Rabbits And Other Stuff

I always feel like a happy little kid when I see a rabbit. I want to run over and pick it up and hold it. of course the adult in me tells me immediately to forget those ideas. I guess it's a good thing most rabbits are pretty fast.

You ever notice that many of us would like to pick up and cuddle a rabbit, but we'd never consider it if we saw a lizard? Lizards just don't seem very cuddly, do they? Rabbits on the other hand...

My uncle used to raise rabbits. He kept them in a giant pen out behind his house. I remember him showing me the setup he had. When we got out there I saw that the rabbits had been digging holes in the ground in there. I asked my uncle how he kept them from digging out and escaping.

He explained that the sides of the pen actually went down several feet into the ground. A rabbit will only dig a certain distance down with their holes. All you have to do is go down a little farther with the sides of the pen.

Many of the rabbits were down in the holes while we were out there, so I guess I only saw part of them. Rabbits have to live somewhere, so holes are pretty good. I think my uncle finally let them all go eventually. I never really saw them too many more times, so I'm not sure what happened to them.

My uncle and my dad used to keep the strangest animals around. My dad usually stuck to farm animals, but I wouldn't have been surprised to visit my uncle one time and find out he had a kangaroo or something like that.

I'm a little different than them. i like animals, but I keep most of them at a distance. I like having a dog around, and I've had cats, but anything more is just extra work. I get my fill of other animals by taking pictures of the wild ones.

But sometimes I think some of them sense I'm their friend. I've had all sorts of wild animals just walk right up to me. It's funny to find out that they're just as curious as I am. If you've ever had a deer try to coax you into coming closer then you know something weird is going on.

So there you have it. My post today was slightly different. But aren't they all? I told you I talk about whatever I'm thinking at the time. I gotta say though, that post the other day about chasing a tree was a stretch. Talk to you later.

The Elusive Blue Jay

Some days it's hard to make myself go out to a nature park. It's not for any reason other than there is so much nature right outside my door. Just the other day I was sitting out front with my camera and this blue jay came flying over for me to take a few dozen pictures.

I can't tell you how hard it was to narrow the good pictures down to three. I had a dozen until just before I wrote this post. I chose these three because they each had a special quality I thought was good for sharing.

It was such a strange occurrence for me when this blue jay came over because I've almost never had any luck getting pictures of them in the past. In years past I've documented right here on this blog my feeble attempts at getting pictures of these birds. I still remember one time how I was so excited to get one terrible picture of a blue jay's tail.

This bird in my pictures today just flew over and landed on the road in front of me. It was like it wanted me to see it there. It didn't take long before it flew up onto the branch it's perching on here. I knew even then that I was going to get my pictures.

I did have to get up off my chair to move to a better position. The Sun isn't always my friend out there. I had to walk over to the middle of the road to begin taking my pictures. The blue jay sat there really nicely letting me take all the pictures I wanted.

So it seems that the blue jays in Iowa are either friendlier than those in Michigan or they just personally like me better. Whatever the real reason, I'm glad this one bird was so patient.

I'm just glad there wasn't the big chase I would have had in the past. It was always so hard to follow these birds for what seemed like hours only to come away with absolutely nothing. I can't even remember the sheer amount of times I went home frustrated, even though I had plenty of other good pictures.

But that's all changed now. I have a feeling my luck has now changed with these birds. Now if only the rain we've been having would let up so I can go back out and get some more pictures. It's looking like Thursday will be the only good day for a couple of weeks. I'll have to make sure I don't miss it. Talk to you next time.