The wild critters seem happy we are back at The Holler. They staged quite the homecoming! Even Wiley E. came out in broad daylight, sashayed by, and winked at me and I have the pic to prove it!
Look how fat and healthy he is! I don’t even want to think about what he’s been eating. He’s not too shy is he?
And what big teeth you have Mr. Coyote! This is a different Wiley. Possibly a Willette. We have lots and lots of Wileys and Willettes at The Holler.
Beep Beep is always content snooping around us. He is a hobbyist human watcher. He doesn’t even pay attention to Wiley E….. Smart Beeper.
The shy little woodpecker even dropped by to say hello!
After six years I have finally learned to make a credible hawk call. I called, they came. Or maybe they were just flying by. But I think they respond to my call and it confuses the ravens too. They keep looking for the hawk on the ground!
And of course The Holler Hummers. I miss them so much when I am away.
Europe is incredible but they don’t have Wileys or Beeps or Hummers. Wild animals just make the very best neighbors. I like having them on my HOA!
And The Holler? Well it is rural, rustic, and in a horrible drought, but even so, it is awful purty.
Cheers to you from all the happy Holler critters~
.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Share this:
Discover more from Cindy Knoke
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Purdy, purdy, purdy. I have a friend that lives in RSF. It’s not quite that wild but it’s peaceful.
Yes, close by, my grandfather lived there and I spent much of my childhood there. It was much like The Holler when I was little~
That is one fat coyote! Beautiful pics. 😀
cate
Terrible drought and the coyotes are thriving. They are so adaptive and smart!
they are – we lived for a bit in CA mountains – every night as soon as we went to bed they were there howling and yipping. Almost ate our cat! LOL
Yes there are no cats at all at The Holler except for the wild varieties!
That’s a real welcoming–sure that nature’s embrace was reassuring.
Oh, and the drought is on my mind all the time. Wish that I could send you some of our East Coast rain.
Oh I wish you could too! I have lived in SoCal all my life and I have never seen things this bad!
Yea, Cindy, it is pretty
Domo arigato Yoshiko~
You are welcome, Cindy 🙂
Enjoyed seeing your photos while you were traveling. Glad you are home safe.
It was awesome to have travel along!!! <3
There must be lots to eat there because he’s one healthy looking creature.
Leslie
Yes indeed. I am afraid it is the cows~
Oh dear, that won’t bode well for him. Take care.
Leslie
That’s so cool that you can call the hawks! Fabulous pics as usual. 🙂
Finally learned how. They seemed as surprised as I was! 😉
I can imagine!
A nice welcoming committee. 🙂
The best and no HOA regulations!!
Or HOA dues.
Another big bene!
Always nice to come home – what a menagerie! The rain seems to be stuck over here – sorry!
Tell it to come play over here please!!! 😉
Wspaniałe zdjęcia
Dziękuję bardzo!
All your posts are great!
Awwwww, thanks!
Almost expecting the road runner lol 😉
Well you got him!! Beep beep!
ah hah!! *Rolls out acme net*
And the tnt!!!! Maybe a huge safe for good measure` 😉
What a beautiful holler – and the Beep Beep, I’ve never seen one before! 😉
Yay! So pleased to introduce you!!! 🙂
Love the pics, especially of fat Wiley and the Roadrunner. Welcome back to the states!
It is always good to be home! <3
While I don’t know where the Holler is exactly, coyotes have been popping up a couple of miles of me clustered around the west end of the Los Alamitos Army Airfield and the golf course. Some folks in this pro-ecology environment want to trap/kill them because they are fearful for their little pets. Somehow, that just doesn’t make sense.
But a roadrunner near you?! Wow. We did have one – ONE – woodpecker… and that’s a great shot!
The roadrunners aren’t just near us. My son calls them our pets. They are always snooping and watching us. Very curious, very fun birds. I was really scared of coyotes when I first moved in here 6 and a half years ago. There was a dominance challenge going on because we moved into their territory. Once we built the fence and asserted ourselves with them, we have learned to co-exist quite peacefully. Now I enjoy seeing them and hearing them. Coyotes will eat little pets if they are left alone outside. My friend has a small pomeranian. She doesn’t let her be outside alone and there is no problem. I have seen urban coyote packs chase a large man and his dog though. Ours have enough to eat from the land.
