Limping buck is still getting by

Wednesday
Range: ~18.5-28 degrees C. At almost 7 p.m. temp was ~23.5 degrees C, humidity ~75% winds westerly 8-10 knots.

Lame buck gazelle noticed in the pines just north of the sapling field. He seems to have something wrong with both back legs, they're skewed to the right though he is able to move quite quickly on them, able to run away from us at some speed. Lower back injury causing some degree of paralysis? Seems left back leg hardly makes contact with the ground and both appear to be kicking abnormally to the right. Strange. However, he can move, he can graze and he can no doubt defend himself with those horns against feral dogs if he must.

From all our observations looks like he 'owns' the territory on each side of the dry water trail from the sapling field to the orchard. I believe another, healthy, buck owns the patch just north of that, (gazelle field and around)

Jays very vocal, quarreling in the pines, Syrian woodpeckers vocal, active. Flock of hooded crows active. Graceful warbler calls, Falcon fly over quite high, hobby from what we can see. Bee-eaters and stone curlews north gazelle field as usual. Hoopoe over field.

Feral pigeons, laughing doves, house sparrows, sunbird singing in the Bauhinia early afternoon.

Juicy fresh figs

An attractive plant we found just up the bank near the beginning of valley road, had managed to sprout out of relatively freshly overturned earth. Looks like a kind of borage, like a white forget-me-not with slightly larger blooms.

Range today 18.5-~27 degrees C. When we headed out- about 23 degrees and falling, humidity ~75% and rising, wind 9-12kt and westerly.

We decided to head over north ridge to the vale on the other side as I expected we could get some ripe figs from the trees over there. Timing was good, there were enough ripe figs for dessert for all the family. Mmm! Nothing is quite as rapturous in the mouth as fresh sweet figs from the tree. We said the blessing 'borei pri ha-etz' ( blessed be-who created the fruit of the tree) and 'shehechianu.. (blessed be.. who has sustained us to this day) ' for the first fruit of that kind of the season tasted.

There were some almond trees there too, their green fuzzy outer pods bursting and the nuts almost falling out. The many olive trees were loaded with fruit, still apparently developing. Quite a few of the figs were already split and would be attacked by flies or birds pretty much immediately.

One gazelle noticed- looked like full grown female and heading up the hill, big one, wondered if she was pregnant, though this time of year? Several piles of fresh gazelle dropping various parts of the hill, and two fox bolts over on the north east slopes, one surprisingly narrow, but typical in appearance.

As far as birds were concerned: quite a few larks heard and seen on the hill top there, probably crested lark (Galerida cristata) , hoopoes about, quite a few bee-eaters scattered over their favourite hunting grounds there though no coherent swarms today. (Lots of ants active today we noticed, gathering grass seed heads, the bee-eaters could be after these) , stone curlews vocal especially around dusk. Blackbirds (alarm, not song) and graceful warblers heard, collared dove about. Some hooded crows foraging on the field. Scattered foraging Eurasian jays.

Garden and street: house sparrows, sunbird (in Bauhinia, very vocal early afternoon), lots of laughing doves at their feeding station, feral pigeons.

Plenty grasshoppers active also, Moshe kept finding them!




No need to leave the house to find wildlife! This beauty almost ran onto my hand as I took a pillowcase from the shelf in the boys' room. Looks like one of the wolf spiders and is just about 5 cm in span.

Limping buck

We found these sprays of interesting looking white berries on the bank immediately west of valley road.

Today's range: 17.5 - 26 degrees C, when we went out: ~23 degrees, humidity ~75%, winds westerly to WSW ~8 kt. Some small cumulus clouds blowing in yesterday about dusk, almost felt like rain but was just the humidity rolling up the hills from the west.

Gazelle adult male sighted up the slope just east of the east valley path, amongst the pines and cypress. Seemed something wrong with back right leg, was limping, kicking it repeatedly to the right.. If same buck we saw a few weeks back in the orchard kicking just that way then seems to have same leg injury since but managing to get by. We didn't press him, we headed up the hill up the shepherd trail till we reached the bare hillside, then down a rough causeway to the orchard but he was already far ahead and lost sight of him.

Hobby sighted heading fast to south beyond the pumping station, disappeared into the trees.
Hoopoe sighted on the way down to the orchard. Repeated sunbird calls in eucalyptus by the orchard. Some turtle dove coos. Some collared dove activity. Syrian woodpeckers vocal. Ring necked parakeet heard central east valley area. Hooded crows flying over singly. Eurasian jays vocal and active throughout woods.

Graceful warblers vocal along valley road. Blackbird chack chack alarms. Stone curlews calling from north gazelle field. Bee-eater flock heard and seen active over there too.

Feral pigeons, house sparrows, jackdaw and white spectacled bulbuls around buildings.

Pouncing fox

Pic of fox from wiki, not here, you can tell, grass is way too green! Front end is more russet than our fox though hind end similar. You can't see the white tail tip on this.

Red and black bug, a common plant bug that really seems to like the leaf litter in one corner of the steps to our house, lots down there!

A delicate tiny flowered plant in bloom right now I need to ID. - found along valley road and our street .

Gazelles, dogs, reptiles: none found today
hyrax: active and vocal on hillslopes west of pumping station

Nicest sighting today, pouncing fox. Husband spotted it, about the middle of gazelle field. Red fox though not russet at all, more brownish/grey tones. Not the dark fox though. One wonders how many variations there are! crouched very still for a couple of minutes, then went into three delightful cat like pounces, each at a different angle, twisting around each leap. After the last, it went down from view, probably into the watercourse by the old fields there. It emerged a few minutes later 'upstream' by the largest almond, appeared to sniff at the trunk, then headed toward the north valley pines.

