I was never that much of a "birdwatcher", but since moving to Florida, nature is right in my face every day!
Today as I sit here, with a large window in front of me, I am watching a small family of egrets taking a stroll, through my yard.
In the afternoons, we sometimes see a squadron of pelicans flying over..

Now in your neck of the woods, what is commonplace to you but would startle,surprise,delight a visitor?

Holy Heron! Yes, enjoy the lovely egrets, they are a wonder!

LOL, is that you Blacktie or is it Batman

I love Egrets!

I see a lot of Blue Herons (my hotmail address) and White Herons. They stand in the marsh like they are invisible but they are these white things that stick out like sore thumbs.

Pelicans are my favorites. Magnificent.

Osprey sitings are thrilling. They fly at a much higher altitude than other birds. I have seen them with a fish still squirming in their mouths.

Dolfin in the wild are always a treat.

Sea turtles are such a rarity that they stop me in my tracks.

Live in a very urban area of Seattle (2 miles north of the airport) where you would not really expect to see much in the way of wildlife and still see Hawks almost daily, as well as the occasional bald eagle. There's an ospray nest in the valley below my house and a heron makes regular visits to the fish pond we built in the back yard. Are sometimes visited by racoons in the winter evenings.

Ken

Hi Scarlet
In the last month within 50 miles of my house in Humboldt Co. Ca. I have seen while driving Deer, Elk, Mt. Lion, Osprey, Egrets (greater and cow) Great Blue Herons,and a Peregrine Falcon. It is the Elk in the Redwood Parks that stop traffic.

Have Fun
GP

LOve all the seabirds here. The many Ibisies(sp) that fly in huge flocks then land on the neighbors lanai...quite a sight IMO. We have monitor lizards that are becoming quite a nuisance around here, they grow about 4-5 feet long...quite spooky looking. Of course there are the gators that swim in our canal. We had a manatee swim under our dock once too. Our very faves, are the many huge blue crabs that we catch in our crab trap. We had so many last year we were tired of them! Judy

When we first moved in, rattlers, raccoons, low flying geese, woodpeckers, squirrels, and occasional mountain lion or two.
Now it's just an occasional loud neighbor.
Ahhh..progress.

This is so great!

Thank you!

At home, which is in such a small town that it's practically country, we have the usual squirrels and chipmonks, but especially enjoy the birds: delightful little ruby-throated hummingbirds, mockingbirds, house wrens, cardinals, blue jays, doves, thrashers, red-bellied woodpeckers, and we are delighted to have this year a pair of Eastern bluebirds.

At our river camphouse (only about 10 miles away) we have deer, wild turkeys, foxes, along with racoons, possums, etc.

We also have beavers, which are awful tenants, since they seem to kill trees for the fun of it, by eating just one circle of bark all the way around the trunk.

Very rarely, but often enough to keep us looking up, we see an osprey, and see many herons and egrets.

After a rain, it's fun to walk up our gravel road to see the tracks.

Many people just a few miles south of us on the river, have seen alligators, but so far we haven't, thank goodness! Anyway, I keep a close watch on Crawdad, our little old pup.

Byrd

Hi Miss Scarlett. Glad you got a nice gander of those Egrets this morning. I saw some in my sister's yard in Houston recently, of all places, and she said it was a first for her, as well.

Here on the island, we typically see Egrets, Sugar Birds, Hummingbirds, Bats, Huge Moths, Dragon Head Lizards, Butterflies, Night Hawks, Iguanas, and Land Turtles from our patio.

Keep us up to date on what else you find!

We live on a farm in NC.

Within the last year, every evening in the fall, we have lots of deer in our pasture and in the yard right by the house. They eat the acorns from our oak trees.

It's also common to find the usual suspects - squirrel, possum, raccoons, rabbits, etc.

Probably my fave is the mated pair of red-tailed hawks we have had for years now.

This time of year is new baby hawk flying lessons, and it's pretty cool to see the new fledglings soaring above the house and crying out in their little cracking hawk voices, "look Ma, I can fly!"

As far as startling a visitor, probably just me at 5:30 am on my way to the barn to feed the horses with no make-up on!

Up in Northern NJ, near the Hudson River, there are many duck families. I love to watch them walking around in their pecking order (tallest to littlest).

Leona- "NJ and family of ducks". Are you really Carmela Soprano?

As I always say, "Better egrets in the yard than regrets in the boudoir".

Or was it "I rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy"?
:-?

The hawks! Still amaze US! And the last couple of years, the Eastern bluebirds have come back to us... what a beautiful treat they are. Our back yard has a bird bath, and several feeders so we have all the usual lovelies........... and what fun to see them take their baths!

We live above the lake so we do have ducks and geese strolling through the yard on occasion... and a huge turtle once! We do sometimes see a Great Blue Egret around the lake....... that's a special moment in the day!

Oh Kal, what are we going to do with you ? LOL

I miss chipmonks and have not seen any hummingbirds yet..but I am really enjoying the 'wildlife' so far..actually, this is about as close to a 'wild life' as I have gotten lately

We have a cardinal family who seem to have a nest near one of our bedroom windows. Late at night I hear small cooing..in the am they are more chirpy. They have been feeding baby and teaching it to bath in the birdbath which is fun to watch, one small bird can empty a birdbath with its exuberant splashing!
GoTravel, how far are you from Jax?
I want to see a Mannatee!
Thank you for all these stories, keep em comin~

In a Portland, OR suburb...just in the last couple weeks I have seen deer and a bobcat just on the boundary of our neighborhood. There have also been cougar sightings...enough that the schools kept the kids inside. We have lots of birds...but they know to be careful since our kitty likes to hunt

In San Francisco, there are migrating flocks each autumn which seem to use parks such as Stern Grove and wild areas like Mt. Sutro as stopping places enroute. We hear birdsong in September which never occurs at other times.

I love the urban crows. Their wiliness, their loyalty to each other, their mockery and wit all appeal to me. They seem to be skilled in sarcasm!

I also love the little sandpipers living at Ocean Beach. When it's really cold in the winter, they will fly about twenty blocks inland and spend the night in the bushes around the reservoir on Quintara Street, then commute to the beach in the morning.

Brave creatures, beautiful creatures - I never cease to wonder at bird life.

Scarlett, your last post reminded me of tree frogs. I adore the soothing sounds of the tree frogs when I lay my head to rest at night.

My yard must be a magnet for strays..We found a 6 month old puppy on our driveway one night, he had been hit by a car and was pretty banged up. After unsuccessfully trying to find his owner and mucho vet bills, he ended up ours. Turned out to be a wonderful dog! We do pet therapy a couple of times a month in nursing homes. In addition to finding our dog, I found a nest of baby rabbits that had been abandoned by their mother and a goosling (sp?) baby goose. They both ended up at the Wildlife Rehabiliation Hospital near our house. My dd wants to be a vet.
Both my dogs got sprayed at 5 am by a baby skunk. They thought is was a cat and tried to play with it. LOL! What a stink!