A great horned owl evicting a raccoon from the owl nest Texas Backyard Wildlife 2020-12-13 | We've wondered what would happen if a great horned owl were to encounter a raccoon up in the owl nest (it can be a busy spot: texasbackyardwildlife.com/a-busy-night-in-the-owl-nest) and now we know. A couple of the raccoons are in the habit of climbing up to the nest to play and snooze and look at the view, and now that the great horned owls are visiting again it seemed only a matter of time until they overlapped. Turns out great horned owls don't have much of a sense of humor when it comes to tolerating interlopers in their space.A little raccoon was up in the nest a few nights ago, just minding her own business, and one of the owls saw her, and was not amused. The owl flew in at warp speed and nailed the poor raccoon in the butt with his talons. The raccoon got an awful shock - I think quite literally didn’t know what had hit her. Owls fly silently and this owl was travelling so fast he was just a blur. The raccoon cowered there in the nest for about 15 more seconds and then decided to get the hell out. As she turned her back to begin the climb down the tree the owl hit her again - this time so hard it shook the nest. We were worried that the raccoon might fall but she didn't. She was fine - shaken, and probably quite sore - but otherwise unharmed. The owl nest is 30 ft up in a big live oak tree and falling would be disastrous, but even in her panic the little raccoon was able to get down again safely. And she was back the following night, so perhaps raccoons are not as smart as I like to think they are.PS: Many people have noticed that there are what look like glowing eyes behind the nest. They are actually lighted radio towers, way off on the horizon.For more great critter videos and photos please visit https://texasbackyardwildlife.com.#greathornedowl #texaswildlife #backyardwildlife
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-10-10 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.A MAP OF OUR BACKYARDAt long last, and with some dedicated nudging on the part of our diligent live-stream friends, we have published a map of our backyard. Here it is: https://texasbackyardwildlife.com/a-m....DISCORDJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Lunchtime for a young black vulture: We can’t BELIEVE he ate the whole thing Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-29 | For 2 summers now (2023 and 2024) our backyard has become a kind of daycare center for a couple of newly fledged young black vultures. The parents nest across the creek, in an abandoned treehouse, and once the little ones are big enough to fly, mom and pop drop the kids off with us while they go looking for food. When they’re little, vulture chicks are improbably cute. They’re powder-puff pink, with black faces and enormous black beaks. Our neighbor with the treehouse has sent us photos of them and we've published some on our Community page.Here at TBW Daycare, the young vultures usually hang out in a big live oak tree near the house or up on an owl nest platform that Dan constructed some years ago. When they’re hot or thirsty, they flap down to one of the water bowls. The parents always know where to find their offspring and they stop by from time to time to feed them and make sure everything’s OK. Last year, a live-stream watcher from Berlin dubbed the vultures The Addams Family. It’s perfect, and so that’s what we call them. They seem to like it.This year, Pugsley Addams injured his leg and we all watched anxiously as he hobbled about and struggled to balance when he perched on a branch. And then just as his leg was improving, he had more bad luck; he lost the long toe on his right foot. It was nasty injury and we have no idea how it happened. He could fly, but landing and standing clearly hurt, and his parents, Morticia and Gomez, left him in TBW Daycare while he recovered and tried to get used to his handicap. His sibling, Wednesday, was off with the grown-ups by now so poor Pugsley was alone most of the day.We all felt sorry for him and watched anxiously for every visit from a parent – as did Pugs; his excitement at seeing mama or papa was heartwarming. He would sometimes do a little hurt-foot hobbling dance and flap his wings – especially if lunch was in the offing. And speaking of lunch, this video shows a lunch delivery. Now, we’ve seen some pretty gross stuff in our time, but this takes the cake (or whatever). Mama had swallowed what looked like half a cow and it was Pugsley’s task to somehow extract it. Easier said than done, but after much tugging and struggling he managed to pull the biggest, grossest, nastiest-looking lump of ex-animal ever seen out of his mama’s crop, and then he gleefully choked it down. #texasbackyardwildlife
A very rare melanistic buck: Tall, dark, and extremely handsome Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-15 | Black white-tailed deer (known officially as "melanistic" deer) are very rare, and we are thrilled that this beautiful melanistic buck has been visiting us. He and Moose, one of the other bucks, had a very sweet mutual appreciation session the other day over by the west gate. Moose seemed pretty thrilled to see him, too. Melanism is the result of a recessive genetic anomaly and it shows up in fewer than 1% of the deer here in central Texas. We are also seeing a much smaller melanistic buck around - maybe a 2-year-old - and he, too, is a handsome dude.
