Small Stories About Animals

[Rodafina]

Have you had any interesting or curious experiences with animals lately? This is a place to share true stories about animals you have encountered. Please be mindful about stories that may be upsetting - the spirit of the thread is to share our encounters with creatures great and small in a celebration of how fascinating and lovable animals can be. Let's exclude stories about human animals and focus on the others in the animal kingdom.

 

[Rodafina]

This post is about a spider.

Earlier this summer, I noticed a most wonderful spider in my garden. The abdomen was about 1.5 inches long. I looked up the pattern and learned that she was a Garden Orb Weaver, situated contentedly right in my garden. She stayed for over 5 weeks, spending much of her time sitting still right in the middle of her web.

She would sit still for hours. She would occasionally disappear for a short time, but recently, I noticed she was leaving the web for longer and longer. Then, her web was gone and so was she.

But, I think she liked her summer spot in my garden because just when she disappeared, I noticed two huge egg sacs, left behind. She is gone now, possible passed, but the circle of life keeps spinning.

https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Invertebrates/Yellow-Garden-Spider

 

[FayetheAspie]

A young raccoon was playing at the edge of the horse pasture. It would do silly things like grab a limb and swing on it. It seemed to be intentionally trying to show off for my Mama and me.

 

[WhitewaterWoman]

This post is about a spider.

Earlier this summer, I noticed a most wonderful spider in my garden. The abdomen was about 1.5 inches long. I looked up the pattern and learned that she was a Garden Orb Weaver, situated contentedly right in my garden. She stayed for over 5 weeks, spending much of her time sitting still right in the middle of her web.

View attachment 134335

She would sit still for hours. She would occasionally disappear for a short time, but recently, I noticed she was leaving the web for longer and longer. Then, her web was gone and so was she.

But, I think she liked her summer spot in my garden because just when she disappeared, I noticed two huge egg sacs, left behind. She is gone now, possible passed, but the circle of life keeps spinning.

View attachment 134336

https://www.nwf.org/Educational-Resources/Wildlife-Guide/Invertebrates/Yellow-Garden-Spider

Long before the internet, when looking things like this up was hard to do, I named this spider the zipper spider, for obvious reasons.

 

[Aspychata]

On the last day of my very first job in Florida, a dirty green parrot was running around in front of my car in the parking lot. l remember just being mesmerized by how cute it was. Then l went into my job and was let go. But l wasn't upset because the parrot left me smiling. Some point later, l went back to the store, and my supervisor told me it wasn't her, but the owner who wanted me gone. She said she liked working with me. Later, she too was no longer there.

 

[SusanLR]

There are many birds that live in the bushes and trees by my pool where they build nests. One in particular is very tame and friendly. She keeps a nest in the shrub by the back door.
I can look in even when she has babies, and she is OK with that.
I talk to her and whistle for her when I put meal worms out in a box under the shrub.
She eats and feeds her babies from the container. Later she teaches the babies to eat on their own, but they really keep her busy. Her mate helps as they raise the babies together.

I get to observe it all right at my feet. They are so tame.
Other birds come in to eat and take food to their young also, but they aren't as tame as this one bird. I say, "Hey, girl. C'mon down. The food is here."
It is a Mockingbird.

The nest with first egg of the season.
She's raised six babies already this year.

 

[Jeff T]