Lovely photos, Cindy, how lucky you are to live with this wildlife and birdlife. The one thing I really miss here in North Cyprus are the birds = eagles, kookaburras, parrots, willie wagtails.
Australia is bird heaven. I was in bliss when I was there and of course, I want to go back~ 😉
Really enjoy these wildlife and bird photos! They were there welcome you home. 🙂
I have been wondering if you have arrived home, Cindy. So glad you are and enjoyed the grand trip!
So happy you do my friend. The Holler critters are different because there are so few people out here that the animals seem almost interested in us!
Such incredible photos. I enjoy seeing wildlife around the homefront.
I of course was raised in the burbs so it was quite a learning curve in the beginning. Now I can’t imagine living with nearby neighbors and traffic makes me nervous! We call grocery shopping, “going to civilization!”
Same here. But now I wouldn’t trade this life for any city or civilization.
It’s a very good thing isn’t it. People just do better living in tune in the natural world with it’s wild creatures.
Yes it sure is purty. What a magical wonderful wonderland you live in. Great pics Cindy.
We saw a grey fox in the (suburban) woods yesterday! Didn’t get a photo though 🙁
Alison
We have foxes here. Red ones. They eat gophers which makes them very appreciated! I am enamored by foxes. In my entire life I have only seen a handful. I saw an arctic fox once. What a thrill!
Stunning!!!! Have you ever heard about Coyote Oldman, your photo of a coyote brought this one back. Wanda
No I hadn’t heard of it. Quite lovely! Thank you so much for sending it to me~ <3
There’s no place like home. Welcome home! Nice to see familiar “faces.”
Exactly!! The neighborhood watch! 😉
Fantastic photos Cindy, I love them all!
Awwww, so motivating! Thank you~
Excellent photos Cindy and I loved taking a nature walk with you today!
You were such a great companion and not even scared of the coyotes! 😉
I have enjoyed your travels but agree there is still something very special about coming home and sleeping in your own bed… glad you had a great welcome from the neighbourhood.
I like my hood!!! 😉
You just take the best pics! Glad you’re back and that you had a good trip.
Awwww, merci beaucoup mon ami! <3
Glad you’re happy to be home Cindy, I really hope you get a whole lotta rain soon (but not floods!). I was out in California in July and it was so dry, but extremely beautiful 🙂
It is really very bad now. Many of the orchards have died and we are talking 50 year old orchards in many cases. Lots of ranchers have given up irrigating. It is very sad to see all the dead trees. But nature’s resilience is amazing too. Certain creatures continue to thrive like the birds and coyotes. The free range cattle have been hit very hard though with noticeably dwindling numbers.
It sounds terrible Cindy, I hate to think of those orchards and other trees dying, I really hope you get some respite soon
Wow, what great photos! Thank you for sharing, 🙂
Thank you more for appreciating!
Outstanding images! You really are a great photographer my friend x
You really are so kind! Thank you~
Just being honest x
Fantastic pictures, it appears to me that you live in an amazing and beautiful part of the world!
It truly is, but it is quite different and I am sure not to most people’s tastes. Too rural, too scraggly, too all alone. I love it!
What a beautiful place…. I lived for a time on a peninsula on Boston harbor, and we went through a phase of coyotes swimming across the bay to our town and terrorizing the place….they had to close the school for a time, and there was the horror of one lady out walking her small dog, helplessly screaming as the coyote carried it off. The situation was solved by Animal Rescue, I forget just how. I am truly glad to see your situation, where nature is allowed to make its own compromises. What is a hawk call like? Can you describe/simulate it for us? I’m truly impressed that you can do that!
Wow, swimming across the bay. That is impressive. Did you know a coyote lived in Central Park for awhile? It took the subway once and I think was poisoned. Coyotes can get aggressive when under stress for food. Here they prey on the cattle. Calves mostly. The mother cows bellow for days after they take a calf. They are wild creatures and when I first moved in I was quite frightened of them. Now we enjoy a peaceful coexistance. I don’t underestimate how dangerous they can be though. UC Davis runs a program called coyote bytes where they monitor negative human-coyote interactions.
I don’t know how to describe the hawks cry. It is two toned in the same way that Horned Owl cries are. I do them to really good effect too. The howls and I hoo back and forth until one of us gives up!
You take such wonderful pictures! I wanted you to know I nominated you for A Lovely Blog Award.
Awwwww, I am honored and so appreciative of your kindness! Thank you~
You so lucky to have these beautiful creatures around. Fantastic photographs too!
