It's been a great week of discovering new birds and furry animals! I'll start with the Lewis's Woodpecker. This beautiful pink-bellied bird came to our backyard with a couple of his pals twice in one week! We haven't seen this Sierra bird in 2 years so it was a great sighting for us!
During the same week, we found our very first Red-naped Sapsucker! They are rarely seen in our mountains as well but a few lucky people see them in the Winter occasionally. This one looked like it had just landed from a night of flight. He sat motionlessly on this Jeffrey Pine tree trunk blinking his eyes slowly. Great for us since we could get a good look at him.
We had a couple of new butterflies to add to our list. This one landed on our newly planted Butterfly Bush. It looks quite like the other Swallowtails but remember it's all in the details...this is the Anise Swallowtail. It has dark "shoulders".
The other new butterfly for us was this Common Buckeye. No other butterfly on the mountain looks quite like this one. Yeah! There are a few easy ones to learn.
Coffee Berry bushes are filled with berries now. At Lake Hemet, we found both a flock of Yellow-rumped Warblers and White-crowned Sparrows feasting.
By far, the cutest animals on the mountain this past week were the two alpacas who came to visit at the annual quilt show. If you are in the market for alpacas, they can be purchased from a farm in Anza. These animals are incredibly magnetic! We couldn't leave them. Once they started to make a sound, I heard Chewbaca speaking to me! Wow! George Lucas must have been inspired by these guys!
It's been an exciting couple of weeks down the mountain in the desert for thousands of classic Rock fans. If you listen closely, you can pretend to hear Paul, Mick, Bob, Neil and Roger singing to cheering fans! Enjoy! Tonight is the final night of the historic concert!
Click on photos to enlarge.
Photos and content by Robin Roberts.
