Mink!

First time I ever saw a mink here! This was taken yesterday, Friday the 13th, July, 2012.

Big Brown Bat

Josh spotted this Big Brown Bat walking up our walk this evening. I called my local rehab and she said to get him vertical and he should be able to fly away. After trying and trying, he held on the tree for a little while, but fell again, and again.

American Toad... darn big one!

I ran out in the rain to measure this gal as best as I could. 3.5 - 4 inches! Mighty big. Just smaller then my hand. It turns out this she a common American Toad, but a darn big one. I say her, because I recently went out with my four year old son to gather some tadpoles, so he can watch them grow, so I am hoping this may be mama! This photos were taken on Thurday, May 19, 2011.

TICKS! & Josh & Lyme disease

So this isn't completely about animals on the creek here, but then again it is. Josh, my 4 year old son, has Lyme disease. He just started antibiotics today. I am going to make notes here so others may be able to be educated about the symptoms etc.

So I just had the one day "poop & puke" as my friend Linda often describes the flu two Sunday's ago on October 31. Then my husband Joe and Josh seemed to be feeling off. Josh started to have a little fever in the middle of the night around 2 or 3 am. Usually the fever was 99 or 100, and some children's ibuprofen did the trick to make him feel better. Around Nov 1 is when Josh started to complain that his stomach hurt. He also complained of headache. He was also complaining about a pulled muscle behind his knee. I think this may have been unrelated to the Lyme. Then it seems a small sore throat was developing. We thought this all might have been the flu that I had just had, but that flu was just a one day violent throw up sort of thing. Josh's symptoms were different.

Joe took Josh into the doctors on Monday the 8th. The doctor check his throat and did a culture for strep throat. Tuesday at school after nap when Josh got up he was running a fever of 101 +, thus they called and kicked him out of school for the next day. Also on Tuesday a slight red glow mask appeared around his eyes bridging across his nose. Wednesday the 10th the doctors office called and said the strep throat test was negative and they wanted to do a general blood work up. I talked with the office and told him he was still having these weird spiking fevers in the middle of the night or after nap, but then was fine, and most interesting he had not thrown up and had normal bowel movements. If it was the flu that didn't make sense. I told her we had a explosion of ticks here a month ago and I was concerned about Lyme disease, he also complained that his shins were hurting that morning and told her about his red "raccoon" mask rash. So she discussed it with the doctor and added Lyme to the blood work up. Since Josh was home from school, we went right and and got the script and had the blood work drawn.

Josh wen to school on Thursday the 11th of November, just like normal. He was picked up from school by a friend and had a playdate after school. Joe and I both were out that evening. When my friend Jen brought Josh home, he basically put himself to bed and went right to sleep. Friday morning right after I dropped off a very cranky Josh at school I got a call from the doctors office saying his Lyme test was positive and what pharmacy do I want the Amoxicillin called into. Thus Josh is now on a teaspoon of Amoxicillin twice a day for 21 days. 400 mg/5ml. I picked it up and went into school and gave him his first teaspoon full.
3:20 after nap, I got a call from school. Josh was miserable. He didn't really want to get up from nap and was running a fever. On the way home from school Josh complained about the sun in his eyes and how he needed his sunglasses. The sun was low, but he has never complained that much about it. I took his temperature now that he is home. 99, 100, 102.4. I take it 3 times for the squiggle factor!

So basically the summary of his symptoms is this. He seems to constantly complain of a headache in the front part of his head. He touched his forehead to explain where it was. He was constantly complaining about his throat hurting. He also has had a loss of appetite. Maybe due to the sore throat. Ice cream, and yogurt seems to go down just fine. He does seem hungry at times, but then he doesn't want to eat. Each day he seems to be sore in a new place. Since Tuesday his red raccoon mask seems to be getting brighter. Today in fact it seems to have expanded all the way down his face. I was hoping it would go down with the ibuprofen I gave him when he came home, but it doesn't seem to be the case.

