What wildlife do you see on your rides?

[withm]

We rode at Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge on Sunday. It's sort of cheating to reply here with the critter count, but this is what we saw:

3 bald eagles
10 turtles
1 nutria
1 fox
2 deer
lots of great blue herons
lots of egrets
lots of ducks
a gajillion geese - Canada & snow geese
1 cat
1 grasshopper

And we heard osprey but couldn't find them.

[HillSlugger]

I saw a nice garter snake on Sunday.

[Desert Tortoise]

Yesterday morning (Monday) I saw a huge owl perched on a powerline. He even hung around for awhile after I stopped to watch him. He screeched at something in the distance, looked at me, looked back to the same place, screeched some more, hung out for a bit longer and then flew across the street to some trees where.....another owl came flying down towards the first.

This was incredible!! This all happened close to 6 am, which seems late by owl standards. Around here they seem to come out late at night or in the very early hours of the morning. I've only gotten glimpses of them at night and hear them more often. Sometimes on my house's roof. This is the first year I have heard two of them up there hooting away. I wonder if the two I saw in the morning are the same that like to hang out in my neighborhood? I was only 2 miles from my house.

This was a treat!!

[PamNY]

What a great day at Blackwater! Owls sound like a treat, too -- do you know what kind?

Garter snakes -- gosh I haven't seen one in years, being a city person now.

[7rider]

Deer are active in the park through which I ride to/from work this time of year, being mating seaon. The bucks will chase does across the street without regards for anything around them. I frequently see small herds running near the edge of the street.

Unfortunately, this season also brings out the Gawker - usually little old ladies in Subarus who gaze upon this natural wonder before them, and allow their cars to drift across the lane into the shoulder where yours truely is biking. (Okay..."little old ladies in Subaru's" is a generality, but it was an actual occurence yesterday).

Strangely, drivers are willing to patiently slow down for deer in the street (and disinclined to lay on their horn), but not always so willing to show the same courtesy for cyclists. Maybe I should put antlers on my helmet and hang a white furry tail from my rear rack!

[Desert Tortoise]

PamNY, I know nothing about types of birds and such but I did a quick search on the Arizona Desert Museum's site (I'm just outside of Tucson) and figure it was the great horned owl. Even in the low light of the early morning I could see it was easily over 1 ft tall and there was no missing the huge ear tufts.

[azfiddle]

Yes, Great Horned Owl. There are some other owls in our area, but none so large.

Desert Tortoise, if you ever ride the Aviation bikeway near Craycroft (where it is on the south side of the street) you can see burrowing owls in a hole- they are diurnal. The rest of our owls are smaller and definitely less visible- screech (year round), elf (summer only) are both in saguaro areas and oak-sycamore areas at higher elevations. Sometimes there are Long-Eared Owls up at Catalina State Park in the winter.