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-09 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.DiscordJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-07 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.A MAP OF OUR BACKYARDAt long last, and with some dedicated nudging on the part of our diligent live-stream friends, we have published a map of our backyard. Here it is: https://texasbackyardwildlife.com/a-m....DISCORDJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-07 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.A MAP OF OUR BACKYARDAt long last, and with some dedicated nudging on the part of our diligent live-stream friends, we have published a map of our backyard. Here it is: https://texasbackyardwildlife.com/a-m....DISCORDJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Foxy foolishness: Pale Fox meets a fawn out on the field Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-09-01 | What's a fawn gotta do to get a little rest around here? Pale Fox, Dolly's mate and the father of 3 sleek and beautiful kits, is fascinated by our motherless fawns. We've seen him trying to play with them on numerous occasions - he races around, running up and down trees and generally showing off. He seems (to us) to want to engage with them. Sadly for Pale Fox, the fawns pretty much ignore him: "Silly fox. What's he doing?".This time, out on the field, one of the fawns was lying in front of a camera so we were able to capture their brief encounter. Pale Fox climbed a little branch beside the fawn, and then hopped down and poked the fawn in the butt with his nose before scampering off. Silly fox, indeed.
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-08-16 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.DiscordJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Gray fox family: Part 6 - Dolly and Frances at play (again) Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-08-15 | This is Part 6 of our story about Dolly, Broken Ear, and Frances, the gray fox family who lived with us here in the magic tree den for a couple of weeks during the summer of 2023. What can we tell you about this video? It features Dolly and Frances, and play and more play. We love watching this stuff. Dolly gets chewed on, sat on, lounged on, and roundly abused, and through it all, she smiles. And Frances clearly loves her mama. Heartwarming can be such a tired and over-used term, but we think their relationship is heartwarming.#texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
Gray fox family: Part 5 - Dolly and Frances at play Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-08-04 | This is Part 5 of our story about Dolly, Broken Ear, and Frances. The moral of this episode is: If you don't want to have your tail pulled then (a) don't hang out with Frances, and (b) don't have such an enticing tail.We never get tired of watching clips of Dolly and Frances hanging out together. They truly seemed to have such fun. We don't want to give you the impression that Frances and Dolly did nothing but play; Frances was often left alone in the den while Dolly and Broken Ear were out doing whatever it is that gray foxes do when they're not in front of our cameras. However, as Dan says in the narration, because Frances was a singleton, Dolly seemed to make a special effort to spend time with her, and we were lucky enough to be able to video hours and hours of foxie fooling around. #texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
Ill scratch my back, you scratch yours: A red paper wasp shows us how its done | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-08-01 | We’ve been watching a fine-backed red paper wasp building her nest in one of our bird boxes. Her name is Janet (one of our livestream watchers, B. A., named her for Janet van Dyne, a Marvel comics character who could transform herself from society lady to crime-fighting super hero at the drop of a “Help me, someone please help me!”). Janet has been hard at work creating her papier-mâché nest for 3 or 4 weeks now and she doesn’t seem to be slowing down. She harvests wood fibers from trees outside the box, chews them into a sticky paste with saliva, and then carefully spits the paste out in thin layers to create open cells for her eggs. We’ve seen her lay 4 eggs as I write this (on July 28th, 2024) but she no doubt has more.As Dan says in the narration for this little video, Janet has extraordinarily maneuverable “arms”. They seem to be attached to her thorax with ball joints. She can reach over her head, behind her back, directly in front of her, and pretty much everywhere else. We find this fascinating, and we thought you might, too.
