Favoritos de owlpelt

Grizzly Bear
AKA
Brown Bear
Ursus arctos
Teller Road
Nome, Alaska
4 June 2012
two shots posted

This bear was encountered about 40 miles out of Nome on a gravel road where I was helping to lead a small group of birders. This was not one of the typical Yellowstone National Park-type encounters with a bear that is used to people being watched by tourists in 300 parked cars. On this occasion it was just us in our van with this bear. Initially the animal was about 200 meters away, shot taken with a 500mm lens. We were on the road and the bear started approaching us as if curious. We got back into the van and the bear kept coming. The 2nd shot was taken when the bear was about 50 feet away I think. The bear finally wandered away. A good example why you stay close to vehicles in this area, but it was a great experience. This bear was unusually shaggy (perhaps still in winter coat?) and very blonde.

Melanistic juvenile (likely male based on size relative to the Great-tailed Grackle it was feeding upon). Verified by William Clark, and Lance and Jill Morrow. First observed by M. Silvas with me, and I shouted "melanistic Cooper's Hawk, OMG" as I identified the bird preliminarily, before submitting it to experts for review.
N31.070728 W-97.369269
JPK-2925

been trying to figure out where this bird was for two years... persistence, a hunch and a tip put this one on my life list after I shed a few tears, did a jig, and gave out a loud yelp later in the day

California Long-tailed Weasel

On a visit to a friend's home, I thought I spotted a lost kitten at her gate to the driveway. I exited the car to see if I could capture it, and realized it was not a kitten, but a wild animal...

I thought it would be frightened and run away, but instead it stayed at the entrance to its hole and posed for almost a minute. Really adorable creature.

melanistic

interesting article from the Wilson Bulletin from 1965 about a melanistic Pileated Woodpecker at Okefenokee in 1917:
https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/wilson/v077n04/p0404-p0405.pdf

Dicephalic neonate found in a residential yard. GTS 861. VW ABC 015. Note several spinal kinks. Specimen survived several months, fed sporadically, died and was preserved.

See: Wallach, Van, and Gerard T. Salmon (2013) Axial Bifurcation and Duplication in Snakes. Part V. A Review of Nerodia sipedon Cases with a New Record from New York State, 102-106. In Bulletin of the Chicago Herpetological Society 48(8).

I guess an accurate description of this bird is a female partially leucistic hybrid Mallard X Grey duck.
This is the first time I've seen this bird at Travis Wetland, there used to be a similar looking one at Bexley Wetland.

Red Fox would have white tip on tail so points to Gray Fox. Red fox would have black socks and Gray would not.But the black extends well up the leg. Note black ears. Very small white spot on chest. Gray has stripe down the tail as does this one. Face more cat-like pointing toward Gray Fox. My vote is Gray. INat repeatedly suggested Arctic Fox - nope and Gray was way down the list. But I think this is a Gray Fox color phase with black points. Hope to see kits any day now.

My dad and I saw this fox near San Juan Island National Historic Park (South Beach). It had blonde fur and very skinny legs. In the summertime, there are giant groups of rabbits running around the grassy fields. I often see foxes in this area, and I assume they predate these rabbits.

An interesting looking wild turkey I have been seeing for a couple of months. After lots of research I am comfortable saying this bird suffers from Leucism "a condition in which there is partial loss of pigmentation in an animal resulting in white, pale, or patchy coloration of the skin, hair, feathers, scales or cuticle, but not the eyes. Unlike albinism, it is caused by a reduction in multiple types of pigment, not just melanin."

Well, I suspect this is a Western honeybee, but its yellow appearance did not feel quite right to me so I snapped a number of pictures. I realize that there are color variations in honeybees, but I have never before seen one like this. And sometimes I wonder whether I am looking at a bee or a fly mimicking a bee. @johnascher Western honeybee? Something else?

I’m pretty sure this is a chipmunk and not a small squirrel. It’s small like a chipmunk. It stays on the ground, not in trees. It’s tail is slim and not bushy. This animal has been around for several years now - it’s not a juvenile.

I caught this photo while riding down Erwin Road in Durham, N.C. in the vicinity of Duke Forest. I saw a glimpse of white out the corner of my eye, pulled off the road immediately, to the utter surprise of my wife and four children. Then jumped out of the car and starting running after this albino deer. I was able to take a very good picture of this remarkable animal.

White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), the smallest members of the North American deer family, are found from southern Canada to South America. In the heat of summer they typically inhabit fields and meadows using clumps of broad-leaved and coniferous forests for shade. During the winter they generally keep to forests, preferring coniferous stands that provide shelter from the harsh elements.

Adult white-tails have reddish-brown coats in summer which fade to a duller grayish-brown in winter. Male deer, called bucks, are easily recognizable in the summer and fall by their prominent set of antlers, which are grown annually and fall off in the winter. Only the bucks grow antlers, which bear a number of tines, or sharp points. During the mating season, also called the rut, bucks fight over territory by using their antlers in sparring matches.

Albino deer are deer that lack pigmentation and have a completely white hide and pink eyes, nose and hooves. Albinism is much rarer and may only be observed in one in 30,000 deer.

Female deer, called does, give birth to one to three young at a time, usually in May or June and after a gestation period of seven months. Young deer, called fawns, wear a reddish-brown coat with white spots that helps them blend in with the forest.

White-tailed deer are herbivores, leisurely grazing on most available plant foods. Their stomachs allow them to digest a varied diet, including leaves, twigs, fruits and nuts, grass, corn, alfalfa, and even lichens and other fungi. Occasionally venturing out in the daylight hours, white-tailed deer are primarily nocturnal or crepuscular, browsing mainly at dawn and dusk.

In the wild, white-tails, particularly the young, are preyed upon by bobcats, mountain lions, and coyotes. They use speed and agility to outrun predators, sprinting up to 30 miles (48 kilometers) per hour and leaping as high as 10 feet (3 meters) and as far as 30 feet (9 meters) in a single bound.

Although previously depleted by unrestricted hunting in the United States, strict game-management measures have helped restore the white-tailed deer population.

This doe is leaning towards semi-leucistic with a coat that is lighter than usual. We call her "blondie", because she stands out from the rest of the herd that has darker colored coats. This is caused by recessive alleles.

Photo 1:
Patty Possum
Turns out there are two female dark possums at my house. I had looked out my window the night before and the street light provided just enough light for me to see them both under my feeders. The next morning at 8 am on a cloudy morning I saw this one. She is darker than Penelope. I was able to step outside and use my flash to get a few photos before she ran off.
Photo 2:
Unusual Black Coat
Most possums I've seen are various shades of gray. I'd never seen such dark ones. Very pretty.
Photo 3:
Birdseed? What Birdseed?
I took a step forward and stepped on a crunchy leaf. Patty's head came up with her snout covered in seed bits that she had been munching on. She whirled around and ran off.

Came to Newcastle island to see if we could find one of these leucistic raccoons, and was lucky enough to find one. It is a mother of four with three of the pups shown in the last photo. Depending on the lighting some pups did seem to be lighter in coloration than regular raccoons.