I also had the great good fortune to witness an emergence from Bracken Cave, summer home to perhaps 20 million-plus Mexican free-tailed bats. My group arrived perhaps two hours before sunset to see the emergence in full flight. We left when it was almost dark and the emergence was still in full flight. What an amazing experience of sight, sound, and feeling.
I had the great good fortune to witness, several times, the bat emergence at Austin’s Congress Avenue Bridge. Over a million Mexican free-tailed bats roost under the bridge from late spring to early fall. late summer emergences can be very remarkable, as this one in August 2005 was.
It was, is, a pleasure to help play a very tiny part in helping people appreciate the crucial role bats play in maintaining healthy ecosystems.
In the distance, at the far end of a soybean field, peeking out from one bush and standing in front of another, hay bales await the tractor and trailer.
Last December I brought home from work a hibiscus plant. It was struggling with an awful whitefly infestation. We quarantined it, treated it with insecticidal soap, and eventually eliminated the infestation. While the plant grew some this year during our mild and dry spring and early summer, it didn’t seem to flourish. Since late July it’s been quite hot, humid, and we’ve had quite a bit of rain. Our patience has paid off – this week we revelled in the beauty of a hibiscus flower.
A Canada goose glides through still waters.
A flock of ducks takes a siesta on a spectacular early September morning.
I recently had the great good fortune to attend a performance of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) Musical Ride, a performance by Mounties and their mounts to music.
Look at this photo. Marvel how every rider is looking up, looking in, seeing where and how their fellow riders and mounts are. Marvel further that many of the riders had never sat a horse before volunteering for this duty, so riding is not yet a natural thing.
It is good to sometimes look past our nose, our own interest, to see how we fit into the group.
Old barns like this are disappearing in our part of the world. They can be costly to keep up and (I assume) they are not as ‘efficient’ and ‘modern’ as ones with a metal frame and skin.
Yet they are beautiful, evocative of another time, and I sometimes make a point to stop and photograph one, like this one. Then I wonder. Who lived there? What was life like? What successes, failures, did they have? Were they happy or at least content?
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