These animals are extremely shy. I couldn’t believe my luck when this one just appeared. I knew it existed but I’d never seen it so close before. It lives in the lagoon, literally just over the track from my front door. I’d had a large glass of wine and gone outside with my camera to enjoy the evening.
It all happened so quickly….. and then he just disappeared under the water.
I was focused on a bird, when I noticed what I thought was a stick move in the water. He looked at me and I quickly swung the camera around and ‘klicked’ just before he disappeared again.
This might be a friend of his. It was about a month ago. It was just starting to rain a little when my husband spotted him by the edge of the water.
I didn’t have my ‘big’ lens but managed to get quite close to him before he shrank back into his shell.
Today was hot and humid. Most of the wildlife was quietly at rest, finding places to cool off. The pelican seemed happy just to cool off in the shallows.
It took me a while to realise this cockatoo was sitting above in the leaves just keeping an eye on me.
The duck also happy to sit around in the lagoon.
The turtle was just surfing, waiting for a wave that wouldn’t eventuate.
The hawk was just not bothered and keeping a wary eye out.
This is a Yellow Admiral Butterfly (Vanessa itea). Also known as Australian Admiral Butterfly. South Eastern Australia. Apparently it really like stinging nettles and I have plenty of them, popping up in my garden and growing profusely between the paddocks of lucerne. It is not an uncommon butterfly.
Knowing nothing about butterflies, I was a little perplexed because I couldn’t see how this could be a ‘yellow’ admiral butterfly. I couldn’t see any yellow at all. They mystery was solved by a visit to the ‘net. What you see here is the underside of the wing. The butterfly looks totally different when its wings are down. Click here to see.
My opponents in the battle to have a garden, (other than the weather), are usually furry, have cute little white tails, eat most of our lucerne crop and have travelled across Australia. A rabbit proof fence had to be built across the continent to stop their advance. Sadly, I have never been able to afford a fence all around my property. Over the years I discovered that they were very reluctant to leap over a smelly old tyre and eat whatever treat I had just planted. The evidence of my success is everywhere. Look at my amazing gum trees I planted years ago. In most cases I remembered to remove the tyres, just before they strangled the trees.
I’d nurtured my new gum tree in the glass house until it was 3 feet high. It was healthy and looked ready to go. So imagine my horror this morning when I went to check on my new gum and found this. All that was left was a STICK!
The tyre was intact. So can I conclude that either a three feet tall bunny, ate dinner last night or I have some sort of bouncing bunny that can repeatedly bounce and eat…? or what?????