recess

One of the advantages of Tom's semi-year-round school schedule is that he gets a week off in October. This year, he split the week between San Francisco, Santa Cruz, Ventura, and Big Bear; he covered a lot of area in a week! He started right after school was out on Friday night by flying up to San Francisco where he rendezvoused with his friends-since-freshman-year-at-UCSB, Chris and John. While there, the guys were joined by two of their sons - Jesse lives in San Fran and Sam came down for the weekend. Sunday, they drove down to Santa Cruz and spent the night at John & Judy's, and Monday, Tom drove Chris's rental car down through Big Sur so Chris could spend a couple of days in Ventura before flying home to Boston. I really wanted to see fall colors, so the following Friday, the two of us drove up to Big Bear. It was a quick trip since we needed to be back Saturday night, but we got to see autumn leaves, check on the cabin, relax, and enjoy some time alone together.

More Pond Visitors

I have been trying to catch these birds for several weeks but wasn't able to capture them on camera until yesterday.
Last night, I surprised a couple of our neighborhood opossums as they were crossing the bridge over our pond. I'm one of the weird people who think opossums are cute and often put out old fruit for them by one of the outside water bowls. I was up late doing laundry and so surprised the little one, it jumped into the water! Luckily, it was small enough that it didn't knock anything into the water as it climbed out. What a cute little thing. I got this shot of the mother(?) when it came out from under the porch.
I've often wondered whether to call these "possums" or "opossums" but have learned that only oppossums live in North America - where they are commonly called "possums". While searching for more info about these critters, I ran across a great blog: Camera Trap Codger. Take a look and you'll see some great photos!

Yippee! Another Unsuccessful Racoon Attack

After several years of coming to our backyard ponds and cleaning them out of all fish in September and October, we hope that last night's second unsuccessful fishing expedition will reinforce the message not to go fishing in the Hundley ponds. Last time, the intruder(s?) knocked some rocks, plants, and knick knacks from the waterfall in the big pond and knocked the fountain tubing out of the square pond so that it lost about 30 inches of water. All fish survived that night. Last night, it/they messed up the water lilies but seem to have left the square pond alone. (The two goldfish living in that pond have learned to stay down deep and hardly ever come all the way to the top anymore.) They knocked over the big pottery urn and disconnected the hose from the pump in the big pond, but all fish are accounted for. Knock-on-wood that the masked critters give up and go somewhere else. (Actually, they are soooooo cute, that I wouldn't mind them just visiting and maybe just drinking from our outdoor water bowls - but that is probably too much to ask!)

Changing to Fall Colors - Leaves AND Fish!

With the first day of Fall this week, we expect - even in SoCal - to see some of the trees turning orange and red. Seems the old goldfish (the ones born in the pond last year) have also decided to change colors this season. All three of the surviving goldfish (they survived last fall's infamous racoon attacks!) kept their black color until this spring when one of them turned orange . . . then orange and white . . . and now that one is totally white in color. The other two are just beginning to turn from totally black . . . to black and gray . . . and now are beginning to show some orange!

Autumn Has Arrived . . . .

. . . You can tell because the "wildlife" in our backyard has changed. The little yellow birds have reappeared (I'm still trying to have my camera with me when they come to the pond.) The monarch butterflies are starting to be seen on plants and floating through the air. The hummingbirds are also back, and it looks like the racoons are beginning to revisit the pond. All are welcome in our backyard - as long as they don't tear anything up (and in the case of the coons, they don't try to eat our fish!)