Gray fox family: Part 4 - Lunch, a visit from Broken Ear, and more playtime Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-27 | This is Part 4 of our story about Dolly, Broken Ear and Frances. Frances, though still very young (we think about 6 weeks old at this stage), was growing up fast, and here we see her having one of her first solid meals. It was a baby bird, and Frances, honestly, was not all that enthusiastic about it ("Mom!! This thing has toenails!").Broken Ear paid his little daughter a cautious visit, making it clear that his newly re-injured ear was still tender and that a play date was out of the question. Fortunately, Dolly - younger than Broken Ear and always ready for fun - was nearby and happy to be climbed on and chewed. #texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
Gray fox family: Part 3 - Dolly gets her ears chewed (again) Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-21 | In Part 3 of our story about Dolly, Broken Ear and Frances we see some more rough-and-tumble play sessions. And when we say "rough", we mean rough. We were surprised that Dolly had any ears left at all after a few days of being Frances's sole playmate and chew toy. Gray fox ears must be made of titanium.When Dolly and Broken Ear were on watch duty outside the den, they almost always sat on the tallest of three big stumps in the playpen area. Of course, Frances wanted to be up there too. Eventually she made it, but in this video you'll see some of her more comical failed attempts. Dolly sits impassively on her stump and watches as Frances tries and fails to jump up onto the stump to sit beside her mama. She took some memorable falls but always came back for more. Perhaps fox kit butts are made of titanium too? #texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
A hummingbird and a cardinal walk into a bar... | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-17 | Hummingbirds are ballsy little things. They only weigh about as much as a marshmallow, but most of that weight is assertiveness.In this video, a male black-chinned hummingbird faces off against a young male cardinal down at the water bowl. Hard to say who wins, if anyone, but the cardinal, who was waiting have a drink, seems to be equal parts mesmerized and perplexed to be buzzed by a tiny in-your-face little hummingbird.The hummingbird had his fun for a few seconds and then zoomed off to find a drink elsewhere.@TexasBackyardWildlife #texasbackyardwildlife
Raccoons everywhere! A swarm of youngsters Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-13 | The collective noun for raccoons is a "gaze"; a group of raccoons is a gaze of raccoons (go figure). However, there's never a lot of gazing going on when baby raccoons are out exploring; they swarm. Everyone bustles in a different direction, checking things out. They climb the trees, scramble over the stumps, look in all the holes, and feel under the rocks (which is something that no one in his right mind in these here parts would do; there are scorpions, fire ants, snakes, spiders... The list can often seem endless).The little ones in this video were out with their mama in the tree stump den playpen. Mama was (as mama raccoons usually are) unconcerned about trying to keep tabs on what each of her pretty little kits was up to. Which is just as well, because she didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell. #texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
Gray fox family: Part 2 - Frances explores her new home Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-12 | We return to the story of Dolly, her mate, Broken Ear, and their kit, Frances. They moved into one of our dens during the summer of 2023 and stayed for a couple of weeks. Our cameras recorded non-stop while they were with us, both inside the den and out – and often simultaneously if Frances was inside asleep and one of her parents was outside keeping watch from the tall stump. So we have hours and hours of great video and we’re having fun publishing it.In Part 2 of our story we see Frances exploring her new home and climbing on the logs and stumps while her mother smilingly keeps her eye on things. Frances had no siblings to play with, and Dolly – the most patient and loving fox mother we’ve ever had the good luck to observe – seemed to understand that she needed to become the fun companion that her kit was missing. Fox kits play-fight constantly and Dolly put up with tail-pulling, ear-biting, nose-chewing, and countless gleeful ambushes. She was endlessly patient and seemingly indestructible. In this part, we also meet Frances’s father, Broken Ear, for the first time and see Frances’s and Dolly’s excitement at his arrival. Broken Ear was an attentive mate and father, but he had recently been injured in a fight (probably a territorial wrangle with another fox) and for the first week or so of our story he was still sore and trying to avoid being further beaten by his rambunctious little daughter.#texasbackyardwildlife @TexasBackyardWildlife
Fox acrobatics: Dolly nursing 3 kits while perched on a tall stump | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-07 | Last year, our resident mama fox, Dolly, had a single kit (or pup, if you prefer), Frances. This year (2024) she had 3. Dolly often nursed Frances while perched on top of her favorite tall stump, and apparently she saw no reason to do things differently this year, even though the stump was no bigger and her little ones were. She sat there, grinning, while her kits flailed around desperately, trying to nurse AND stay on the stump. As you'll see, not everyone managed to hang in there. These stumps can be slippery little suckers, right?
Pale Fox supervising Chris to make sure he gets to and from the water bowl without straying Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-07-04 | Dan and I went away on vacation for a week in late June this year and our friend Chris moved in to look after the critters for us while we were gone. Chris is a good guy, obviously. The critters like him and so do we. One morning when Chris went to put fresh water in the bowl by the big live oak, Pale Fox followed him all the way down the trail, and then he turned around and followed him all the way back to the house, trotting along behind and supervising from a respectful distance. Pale Fox is a friendly creature, but we've never seen behavior like this before. We think he's in love. When we got home, Pale Fox was waiting for us on a stump by the firepit. We greeted him and told him we'd missed him while we were away. He raised an eyebrow and said "Yeah, nice to see you guys, too. Where's the tall dude?".
