At 3:00am this morning, I was awoken by a kind of constant whiny mewing just outside my window. A kitten? I didn’t think so since there are no feral cats around here that I know of and the sound was too small to be a bobcat. Maybe a baby opossum, some kind of rodent, or even a baby skunk?

I listened to it for awhile becoming more insistent and clearly irritated. I woke up Brad.

We went to the window. It seemed to be almost directly against the house, but we couldn’t see anything. We turned on the outside house lights and got a flashlight. Still nothing. But the mewing continued.

Finally, Brad ventured outside (in his underwear…quite a sight, and it was cold). What he saw was a spade footed toad….being eaten by a much smaller snake.

The snake looks big in this zoomed up picture, but the snake was only the thickness of a fat pencil and less than a foot long. We think it might have been a juvenile nightsnake but we’re not sure.

No sign of either party this morning.

No, it’s not talk like a pirate week… I’m just excited to finally see a turtle.

We been hearing about the desert turtles since before we moved here. There are signs warning you not to run them over. There are roads out here are named after them, “Turtle Run”. There are even signs proclaiming love for the turtles. I never see them though… until yesterday.

I was driving back from our property when I saw a rock in the road that looked a lot like a turtle. I stopped to take a look and indeed, it was a turtle. Wow! I have a hard time believing they survive out here. It seems so hostile and they’re so small.

Here’s what one looks like in the road.

And here are a couple of close ups.

(In this picture, I crossed a line and he scrunched up.)

It was another interesting day for wildlife. I got a couple of nice vulture photos.