Joe just picked up some sunglasses for Josh and his light sensitivity.

So on Thursday when I was taking Josh to school something clicked inside my head. I remembered Josh woke up one morning about 3-4 weeks ago with four or five mosquitoes bites right between his eyebrows. I think they itched him a little, but not as much as mosquito bites usually do. With the rash appearing around his eyes it made me more convinced that it was Lyme disease and they had been tick bites, even before we heard the test was positive this morning. They didn't "bulls eye", unless this rash on his face is now a really big late part of the "bulls eye". They were just small bites.

Mothra

Very big moth. About two inches long. Just saw him on our kitchen porch while eating dinner. I would love help identifying him.

Grasshopper & Stink bug

Young stink bug just happened to land on this grasshopper last night when I was playing around with my camera doing night shots.

Leopard frog

Just took this. I will identify it later. Probably a Northern Leopard Frog.

Focused, but out of focus...

The camera says this swallow is in focus, on auto or manual. But when you crop it is totally clear he is not. OR is it just me wanting my Canon 40D and 70-300mm 1:4-5.6 Is lens to be something it is not?

Swallow

Taken 7/18/10 Swallow spreading it's wings... One of those photos I have cropped, and felt was blurry, so I sharpened it and tweeked it a little.

One animal I don't like...

Tick. One of the human/animal interactions I don't care to have. Don't ask me what kind of tick, for I don't really care. This is one animal, this animal lover has no qualms about killing. But on the other hand, I did find a website that does define the different types: http://www.tickinfo.com/

Juvenile Bald Eagle!!!

10:45 May 31, 2010. 85°F | °C Current: Sunny Wind: SW at 3 mph. Humidity: 50%

I have seen bald eagles around here, but never a juvenile. What a treat and he was a great poser right on the top of the dead tree on the end of our lawn and the Perkiomen creek! He headed upstream when I took the last shot of him taking off!

Honey Bees that bores in wood..

Pheasant remains

I took a walk late afternoon yesterday and found what I thought wasthe remains of a Red Tail Hawk, but after a friend pointed out what type of birds have this spur, I feel it is a pheasant. I assume the Bald Eagle that got it, but maybe it was a lucky fox. The bones were picked clean. Probably by the Black Vultures that have been around lately. Not all the bones were there, but some could have washed away in the rain storm a few weeks ago for they were on the sandbar island and very near the waters edge. Some of the feathers had mud on them.

Dinosaur footprint

Left manus impression of Rhynchosauroides from the lower Lockatong in Arcola, PA. Olsen, P.E., 1986.

I found this image on:
http://digsfossils.com/fossils/footprints_pa_lockatong.html

also check out the book The Beginning of the age of Dinosaurs, Faunal Change Across the Triassic. By Kevin Padian. You can find the text on Google Books. http://www.google.com/books?id=lssj8lR0zXMC&pg=PA66&dq=arcola+pennsylvania&cd=2#v=onepage&q=arcola%20pennsylvania&f=false

It states the fossil was collected by P. Olsen (Paul E. Olsen) and Cynthia Banach.

Black Vultures

I have seen this pair around here for the past week. The dogs have also been rolling in something very smelly. These were taken today, Thursday April 15, 2010 around 6:30 pm. Sunny day.

Wood Ducks and Flicker

I took this 4/1/10 around 8 am. See all tree birds?

Great Egret (Great White Heron)

3:30 pm on Saturday, April 3, 2010. Sunny. 69 degrees.
I had my 72 mm lens on to take photos of plants and I stumbled across this Great Egret!

Female Wood Duck and family

Seems she has 6 babies this year. They are very shy and hard to get a photo of for they hug the island tightly.

Braconid Wasp

A wasp with a very long end... My best guess it that this is some sort of Braconid wasp. Josh found it yesterday in our porch next to the kitchen.

Red Tail Hawk

4/22/09 8 am ish. Red tail hawk...