Gray fox family: Part 1 - Dolly & Frances move into the den Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-16 | In the summer of 2023 a gray fox family - mama, papa, and a single kit - moved into one of our dens. The mother fox, Dolly, had been visiting the backyard and for quite some time, and we could tell that she was nursing. We'd been hoping that she would bring her family closer and so we were delighted to see her carry a kit in past the water bowl one day in late May.This video is the first episode in our story of Dolly, her mate Broken Ear, and their little one, Frances during their 2.5-week stay in the magic tree den. As I write this, I don't know how many episodes there will be - we have about 350 hours of great video. (Don't worry, we won't attempt to inflict it all on you, but Dan's edited highlights are still a couple of hours long, so we have some serious cutting to do.)In this first part, we see Dolly carry Frances - then probably 5 or 6 weeks old - along the trail and into the den. She spent an hour or so settling in and reassuring Frances that her new home was safe and comfortable, and then she took her back outside for a little tour of the playpen area. Dolly is the most attentive and loving mama fox we've ever had the privilege of spying on with our cameras. She is patient, playful, and very involved. Broken Ear was a good father, too. He was a little battle-weary at the time they moved in, and didn't much want to play, but he and Dolly split guard duty and food gathering, and very clearly (to us) brought up Frances together. I am writing this in June 2024, and Dolly - with a new mate, Pale Fox (we believe that Broken Ear has died) - is back in the magic tree den with 3 kits. Frances is still around and has a family of her own (we can see that she is nursing). She doesn't visit our backyard very often, but when she does she is immediately identifiable because she inherited her mother's long, elegant tail. We look forward to meeting her kits one day.
Three gray fox kits on a tall stump - 12Jun24 Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-13 | Dolly supervised a chaotic and very entertaining play session for her kits on the morning of June 12th. Here, all three of them are trying to sit on the top of the tall stump - not easy for a squirming, scuffling bunch of little foxes.
Texas spiny lizards: The best close-up video you will ever see Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-11 | Texas spiny lizards are quite common around here – though, as with many other species, we don’t see as many as we used to and, actually, we hear them more often than we see them. In the summer, when we’re outside, they will rustle away from us in the undergrowth or skitter up the nearest tree, their immensely long claws making little ticking sounds on the bark. Many people, locally, call them “tree lizards”.The adult spiny lizards we see in our backyard are typically about 10” (25 cm) from nose to tail-tip, and a lot of that length is tail - they have very long, thin, tails. Their variegated gray, white, black, and brown scales are perfect camouflage against the live oaks and they can be hard to spot when they’re not moving. We have a video clip of a wren almost landing on a spiny lizard who was sunning herself on a live oak stump. Spiny lizards eat bugs – insects, spiders, and any other creepy crawlies they can find. They are carnivores, like most lizard species.Female spiny lizards lay up to 4 clutches of eggs each summer, as many as 30 eggs at a time, in holes that they dig out of soft earth and then invisibly cover over. The eggs hatch after about 60 days (our reference from the Texas Master Naturalists says 43 – 83 days; we don’t know what accounts for the surprisingly wide range). This video is a compilation of lots of clips that we've recorded over the past month or so. Because spiny lizards often sit for a long time without moving we have been able to record some extraordinary close-ups. One of the things that we've found most interesting in watching the lizards like this is that their skin really is a little spiny. Geraldine F., one of our many scientifically minded live-stream observers, described them as "shaggy". We can't think of a better word.
Mama raccoon & a baby in the magic tree den - 30Jul22 Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-09 | This is how hot it was in July 2022. Really, really hot. Our poor magic tree den mama raccoon was crashed out, and a baby was crashed out and draped over her. I know we shouldn't laugh - it must have been an oven in the den - but it's a funny little clip.
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-08 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.DiscordJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Mating Texas spiny lizards Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-03 | You saw it here first (probably): Spiny lizards having sex. We’re not sure whether to warn everyone that this video is a quite graphic or shout to the rooftops that it’s extraordinary. I think we’ll go with shouting.Texas spiny lizards are quite common around here – though, as with many other species, we don’t see as many as we used to, and we actually hear them more often than we see them. In the summer, when we’re outside, they will rustle away from us in the undergrowth or skitter up the nearest tree, their immensely long claws making little ticking sounds on the bark. Many people, locally, call them “tree lizards”.The adult spiny lizards we see in our backyard are typically about 10” (25 cm) from nose to tail-tip, and a lot of that length is tail - they have very long, thin, tails. Their variegated gray, white, black, and brown scales are perfect camouflage against the live oaks and they can be hard to spot when they’re not moving. We have a video clip of a wren almost landing on a spiny lizard who was sunning herself on a live oak stump. Spiny lizards eat bugs – insects, spiders, and any other creepy crawlies they can find. They are carnivores, like most lizard species.Female spiny lizards lay up to 4 clutches of eggs each summer, as many as 30 eggs at a time, in holes that they dig out of soft earth and then invisibly cover over. The eggs hatch after about 60 days (our reference from the Texas Master Naturalists says 43 – 83 days; we don’t know what accounts for the surprisingly wide range). This video shows a mating pair of spiny lizards. The truly extraordinary thing to watch for is the male’s genitalia, which extrude from his lower abdomen during sex, looking worryingly visceral, and then slowly retract once the lizards have parted. We feel very, very lucky to have been able to capture this remarkable event with one of our tree stump den cameras.
