mthew

I found this Gray Squirrel a few minutes after spotting the Groundhog I posted pictures of yesterday. Later, looking in an old guidebook to North American mammals, I noted that Groundhogs are in the squirrel family, Sciuridae. In fact, they are the biggest of our squirrels. Humph!

This Groundhog’s den is near Sophie Calle’s Here Lies the Secrets of The Visitors of Green-Wood Cemetery, which lets people write down and slip their secrets into an underground vault. Making this the Woodchuck Who Knew Too Much?

Some sprouts at the base of a mature linden/Tilia were cut off recently. And while we’re on the topic, this is the big bole of a Beech.

Hunting from obelisk to obelisk… …this male American Kestrel spots something below. Mantling over the prey… …and autofocus flubs it! The bird flew towards nearby trees. It took me less than a minute to find him again, but there was no sign of the lizard. Did he drop his prey, or stash it for later?

Virginia Springbeauty/Claytonia virginica. Spring Beauty Rust/Puccinia mariae-wilsoniae

Male Bufflehead preening, head-scratching.