Check out these fur babies! I recently got these shots of a young squirrel and raccoon, hanging out. I am not so crazy as to get that close to a raccoon, and the pictures are thanks to my new telephoto lens!
These pictures join my other urban wildlife photos that I’ve taken recently. Here are some young robins, and here is a series of insects. Also, back on Christmas day I captured these of a rare white squirrel that lives in a park nearby.
Now, I have also seen a couple of skunks lately too, but that’s when the “I’m not so crazy” part really comes into play. I would have loved to get a shot, but they mostly come out after dark and frankly, I didn’t want to take the risk of being shot back after startling them with a flash!
However I do have this interesting story about one of the sightings … Nick and I were quietly sitting in our yard one evening when we heard some rustling and crackling coming from the other side of the fence. Then we spotted the source … it was a HUGE skunk, meandering towards the opening in the fence. Straight.towards.us! Then we noticed that the reason it was so big was that it wasn’t only one skunk, but a whole family traveling together as one. The mother (we presumed) walked along with her young gathered tightly around her. I guess this is how the babies stay safe, because it is my understanding that newborn skunks don’t yet have their defensive mechanism developed until they are older, so are very vulnerable at that age. But if they merge with others and become part of a really large skunk you can be darn certain that nobody is going to mess with them! They ended up just shuffling by and completely ignoring us.
I remember one summer as a child when we were camping and found some baby skunks. I was able to get a close-up look at them and found them to be adorable. I really wanted one.
Anyway, I’ll keep a look-out for a good skunk photo op but it might take a while! In the meantime, please enjoy this selection from my vintage greeting card collection.
Thank you very much for dropping in. I appreciate your visit to my blog!
xo loulou
(title source: Cat Stevens)