Dolly & 3 kits 02Jun24 Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-06-02 | Dolly and her kits on move-in day at the magic tree den. Sunday 02 June 2024.
This is how raccoons deal with mosquitos Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-05-27 | This great little clip shows a mama raccoon in the Hobbit box nailing a mosquito that was plainly getting on her nerves. There are two things that make this video remarkable: First, it was pitch dark in the box. We can see, because the camera is using infrared night vision, but the mama raccoon can't. And yet she zeroed in on the mosquito with absolute precision. She could hear it, and she could locate it using hearing alone.Second, she killed the mosquito in exactly the same way we would, by clapping her hands together. We watch the raccoons and squirrels and opossums using their hands and constantly find ourselves wondering why more species didn't evolve them. They seem awfully, well, handy. Our fearless mosquito-killing mama raccoon gave birth in the Hobbit box in May 2023 and brought up her two little kits there for about 5 weeks. She was named Mommie Dearest by our livestream watchers because she was an obsessive cleaner of the little ones. They barely had a moment's rest when she was in the box with them. It was a relief when she moved them to a bigger space, under the deck, where they could at least attempt to avoid her when she was at her most neat-freaky.#texasbackyardwildlife@TexasBackyardWildlife
The titmouse and the fox: Soft fur for lining a nest | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-05-13 | Occasionally our cameras catch things that we wouldn't believe if we hadn't seen them ourselves. This is one of those things. A fox snoozing in the sunshine outside a den was being disturbed by a tiny titmouse, who seemed intent on doing everything she could to be irritating. She pecked at the fox, jumped on his back, and launched little kicks at his side, and every time the fox stirred and tried to get her to leave him in peace, she flitted out of reach. And then came back. What on earth was the titmouse thinking? She could so easily have wound up being lunch.Turns out this is what she was thinking: "This is a very furry fox. Fox fur makes a nice, soft nest lining. Surely this fox doesn't need all his fur? Summer is coming, after all. Surely he won't mind if I take some?". And that's what she did. Once she'd established that the fox wasn't going to kill her, she went to work plucking out fur and the fox let her do it! We were astonished. She hopped around on the fox's back, harvested a beakful of fur, and took off with it. Eventually, the fox got up and moved to sit on a tall stump to consider his next move. The titmouse flew up and sat beside him. The best of friends, apparently. The next day, the fox was sleeping in the exact same spot the and the titmouse returned to harvest a little more fur. @TexasBackyardWildlife #texasbackyardwildlife
The thoughts of a small field mouse | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-05-10 | I'm just a little field mouse,Nibbling on some lunch.I'm awfully fond of sunflower seeds,I like the way they crunch.My mama brought me up well,I'm always fresh and neat.My eyes are bright, my nose is clean,I always wipe my feet.You humans think you're special.The world bends to your demands.But have you ever noticedI've such perfect little hands?-----------------------------------------------This beautiful little field mouse has been coming by to nibble on sunflower seeds that we put out for the cardinals and other birds. We managed to capture some great close-up video. Mice are not the world's most well-loved creatures, by they (and their cousins, rats) need a better public relations company. They are clever, interesting, and - for want of a better word - cute. Look at this little one's hands when s/he holds the seeds to eat them. It's impossible to see hands like this and not think of the many things that we mammals have in common.@texasbackyardwildlife#texasbackyardwildlife
An American opossum: Up close and very, VERY personal Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-05-05 | Opossums are truly unique creatures. They are America's only marsupial, they seem to be immune to the venom of rattlesnakes and copperheads, and they have some fascinating reproductive traits (as you'll see in this video). Opossums' ability to feign death when threatened by a predator has given us the phrase "playing possum". (It's worth noting that when "playing possum", an opossum not only looks dead it smells dead; it releases a foul corpse smell from its anus, and there probably isn't a coyote in the entire country who still feels hungry after a whiff of that.)We've already published a video of an opossum cleaning herself - they are very tidy animals and we often see them busy with grooming - but in this clip, the opossum is a male and grooming went a little far, and... well, you'll have to see for yourself. It reminds us of the old joke "Why do dogs lick themselves? Because they can".You'll notice, also, that opossums have double-tipped penises. See? We told you they were fascinating creatures. The second part of the clip is less salacious but, we like to think, no less interesting. Opossums build themselves comfortable nests out of twigs and grass, and they carry nesting materials in their curled-up tails. Quite a skill.For more information about "the strange ways" of American opossums, take a look at this page on Roads End Naturalist (roadsendnaturalist.com/2013/04/25/the-strange-ways-of-possums/). We learned a lot and we hope you will too.@TexasBackyardWildlife #texasbackyardwildlife