They show me everyday what life is really about. They don’t take antidepressants and neither do I! 😉
How precious! What a nice homecoming. Loved it!
Well I am very glad you did and cheers to you!
Delightful! And I can tell that your darling critters think so too. 🙂
I bet they think just like me, “I’m so glad there are no more humans here!” 😉 Laughing. I love people but I love to live amongst nature. The cities are good for visits. You must feel the same in Maine~
Coyotes are new to this neck of the woods. I hear them howling but rarely see them. Beautiful shots! You have planted a seed with your calling of hawks. I will be practicing.
ooooh let me know how it goes. Once you get it right, you and the hawks will immediately know it. The ravens will too. The hawks will fly close when you call and even land close which one just did the other day. I love the hawks unreservedly!
Beautiful pictures of beautiful surroundings. That is definitely one hefty coyote! I sure wish I could send some of our Florida rain to you to top off your happy homecoming.
I so wish you could. I wonder if we will get rain this winter. If not this whole place will turn into a desert. Many of the surrounding orchards are now dead. It is sad.
I do hope you get rain but if you get a lot won’t you run the risk of those awful mudslides we hear about out there?
Oh yes we will, especially with the dead orchards. Drought, Fire and mudslides that about sums up this part of the world!
Well, they do say you’ve got to take the bad with the good but that’s a bit extreme. Well wishes for the best to you! Hugs <3
Yes SoCal is indeed a land of extremes at times. It would be very nice if the drought would end. <3
Great shots of your neighbors – healthy all, by the looks. Wiley is pretty brazen. Thankfully, ours are shy and pretty much nocturnal. Best to keep the domestic pets inside!
The Holler requires big dog(s). One is not enough to stand up to a pack of coyotes. There are a few coydogs in the mix as well. People abandon dogs out here and the more aggressive ones join up with the packs. We don’t wander around much alone at night at The Holler. The coydogs are much more dangerous than coyotes because they have been abused and abandoned by humans and are generally not positively disposed to our species. I haven’t seen a coydog for while which is good. They scare me much more than encountering a grizzly. You whistle and sing and grizzlies tend to avoid you. Coydogs do not back down. Of course, we have no grizzlies here but I have seen them in Alaska and Canada.
Life in the wilds!
I love your photographs,Cindy.
You know my sweet friend, that makes it worthwhile to post them. Hugz to you Ranu~
The coyote looks pretty scary!
Coyotes are not your dog Spot! They are wild and lethal and pretty amazing creatures.
There’s no place like home…..and how encouraging to see the wildlife doing so well despite the drought.
Yes indeed. The ones suffering are the free range cattle. The coyotes have picked off the calves. I am glad I wasn’t home to hear the mamas bellow. I have to do something because the cattle need to be better cared for. You see you get home and you face responsibilities which is one of the many appeals to me of travel~
Ah yes…responsibilities…..:(
Relieved to be home? I bet!
Yes…….It does get to the point where traveling seems more normal than being home. This is about the time Jim takes me home!
Lots of welcomes there. Lovely photos. Bravo! 🙂
Great to hear from you Jamie and merci beaucoup mon ami!
There’s no place like home, is there? Wow, those coyotes look as though they’re posing for your pictures! I’ve seen two up in the mountains, and they were very elusive, gone in a flash. And that is awesome that you can make a hawk call!
It is good they are gone is a flash. Ideally you want them afraid of you.
Glad to see you are back! I thought you had decided to spend your life on the road (or water, or sky). Nice pics of the Holler.
I have definitely decided this. I look at life at The Holler as a pause between excursions. Our next trips are lined up like jets at O’Hare! Hope all is well with you Wally? 😉
Welcome Back. Love your Holler Critters. Nice to know they are there waiting for you and all is well.
The critters are pretty cool neighbors I must admit. Easy on the eyes and easy to get along with! 😉
Beautiful pictures.
Awwww shucks thank you ma’am! 😉
As wonderful as the pics and descriptions of your trip were, Cindy, I really missed these. Welcome back home. I won’t be outdone by a coyote ! 🙂 Big Hug !
Welcome back to your Holler Cindy – from a human critter fan! I so enjoyed your wanderings but can almost heave that sigh of relief to have you home with the wild things.
You know they missed you! Beautiful…if brown. Couldn’t you have packed some water back for us?? 🙂