The fly season this summer started to look like it would be worse than usual, despite all the eucalyptus here.
The horse isn't bothered much by flies at her eyes, it's the blood sucking gnats in the spring that are her bane.
The mule is the opposite, the flies are attracted to his eyes midsummer. His left eye's mucus-membranes looked a bit thicker than usual. I had to get a fly mask for him.
He's a small mule, on the upper edge of 'mini-mule', I wasn't sure what size to get him. Tractor Supply had "Cob size", but I didn't know what that meant. Got one at local feed store that fit. That was the easy part. He does not want his big beautiful ears touched. At all. He had been mistreated by kids during previous owner. Now, how was I to get that fly mask over and on his head with that small ear opening? I walked towards him with the mask for over a half hour with no luck. He wanted nothing to do with it! He's not a mean guy, he was just nervously walking away.
It's been discovered fairly recently that horses learn from observation. Mules are half horse so perhaps it's the same with them? So I got the fly mask for the horse and put it on her head out in the stall run, close to the mule. I put it on and off two times, talking nonchalantly to the mule. I then went right over into his stall run and approached him with his mask once again out in front of me. Instead of walking off, he faced me with curiosity and stayed put. I moved the mask about and let him sniff it while talking low to him. Then I raised it up and brought his ears together to go through the ear hole in the mask, dropped it down over his face! Snugly attached the velcro bands and done. I was gobsmacked. I had given it a 20% success possibility at the beginning as I had never been able to touch his ears with his consent all these years.
So I guess they do learn from observation.

Definitely a small story.

 

[FayetheAspie]

Well done. I actually put the horse bridle over my own head to show my horse that it would not hurt her.

 

[Pats]

Don't know if this counts, but,....About 2 years ago I got this guinea pig from the animal shelter. Named her Cheyenne and we were a perfect match, she was my baby. Well, wanting the best for her I was reading how important it is for guinea pigs to have cage mates (some countries it is against the law to have just 1). So the shelter called and told me they had a little girl if I was interested, so I brought her home. Within a month or so I figured out that she was pregnant and she had 3 babies. So now I'm up to 5 guinea pigs.
It can be hard to tell what sex they are as a baby and I was certain this one was a boy and you have to remove them from mom by (I forget now how many weeks 3, maybe). So now I have a lone boy piggy who needed a cage mate so I bought a little boy pig and put them together. Well, I was wrong and very quickly ended up with a pregnant pig. So now I have this boy that needs a boy mate so he won't be alone. Getting a cage mate for my, now, lone boy brings me up to 7, which soon followed by another 3 babies, so now 10.
Okay, since then I have gotten 2 others from the shelter that just needed rescued and I'd figure 'what's one more'. Now I have 12 guinea pigs.
Oh and during all this time I soon learned that Cheyenne prefers to be alone and doesn't even like being around other guinea pigs.

 

[Judge]

Not lately, but one worth telling perhaps. Some 30+ years back when I discovered the first Preying Mantis I had ever seen. I stood and watched in on a shrub for about five minutes before realizing I should take a picture of it. I couldn't believe how docile this insect seemed to be in my presence. It was astounding. As if it knew I meant no harm to it.

Then I got this crazy idea to see if I could pick it up and take it inside to put on my dinner table so I could photograph it. Thinking, "This is nuts!" But yes, this creature had no problem remaining on table, looking up as if with human curiosity and allowing me to take a picture of it. Afterwards I carefully picked it up, and placed it exactly where I found it, saying, "Thank you!" Probably my strangest, yet benign encounter with nature.

Another odd encounter many years later was when my cousin and I decided to cross the border into Northern California and we stopped at "Lake Englebright" for some pictures. When we came back to the parking lot, we couldn't stop laughing as there was this llama that appeared out of nowhere. As if it was waiting for their Uber ride or something.

We had no idea where it came from, but it always makes me grin thinking how it simply showed up in a parking lot. Made no sense but was good for some laughs. Just hope the llama found its way home.

 

[All-Rounder]

I went to the pharmacy as usual a few days ago and there was this huge long locust on the inside of the pharma glass door. It was trying to camouflage into all the green but I could see it clearly. It was like the pharmacy's new pet or mascot. I'm not sure what it was or if it flies, it looked kinda like this:

We have them around here sometimes, they like to sneak into homes, I had one into my kitchen and I live on the 4th floor, idk how it got up here unless mom brought it somehow with herbs.

 

[FayetheAspie]

It looks like a katydid.

 

[Forest Cat]

I had a nest full of white wagtails in my garage this summer. Two parents with three kids. They had built a nest on top of a rail that has a sliding door hanging on it. So that door was out of order for a long time, couldn't use it. A little inconvenient but there was no other way. There was a wagtail nest in the exact same spot last summer, I think it might have been one of the same birds that came back and made a nest.