Ferocious bear or baby raccoon? You decide | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-25 | Just because you can already walk on four legs, that doesn't mean you're ready to walk on two. We don't know whether this baby raccoon was trying to imitate a ferocious bear or maybe just get taller so she could see who was heading towards the deck. Either way, she was a little too close to the edge and, whoops!, over she went.#texasbackyardwildlife
18 ducklings - count them if you can: Black-bellied whistling ducks | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-21 | We often see – and hear – black-belled whistling ducks flying overhead at dawn and dusk, usually in flocks of 10 or 20. Their rhythmic, whistling call is one of our favorite Texas bird sounds. However, we don’t often see them in our backyard. Dan was deleting “junk” clips from one of our DVR PCs when he found these videos – they had been recorded the day before. I was out cleaning the water bowls and heard him yelling in astonishment. First the two parent ducks waddle into the frame, and then a duckling, and another, and another – a seemingly never-ending snake of tiny pale yellow and black balls of down. The ducklings stayed in strict one-after-the-other formation. They followed their parents single file, in a long line, and they stayed in that line. If a parent stopped, the ducklings all stopped, keeping their place in line.We think of ducks as water birds, and they are, but this family was a long way from anything wet. The creek was dry and they crossed from one side of our 5-acre (2 hectare) property to the other, west to east, following the walking trails that all the other critters use. The little ones, of course, were far too young to fly – probably only a day or two old.We suspect the parents were taking everyone to a drainage pond about 10 minutes’ walk away (10 minutes for a human; for a duckling, it seems unimaginably far). Whistling ducks often hang out in the pond, but reaching it from our place entails crossing a busy 6-lane street and Dan and I shuddered to think of how difficult that would have been for ducks and ducklings. We checked the street later and there was no sign of carnage, so we are hoping the ducks’ journey ended happily and that the world is now 18 black-bellied whistling ducks richer than it was a few days ago. #texasbackyardwildlife
Just like falling off a log: A tired gray fox kit | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-17 | During the late spring of 2023 a gray fox family with just one kit moved into one of our dens and we were able to spy on them with our cameras. The parents were Dolly and Broken Ear, and we named the little one Frances. They were an absolute joy to watch.Because Frances had no brothers and sisters, Dolly stepped into the role of playmate, and she would spend hours romping with her little one. Gray fox parents are usually quite business-like and pragmatic when it comes to kit-raising, but Dolly and Broken Ear clearly understood that their lone youngster needed company and stimulation, and they were much more present and playful than is usual for adult foxes.We will be publishing the story of Dolly, Broken Ear, and Frances in a series of videos over the next month or so, but in the meantime, we'll upload some shorts showing some of our favorite moments.#texasbackyardwildlife
Foxes on the rocks: A mama fox and 3 energetic kits Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-15 | We have hours and hours of fabulous gray fox video clips and not enough time to publish them all. However, we’re trying to get caught up, and here’s a little sample from a few years ago. The fox family in this video lived in the tree stump den for two weeks, and the mama fox would take her three kits across the field to play on the rocks near our shed. She sat on the biggest rock and kept an eye on things while the little ones scampered and bounced and climbed and, at the end of playtime, she would lead them all back across to the den. (We were tempted to call this video "Foxes on the rockses" but we couldn't decide whether that was funny or stupid, so we refrained.) For more great critter videos, please visit https://texasbackyardwildlife.com.#texasbackyardwildlife@texasbackyardwildlife
Give that raccoon a glass of wine! She wants to join our party | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-10 | Raccoons have hands - and feet, obviously, but their hands, and the way they use them, set them apart from most other animals. Raccoons can pick up and cradle their little ones, smack their palms together to kill flying bugs, and - as seen here - grab food from the table when Dan and I sit outside. We wouldn't be surprised to discover that they can pick locks. If raccoons had opposable thumbs, they might be giving us humans a run for our money.#texasbackyardwildlife
