Quintin & Cruella de Quill

Twilight

Quintin & Cruella de Quill watching the colors at dawn

Cruella: “Hey Quintin! It looks like a pathetic paparazzo is pestering us poor porcupines.”
Quintin: “It seems that way, doesn’t it!”
Cruella: “He can’t leave a pair of porcupines in peace to enjoy the colorful dawn.”
Quintin: “A paparazzo with no regard for porcupine privacy!”
Cruella: “So? What are you going to do about him?”
Quintin: “Uhhh! Like what can I do about him?”
Cruella: “Throw some quills at him! Poof up and act scary like you’re going to attack him, or something!”
Quintin: “You know I can’t throw quills…”
Cruella: “Yeah! But that pesky paparazzo might not know that. Humans believe we can throw our quills at them.”
Quintin: “Il paparazzo is unphased by those tactics!”
Cruella: “You’re going to have to hit him with the heavy artillery!
Quintin: “Nooo! You don’t mean…”
Cruella: “Yes, I do… Set up him the stink bomb!*”

*Cruella de Quill’s weird grammar in her last statement is based on a bad translation of an old Japanese video game. When poofing violently, like they are going to throw their quills, doesn’t phase pesky paparazzi predators, porcupines will drop powerful stink bombs trying to keep predatory paparazzi at bay.

Spunk, Gwendolyn, and Glenda by Laurie

pTerodactyl @ Dusk

Resa’s Wolf Tree and Jupiter

Der Hund von Bosqueville

The Seven Sisters (The Pleiades) over Resa’s Golden Wolf Tree

The porcupine I almost stepped on when we took Jake out on a walk after dark last night.

The Pleiades rising over the Sandias

Sand dunes in the night sky

Sunrise

Der Hund von Bosqueville

Belafonte checking out the washing machine

Loki: “I thought you washed Belafonte!”

Sunset

Dusk

Turtles, Doves, All In The Family

Shelly Snapper

Doves on a gopher mound

Freddy Fly Catcher

Cinnamon Quacker

Harry Headbanger

Shirley Snapper, Shelly’s sister

The other side of Shelly Snapper, Shirley’s sister

Fish

Fish fart

Barney Bullfrog

Bob Bullfrog’s Back

Bethany Bullfrog, Barney’s sister

Peter Porcupine sleeping

Doris and Diesel Duck checking out the ducky looking grass.

Gabby Grebe in hiding

Blondy & The Owls

Blondy feeding on an elm tree by the irrigation ditch.

Above is a 48-second video of Blondy feeding on an elm tree. The video is a little shaky because it is handheld at sunset, and Blondy was backlit. I had to push the exposure two stops to get detail in Blondy. The video gives you an idea of how slow and deliberate porcupines are. Blondy is in some ways like a monkey and other ways like a sloth.

Mama Owl

Daddy Owl

Daddy Owl and Mama Owl

Under A Freezing Midday Sun

We got about an inch of snow last night, and while the sun tried to peek through the clouds, the temperature never got about 25ºF (-3.9ºC). A couple of walks in the bosque and out on the beaches along the Rio Grande resulted in new birds and some exciting owl news.

Sandias and the Rio Grande from North Beach.

Canadian Geese.

Five Thrushes.

These Thrushes looked really iridescent in the snow on the riverbank under the cold, filtered sun.

Red-Tailed Hawk way off in the distance.

Sparrow up north scavaging in the snow and pebbles.

Red-Tailed Hawk in profile.

This poor calf has lost its herd. It’s all alone and has been sadly mooing for someone to keep it company.

Can you spot the northern mama owl sitting on her eggs?

She didn’t use this nest last year because the raccoons had ransacked it. She is in it again this year. The year before, 2018, she had Virginia in this nest: https://wp.me/p1yQyy-4dG

Thrush

Blondy the blonde porcupine sleeping way up in a cottonwood.

Thrush getting a drink.

The acequia madre

Robin

Snowy Bosque

Mama Owl and Daddy Owl in their usual spot with snow all around.

Porcupine Promenade

We got out late last night for a walk under the stars after putting up our third sack of green chiles, making power bars, and doing various other chores that took up all of our daylight hours. A few hundred feet before the bridge that we use to cross the clearwater ditch, I saw what looked like a weed moving ahead of us. I shined my flashlight on it, and, as I suspected, it was Porky, a very large porcupine, waddling along on its way to cross the bridge ahead of us. I pulled out my phone to see if I could get a video, but by the time I got the phone convinced to take a video in the dark, Porky had crossed the bridged and headed down into the cottonwoods between the clearwater ditch and the irrigation ditch. I managed to get a short, 15 second video of Porky waddling into the undergrowth by a large cottonwood.  I assembled and arranged a short piece of music for Porky’s promenade.

The photos below are an assortment of critters and fall colors.

Dead of Night

After posting Lovelorn Wasp performed by Coughing Cooties last Sunday, there were requests to hear something by Violent Phlegm, another virtual group that collaborated with AWB to form Coughing Cooties. Dead of Night is Violent Phlegm’s first single.

Dead of Night
Words and Music by Timothy Price
Performed by Violent Phlegm

Still standing I’m bleeding in the dead of night
Battling daemons ’til dawn’s early morning light
Reaching for the future, tried shaking off the past
Following ambitions holding dreams were fading fast
Wading against the current, I stood against the wave
Control-alt-delete, I refuse to be a slave

Tumbling through the ether in the cold and dark
Social media’s shadow leaves its ugly mark
Cyberspace warriors fight by fiber’s light
Daemons call me out in the dead of night

Control-alt-delete, I refuse to be a slave
Wading against the current, I stood against the wave
Following ambitions holding dreams were fading fast
Reaching for the future, tried shaking off the past
Battling daemons ’til dawn’s early morning light
Still standing I’m bleeding in the dead of night

Tumbling through the ether in the cold and dark
Social media’s shadow leaves its ugly mark
Cyberspace warriors fight by fiber’s light
Daemons call me out in the dead of night