Me versus nature

Not so pleasant run-ins with nature:

The other day I went to fill our watering can to "feed" our potted plants in the front yard. At the side of the house next to the exterior faucet, I saw something fuzzy on the ground. I also saw something brown on the rocks about 6 inches away from the fuzzy mass.

Naturally, I called the Hubs at work to let him know that he had to deal with something when he came home.

The fuzzy mass? A bunny's tail.

The brown stuff? Some animal's poop.

We think that a coyote caught a bunny and ate it right on the side of our house. Of course, the tail wasn't anything good so it left it there. And it 'marked' our house as its territory. Yuck!

Hopefully the bunny that was consumed is the bunny that taste tested almost all my little flowering plants in my front yard. Yes. Nibble-nibble-nibble. We noticed the full-bloom flower heads along with a multitude of leaves disbursed all over the yard.

Now on Wednesday during the drop-off drive to the Princess school, I saw something grey in the street. It looked like some gym socks. I ended running it. As I looked in my rearview mirror, I saw feathers all up in the air. [ugh] I had run over a dead bird. And I had flattened it.

I felt SO bad. I had to remind myself that the little bird was probably already dead on the street before I got there. But to see those feathers flying in the air? Oy!

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On the good side of nature:

At the kids' last swim class for this session as we waited for the earlier class to finish, the kids and I saw a hummingbird. We were sitting on the side porch area and the hummingbird flew down near the fence. It hovered near a big spiderweb. I have no idea why it hung out there for about 10 seconds, but it did. Just enough time for me to see it, point it out to the kids, and for us to watch in amazement. Those hummingbird wings just move SO quickly! We were close enough to it for the Bear to realize how different the hummingbird flies than other birds. He saw the blirr where he's normally see the wings casually flapping.

This morning I went by myself to run an errand (normally the Bear is with me since he's home full-time). As I came up the street closest to our house, a small lizard ran across the street. I had to slow down to make sure I didn't run HIM over. But he was quick.

Also this morning I went on a long walk by myself. I did this because the Hubs was home and I could take a LONG walk at a fast pace. I had to stop for a couple minutes to watch a hummingbird irritate some other birds. These other birds were bigger than the hummingbird, probably the size of an adult's fist. There were about 5 birds. And ONE hummingbird. These other birds were chirping away mightily as the hummingbird hovered and extracting nectar from the buds on that branch. The other birds moved to another branch. And then the hummingbird moved to the old branch the birds had been on. The other birds starting making more of a ruckus. It was TOO funny. This flitty little hummingbird was making the other birds nervous.

Since it's been getting warmer here, I'm surprised that I still haven't seen any snakes crossing any streets. Yes. Snakes. Soon enough I'm sure.

But have YOU had any interesting run-ins with nature recently?