Nesting Bewicks wrens: Part One - Nest construction Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-04-02 | Most years, a pair of Bewick's wrens will make this hollow live-oak root knot their nesting site. (This year - 2024 - they seem to have passed us by.) Nest construction begins in early March and takes about a week. The wrens frame the nest with twigs and then create a soft, warm cup lined with leaves, moss, fibers, and - finally - feathers. The mama wren lays 5 or 6 beautiful pinky-cream eggs with brown sloshy freckles on them and will begin incubating full time once she's finished laying. The chicks hatch two weeks later, and then and the serious effort begins, with both parents working hard to provide food for everyone. The young chicks' digestive systems sometimes can't cope with the bigger bugs that their parents shove down their tiny throats, and it's not unusual to see a fecal sac with actively wriggling contents. We'll often see a parent seem to consider the sac, note that the bug inside is still intact, and - thinking "what the hell, why not?" - eat it themselves.Baby birds are goofy-looking little things, huge heads with buggy eyes on unfeasibly frail necks. It seems incredible that they can survive. But they do (mostly) and after a couple of weeks they are magically transformed into fully-fledged wrens. One by one they launch themselves out of the nest to join their waiting parents in the big wide world. That first flight always seems to us to be enormously brave; the chicks have never been outside the nest, they've never flown, they've barely even had a chance to stretch their wings, and yet they hear their parents calling and off they go. For more great critter videos and photos please visit texasbackyardwildlife.com.#wrens #texas #backyardwildlife #wildlife #shorts
Know how to embarrass a fox? | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-30 | Hint: It's as easy as falling off a log.This 3-month-old fox kit, snoozing on top of a tree-stump, got a little too comfortable and slid right off - an embarrassing tumble for an elegant and sure-footed little creature. He wasn’t hurt but we're pretty sure his pride took a hit.
Lion Tail: The worlds sweetest raccoon | Texas Backyard Wildlife Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-24 | This is the story of one of our favorite raccoons, Lion Tail. He lived with us here during the spring and summer of 2022, and we became very good friends. We called him Lion Tail because he had a tuft of fur at the tip of his tail that was somewhat lion-like. Nothing else about Lion Tail was at all lion-like, as you'll see if you watch the video. Lion Tail and I would meet on the deck in the morning when I went out to empty the raccoons' pool and put in fresh water. He was very fond of blueberries, and walnuts, and we would have a little breakfast together before he retired under the deck to sleep for the day. We would meet again in the evening.Sometimes he would spend the day up in an "owl" box that we call the Hobbit box. (I say "owl", because although Dan built it for owls but has only ever housed squirrels or raccoons.) It's up in a big live oak tree, about 25 ft off the ground. Getting in and out was always a struggle for Lion Tail because he had a pretty ample butt and the Hobbit box hole was a tight fit. We used to watch and giggle as he forced his way in - all flailing legs and fluffy tail.In August a mama raccoon with 4 little ones moved her family from the magic tree den to the deck. Lion Tail tried to make friends, and the kits thought he was fun, but the mama didn't like him much. In the end he got sick of her grumbling and dirty looks and he left, just packed his bags and left. And that was that.We still miss him.#liontail #raccoon #raccoons
Screech owl falling asleep: Watch the owls eyes | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-22 | Watch this tiny screech owl, falling asleep on a branch, constrict her pupils before she closes her eyes. They shrink from huge to pin-pricks in about a second. Another typically "owlish" peculiarity is the ability to control each eye independently, and we see that in this video, too. Owls can close one eye at a time. It's an odd look.#screechowl #owl #owlvideo #shorts
The Transformer: A great horned owl does a super-stretch | Texas Backyard Wildlife Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-18 | Before they fly off to go hunting in the evening, great horned owls often preen themselves and stretch. This owl almost turned himself inside out.The big owls haven't been visiting us much lately, and have only occasionally been using the perch you see in this video; this clip is a couple of years old. But we noticed that we hadn't published it - it was languishing in our archives - and we think it's fascinating. Better late than never.For more great critter videos and photos, please visit texasbackyardwildlife.com #GreatHornedOwls #WildlifeWatching #WildlifeVideos #TexasWildlife #TexasBackyardWildlife
Owl casting a pellet: I cant believe I ate the whole thing | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-14 | Great horned owls eat rats, mice and other small critters, and they swallow their prey whole or in pretty large pieces - they don't have teeth and can't chew. They digest all the bits that have some nutritional value and then later they throw up and bones, fur, and feathers in a neat and tidy pellet. We like the way the owl in this video watched his pellet drop all the way down to the dry creek-bed, about 20 ft below. He seemed amused - or perhaps he was impressed by the size of the thing he'd thrown up? After he had flown off for the night, Dan and I went and picked up the pellet. It contained a whole rat's skull, which we still have.#owl #greathornedowl #shorts
