Nature in the Burbs

Back when I lived in California there was some wildlife that would mix with the suburban sprawl of the various places I lived in.  The City I grew up in had lots of sparrows and black birds but that was it.  I knew there were numerous amounts of deer that would haunt the hills above I-280....you'd sometimes see them on the side of the road....usually they were standing and eating but other times they were smeared across said side of the road....and a Hawk or two would circle overhead playing on the thermals from the Interstate.  One City I lived in had a trail up the street from the apartment building and deer and other critters lived there.  At night, the deer would creep down to my kitty corner neighbor's yard so they could eat his flowers.  Heck Cathy and I saw a dog sized Raccoon duck into a storm drain once.  Then there were the squirrels.  The grey one's were common, but in the last City I lived in there were hoards of the black ones.  Cute little things too.  When I moved to Tennessee the first thing I noticed was Cardinals.  Actual freaking RED birds......like the sports teams mascot, but real!  We don't have Cardinals in California....we have annoying Blue Jays, Canadian Geese (who are a nuisance because they crap EVERYWHERE) and Seagulls who, if you've ever attended school at the Discourser's Site like I did, would ascend on the playground in a scene reminiscent of the Birds at lunch time.   To attract more birds to our yard, we've bought some bird feeders..actually  3 of them came with the house.....we also have a hummingbird feeder and a feeder where you put sticks of food so you can feed Woodpeckers.  We also now have a butterfly house.  I saw a Bat house, but you have to put them so far away from humans that it wouldn't be worth it....hey Bats eat mosquitoes......that's a good thing by me.   Over the years we have had our share of visitors to the yard.  Tons of Finches....the usual brown bodied, black headed ones and a few Golden Finches.  We have a few bird families that come around as well.  We have the Dove couple (brown doves not white), the Robin couple and the Cardinal Family.  The Woodpecker is pretty cool too.  He's got a black body with white spots and a bright red head.   Of course our Diva Kitty Panther thinks it's Kitty Buffet time...although she hasn't figured out that the bell on her collar warns the birds in advance of her coming.  Panther's brother and sister, Cubby and Pandy, also think it's buffet time.   We even have a Falcon that hunts our yard sometimes.  I saw him one morning with a blackbird pinned down, noshing away.  It was damn cool!!  Nature at work right there for all to see.  Heck the Falcon must have a mate or something because the other day two of them were circling the yard looking for food.   Of course we have the other visitors.  Possums have been seen in the yard as well as wild rabbits.  We even had a skunk that was a regular visitor for awhile there.  Our one stray cat Pumpkin found out about Mr. Skunk the hard way......needless to say, Pumpkin was banned from the house for a bit.