It’s been a long while since we had a bird collision. The shelf outside the kitchen window, complete with tall plants, was doing the trick. But yesterday a black-headed grosbeak flew into a gap in the foliage and crashed. The saddest part was that we had only just seen her at the bird bath a day or two before — grosbeaks are not common visitors here. So freaking sad.
The great horned owl (Bubo virginianus), also known as the hoot owl, is a large raptor native to the Americas. We often hear them at night, and sometimes see them. They eat “almost any living creature that walks, crawls, flies, or swims, except the large mammals.”1 In fact over 500 species have been identified as great horned owl prey.
1Lee, Carol. “Powerful feet and talons help birds of prey make their living”. Lubbock Avalanche-Journal.
While learning figure drawing basics with Pedro Loureiro, I’m using reference images from Sketch Daily to practice. Enjoying the process, and looking forward to seeing improvement.
At least there’s no aphids.
It’s fun to come across living organisms in unexpected places.
I looked up this beetle when I got home from our nature journal meetup. Turns out, this is one of the most widely distributed eucalyptus leaf beetles in Australia, but it was only discovered in the US (here in Los Angeles) a year ago.
Paropsis atomaria is considered a pest in eucalyptus plantations in Australia and is reported to cause defoliation, decreased growth and wood quality, and sometimes tree death. Both larvae and adults feed on the foliage. Development from egg to adult takes approximately one month and there are up to four generations per year
So this cute little beetle is quite the eucalyptus scourge. I bet there are many California native plant supporters who are not unhappy that it has reached our shores — eucalyptus species themselves being invasive around here.
I visited the UCLA Mildred E. Mathias Botanic Garden today with the Channel Island Nature Journalers. More than half of the 7.5 acre garden is currently closed for construction, but there is still plenty to see, enjoy and, yes, nature journal!
Mildred Esther Mathias (1906 – 1995) was an American botanist, environmentalist, preservationist, and UCLA professor. She studied, classified, and led groups to discover plants all across the world, helping popularize “ecotourism”. in 1979, the UCLA botanical garden (started in 1929) was re-named the Mildred E. Mathias Botanical Garden in her honour. Thank you, Prof Mathias, for all you did!
Exciting times here today! I don’t know what the prey was, but the predator was very impressive!
I’ve been adding a whole romaine lettuce plant to my green smoothie every morning, trying to eat them all before they seed. Four left to go!
Well, I actually enjoyed American Pastoral much more than I did back in 2008, when I gave it one star (I wrote then: “The premise of this book was interesting, but it was way, way too wordy … Roth just goes on and on and on with boring details about people that aren’t even seminal to the story. Unimpressed.”)
And, as always, my appreciation was enhanced by a two hour discussion with the smart, widely-read, cosmopolitan folks in my book group. I don’t always sketchnote our meetings, but I’m always glad when I do.
hashiworks 