Porcupines: Prickly prehistoric wanderers in our backyard | Texas Backyard Wildlife Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-12 | Porcupines are rare in these here parts (as they say in TX). We're always excited to see one, but we worry, too. The other critters (yes, raccoons, we're talking to you) are curious about them and sometimes get too close. Get too close to a porcupine and you can wind up with a face full of quills. No joke.This video is a compilation of various porcupine clips our cameras have picked up over the past couple of years. Dan says he thinks porcupines are like a cross between a sloth and a prickly pear. Sounds about right to me.#porcupines #backyard #texaswildlife
Baby raccoon vs mama: How feisty is too feisty? | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-07 | Young raccoons can be pretty feisty, and sometimes they get a little carried away. The youngster in this clip was definitely pushing the boundaries. During the worst of the summer heat we put a tub on the deck for the raccoons to cool off in, and they will play in it for hours. If we toss in a ball, they have even more fun. This little guy seemed to be playing imaginary soccer. When his mama came up behind him, he thought "she's coming for the ball". He checked to see if the referee was watching and then deftly defended by body-slamming mama, who - mother raccoons being the most patient creatures on earth - shrugged off the assault and ignored him. #raccoon #texas #backyard #wildlife #shorts
Bath time for an armadillo on a hot Texas day | Texas Backyard Wildlife Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-06 | This 9-banded armadillo on a very hot Texas day took at bath in one of our water bowls. We rarely see armadillos out during the day, but the Texas heat was apparently too much for this little one to tolerate and she came out looking for water and relief.We wish we'd been able to put some ice in the bowl for her; it was late afternoon and well over 100F (about 40C). For more great critter videos, please visit texasbackyardwildlife.com #Armadillo #TexasWildlife #WildlifeVideos #BackyardWildlife #TexasBackyardWildlife
Great horned owls making crazy faces | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-03-02 | Sometimes the great horned owls get a little crazy. They look at our cameras and seem to ask themselves "Who's in there? Is someone watching me?". The answers to those questions, of course, are "us" and "yes".#greathornedowl #owl #owlvideo #shorts
A stunning yellow-crowned night heron fishing in the flooded creek Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-02-29 | Here in Austin much of our precious rain arrives in the spring. April and May 2019 were good months for rain and, after a storm, the normally dry creek at the bottom of the yard turned into a real creek and ran for about a week. When there's water in the creek it teems with life - frogs, apparently-instant tadpoles, crawfish, and tiny darting minnows. On the evening of May 4th, a yellow-crowned night heron arrived to try its luck at fishing. A truly gorgeous bird. It stayed all night, searching the waters for supper, but was unsuccessful. Turns out it was one day too early; by the following evening the fish and crawdads had arrived - washed down from upstream. Night herons are a little unusual in the Austin area but they migrate through on their journey from Mexico and Central America, where they normally over-winter.Also appearing in the video are some frogs. Their eyes shine in the camera's infrared and they're easy to spot and zoom in on. For more great critter videos and photos please visit texasbackyardwildlife.com#AustinWildlife #WildlifeVideos #BackyardWildlife #TexasBackyardWildlife
Some views of our backyard Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-02-28 | We have lots of cameras in our backyard and we stream a few that we think might be most interesting. Often, during the day, there's not a lot going on.After dark, we focus on a water bowl on a busy critter trail and we usually show an overhead view as well as the normal ground-level view. If any of the other trails are busy at night, we'll put them live too.DiscordJoin our Discord community to catch up on live stream highlights and chat about the various critters we see: discord.com/invite/XmzZ2PCDM8
Ringtail vs a wasp: Who wins? | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-02-25 | Ringtails have voracious appetites and lightning-fast reflexes but, even for them, snapping up a paper wasp for lunch seems like a bad idea. However, we like our food hot here in Texas and it seems that ringtails are no exception to that rule.
Indestructible little raccoons | #shorts Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-02-21 | Young raccoons love to wrestle and scuffle with their brothers and sisters. It's their favorite thing to do when they're not otherwise entertained by eating or sleeping. They never get tired of it and we never get tired of watching them. These two little raccoons were wrestling on the top of a tree stump when the inevitable happened and they fell off. Fortunately, raccoons are almost indestructible and no one was hurt.
Did that owls head just fall off? Texas Backyard Wildlife 2024-02-17 | We watched this great horned owl on a VERY hot Texas afternoon trying to stay awake and keep himself cool. Finally, drowsiness overcame him, and he fell asleep with such suddenness that we were worried he might have broken his own neck.He was only out for a few seconds. These owls are nocturnal, of course, but they honestly don't seem to get much quality sleep during their days off. His reproachful stare when he came to again made us wonder if he could tell that we were laughing at him.#Texas Backyard Wildlife