I watched them almost every day and I was there the day the baby birds jumped out of the nest for the first time. And they are still hanging out in my yard now, I saw three of them this morning. There's something about it, it's so nice to have birds around and just watch them. Especially the babies, they are so funny when they are fresh out of the nest and learning things. And wagtails are extra funny because they often try to run away instead of flying. So if you walk towards them, they run as fast as they can.

Soon they will leave, they fly all the way from Norway to southern Europe and north Africa when autumn arrives here. That's an amazingly long trip for tiny birds I think.

Spoiler

 

[Jeff T]

Don't know if this counts, but,....About 2 years ago I got this guinea pig from the animal shelter. Named her Cheyenne and we were a perfect match, she was my baby. Well, wanting the best for her I was reading how important it is for guinea pigs to have cage mates (some countries it is against the law to have just 1). So the shelter called and told me they had a little girl if I was interested, so I brought her home. Within a month or so I figured out that she was pregnant and she had 3 babies. So now I'm up to 5 guinea pigs.
Now I have 12 guinea pigs.

Reminds me of Spike Jones' "You Wanna Buy a Bunny"

 

[WhitewaterWoman]

I had a nest full of white wagtails in my garage this summer. Two parents with three kids. They had built a nest on top of a rail that has a sliding door hanging on it. So that door was out of order for a long time, couldn't use it. A little inconvenient but there was no other way. There was a wagtail nest in the exact same spot last summer, I think it might have been one of the same birds that came back and made a nest.

I watched them almost every day and I was there the day the baby birds jumped out of the nest for the first time. And they are still hanging out in my yard now, I saw three of them this morning. There's something about it, it's so nice to have birds around and just watch them. Especially the babies, they are so funny when they are fresh out of the nest and learning things. And wagtails are extra funny because they often try to run away instead of flying. So if you walk towards them, they run as fast as they can.

Soon they will leave, they fly all the way from Norway to southern Europe and north Africa when autumn arrives here. That's an amazingly long trip for tiny birds I think.

Spoiler

View attachment 134385

Winner!

 

[All-Rounder]

It looks like a katydid.

Okay well I'm glad I didn't disturb it otherwise

 

[FayetheAspie]

Okay well I'm glad I didn't disturb it otherwise

Are the two katydid photos yours?

 

[All-Rounder]

Are the two katydid photos yours?

No, they're from the internet. I looked up more pics by the"katydid" name and found the flying one. So I'm not actually sure if it's the same bug but probably family or similar.

Oh it's them that make that hissing sound in the grass. And other sounds.

Is your profile photo a dragonfly?

 

[FayetheAspie]

@All-Rounder Yes. I took that photo originaly with my camera. Since I don't know how to transfer photos from it to my phone, I photographed a printed copy of the original with my phone camera. The original had a little bit more of the wing section in it. I took the original using a combination of macro and fish eye. Macro for zooming in so close and fish eye for maintaining the globular shape of the eyes.

 

[Ken]

I'm very happy to announce that we have a family of skunks living in our back yard! They originally was living under my neighbors deck. The neighbor planned to have them exterminated. I couldn't stand the thought so I built a three room den for them. I placed a trail of food from my neighbors deck to lure them to the new den. I was so happy when I found that worked. I put food out for them every evening. They are some of the most adorable animals I have seen. I think they are just beautiful. I have encountered them up close a few times. A young one almost came up to me obviously very curious. He/she got within about three feet, then stood up to check me out.
The neighbor where they used to live has dogs that was always attacking them. The result is a lot of skunk spray and powerful sent and an angry neighbor that was always having to bathe their dogs. Now that they are happily living in our back yard with their own den and safe place, there is no scent at all. Not even a hint.
Skunks are actually very good to have around. As long as they are never attacked, they never spray or smell. They sleep all day and come out at night. They dig up and eat grub worms that eat tree, grass and other plant roots.
Also, they have the most adorable personalities.