Local wildlife where you live

Deer and moose are common on the highways out of town - lots of car accidents because the animals can't or won't read the "Deer/Moose Crossing" signs.

We have tons of coyotes, bobcats, and snow hares roaming the cities. People catch them on their door cams and post them. Many dogs and cats are never found because they became supper.

We have bears, too, a little ways out of town on the highways and in the mountains.

We have deer, possums, rats, coral snakes, squirrels, blue jays, mocking birds, cardinals, woodpeckers, sparrows, ducks, vultures, hawks, lizards, geckos, toads, turtles, tortoises, mosquitos, flies, ants, wasps, dirt daubers, butterflies, and others I can't bring to mind at the moment. Used to have armadillos, rabbits, foxes, and a few others, but no longer see sign of any.

You know what really pissed me off once. We do have field mice in the area; I saw one run across the living room floor so I called an exterminator out. He told me a mouse could squeeze through the tiniest hole. Then he see’s the parrot and said there was nothing he could do as long as we had a parrot in the house because they toss their seeds on the floor and that attracts the mice.

So I called out another exterminator, they went around the entire house and sealed up every little hole a mouse could get through, we haven’t had another one since!

Yeah, I once saw a show on mice - it's bloody amazing how they shrink their bodies into just about nothing to squeeze in somewhere. Glad you got it fixed!

When we bought our house in West Van, we inherited rats in the outside crawl space (gross - they're big!). We called Peter the Pest Guy and he took care of things toute de suite! Mice are one thing, rats are another! Thank Goodness Alberta doesn't do rats. We have a Rat Patrol here

Lots of deers. I saw many of these. Also skunks, hedgehogs.

This guy is causing a stir here as he is very far from home.

https://www.starnewsonline.com/story/news/2022/03/28/rare-mountain-bluebird-draws-bird-watchers-wrightsville-beach-north-carolina-climate-change-wildlife/9457261002/<br />

That is one beautiful bird! I've never seen one that shade of blue - no wonder it's attracting attention.

We have the same wildlife and a few weeks ago it was still mating season of coyotes and I am walking the dog on a long leash behind me and when I turned around, a coyote was ready to leap at my dog. I screamed so hard at him and he walked away, but more leisurely than running. I think it was a coy-dog, way bigger than a regular coyote and not afraid of people.

We also have raccoons, they're kind of funny to look at and yes, rattlesnakes are a real threat these past years. We live up on a canyon and have way too many. Opossums eat rattlesnakes, they're immune to the venom.

Huge seagulls, as big as a small dog.

Wombats are probably the most common animals we have around here judging by how often we see dead ones on the side of the road. They have a habit of wandering out in front of a car and then just stopping in the middle of the road.

Possums would be next. I have some living in the trees on one side of the house and at night they scamper across the roof to eat the tree ferns on the other side.

Wallabies and kangaroos are pretty common too, as well as kookaburras, magpies, various parrots, cockatoos and lyrebirds.

There are also echidnas and goannas but I don't see either of them all that often.

I live next to a small nature park so a lot of raptors tend to fly around my neighborhood. I love watching the interactions between them and the smaller, nesting birds. There are also a lot of vultures. I saw a flock of them just sitting in a cleared lot the other day. As for nesting birds, for some reason they think my garage is a perfect nesting site. Normally I can keep them out but last year I ended up with a nest and baby birds.

The apartments where I once worked periodically had to get bats removed from the chimneys. And in one building honey bees nested for years because the pest control couldn't seem to get them out. The last time they came they had to have used poison because all were suddenly gone. Our biggest problem was red wasps nesting deep in the old cedar-sided buildings. Using Hardiplank to replace the cedar solved the problem in the end.

My boyfriend and I often go take a walk in the wood. Once I sat on a bench and I saw deers in the forest. My boyfriend when around them, then towards them, so they walked in my direction and they crossed the path a few meters away.

I was walking through the field below my house in a section I hadn't mowed and a woodcock exploded into flight a few feet in front of me.

My yard backs up with some wetlands and conservation area - so I get all sorts of critters - all types of birds, squirrels, deer, fox, coyotes, turkeys and more -

One of my favorite videos is of turkeys they are very strange creatures - several years ago in a couple of towns over this was in the news:

I found a tarantula in my house a couple of weeks ago. There used to be several in burrows in my backyard, but not lately.