Albuquerque is all about the billboards - the one pictured above is ginormous and the centipede is three dimensional. Their new one has a giant (at least 25 ft) scorpion threatening 1-25 traffic. These warnings say a lot about the environment here. 

We recently had a different company take care of our black widows after we found more than a few and those mate-killers and they had egg sacks ready to go. 

Speaking of mate-killers I came out onto the deck one evening and saw this.

 

 At first I thought that finding a praying mantis on the hummingbird feeder was a good thing - it meant that the black widow poison had not killed all the beneficial bug eaters. I left her where she was. But something was poking at the back of my brain. So I put "Mantis vs. hummingbird" into Google.

Up popped this from none other than the Audubon Society

"It’s rare, but it’s gruesome." Occasionally a PREYING mantis does snatch a hummingbird out of the air. I guess they have tasty brains or something.  (photo from Audubon site)

 SO...  I went back out on the deck with a flashlight and a broom and made the ambitious mantis move along. Danged if she wasn't right back in the same spot in the morning. Apparently our resident mantis is an aspiring big game hunter.  This time I took her to the farthest spot in the yard.

On the way back I saw one of our two resident bunnies - a juvenile (about 6 inches.)

 Not much cuter than a baby bunny.

 

I have mixed feelings about the bunnies, because they can eat your garden clean in a night, but so far the two who live with  us have taken a reasonable tithe.

I stepped back up on the deck and watched the bun for a minute or two. A dose of cute did me good at that point. But soon I had a weird feeling of having eyes on me. I looked left - and there - six feet from my head sitting on the deck screen was a very larger raptor. Raptor looked at me and I looked at bun. Raptor looked at bun.

I clapped by hands and yelled "RUN!"  and she did.

Big bad bird gave me a dirty look and lazily flew off. 

Not today, Mr. Hawk - Not today.

I did not get a pic of the hawk.

 

 

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