Bee-eaters: scores active north west gazelle field. (as also yesterday) Moved up in a high swarm to south around sunset.
Turtle doves: not heard
Hobbies: one gliding just above canopy down east valley, towards north,

House sparrows: garden as usual laughing doves heard cooing:
Hooded crows: a few windsurfing off south west upper slopes of 'windsurfer hill'
Jackdaws: vocal flock heading south, 70,80 ish over east field
Eurasian Jays: squabbling vocal, active in many parts of the pine forest
Feral pigeons: Between buildings, singles over valley
Greenfinches: Some calls by the orchard and larger pines
Blackbirds: no singing last couple of days but alarm calls, chackchack and tzeet and seen foraging
Collared doves: some coos heard near cistern
Stone curlews: calls north end of gazelle field
Sunbirds:garden, top of acacia near pumping station.
Syrian woodpeckers: active and vocal
Bulbuls: quite active and vocal, sound like family groups about, bank and east valley
Great tits: some calls in pines up to east of valley path.

Yesterday: similar plus a couple of hoopoes on the path by the pistaccio orchard.

More on the Shell Saga, and local birds.

Encrusted end of the shell obscures some of the difference betw. Conus and Conomurex. As you see, from this angle the opening is quite wide, much wider than it is in a Conus. We have an empty Conus from Eilat, looking at it now the differences become clearer. I will have to put in a photo of that for comparison later. The occupant had retired quite deeply inside, no doubt to avoid the sun. He will soon be returned to the sea.

Prof. Bella Galil, an expert on our coastal fauna, was kind enough to respond to my enquiry and readily IDd the mollusc as Conomurex persicus, also known as the Persian conch. She told me this was one of at least 300 different species that had reached the Mediterranean via the Suez Canal (at least I got that right!) and had established itself very successfully along the western shores of Israel. From the dark colour of the toothed radula we can surmise it was a male.

A beautiful photograph can be seen at http://www.gastropods.com/6/Shell_1376.html
I was quite surprised it wasn't a Conus, though in many ways the shells are similar. The whorl end in Conomurex is more peaked and developed (with some variation) whereas Conus is flatter, but take a look at the end of the shell we found on the beach, above. The encrustation obscured this difference a great deal. Of course I certainly defer to Prof Belil's experience and expertise in her field, she seems familiar with this one!

We were relieved that by replacing it in the water we would not endanger future paddlers. However, our alert still stands. If Conomurex can make it up the Suez and establish itself, so can Conus!

What was happening down in Eyn Porat today? Scores of Bee-eaters up where they were yesterday, north west end of gazelle field, and then moved over east to hunt over the whole field. Hoopoe seen flying into the acacia back there, stone curlews heard calling. Syrian woodpeckers also heard. Flock of about 70 jackdaws foraging on the ground far north end of the field/lower hill slopes, possibly picking around gazelle droppings for bugs as they do with goats.

Several gazelle spotted up on the skyline hilltop to the north, appearing and disappearing quite tantalizingly in ones and twos.

Sunbird singing in the Bauhinia tree today.

Nothing particularly new down in Eyn Porat today (species noted below) so I thought I'd share another couple of pics from the Tel Aviv outing. I sent the cone shell pic and pertinent info to some local oceanography profs. to hear their comments. They might be very interested since its almost definitely an invader from the Red Sea via the Suez. We also sent warnings to some neighbourhood lists to let people know NOT to handle such shells on any of our beaches.


Typical encrustation of life on the pier rocks. The largest conical shells are limpets, the spotted snail like shells next to them are some kind of periwinkle or similar.. haven't found which genus online- both molluscs(mollusks) - both spellings are valid. Up one periwinkle from the central limpet and slightly to the right is a barnacle, you can see it's 'trapdoor' on the top of its little round shell. Though barnacle shells look a lot like those of molluscs they're actually very tiny crustaceans, like teeny shrimps with a home. There also seems to be some kind of marine yellow algae.


This cute li'l crab was found by some youngsters at the end of a short rocky pier. It's perched on Moshe's very water wrinkled finger.

Today's range: 22.5-31 degrees C, ~ 28 when we went out, ~50% humidity and rising. Winds mostly westerly 7-12 knots most of the afternoon.

We went down to the beginning part of the north valley trail today. Lots of bee-eaters around, scores, hard to determine, they were everywhere particularly in the north west end of gazelle field which they seem to favour these days.

Stone curlews also gave us a number of sightings, flying to and fro about the same area and beyond the bat cave toward the secret valley, and very vocal.

Hoopoes seen, Syrian woodpeckers, turtle doves, collared doves heard and seen. Graceful warblers and chukar partridge heard.

Gazelle crossed central trail from the south, continued on to the north valley path, ran across, traversed the flat area by the north watercourse(planted with eucalyptus and acacia) and headed for the pines just north. Parent and young. parent had very thin horns, probably a female. The adult females of this species are supposed to have very thin horns though we often seem to see individuals with no horns at all. If visibility is at all hampered, (camouflage, late afternoon lighting) they may well have very thin horns that are just not visible. The second time I sighted this one today I could not see the horns at all though first time and final time I could see them clearly. They're nowhere near as developed as those of an adult buck but appear just as very fine sticks between the ears.

Laughing doves, feral pigeons around the buildings as usual, single hoodie in flight.

Hyrax aggression and Caper berries

Plenty hyrax were active today near the pumping station, including a lot of the dark coloured youngsters. This one we photographed allowed us to approach within about eight feet and take numerous pics, it was quite unconcerned, and between fixing us with its beady eyes, looked around for something to nibble.

We noticed it appeared to have an almost bald patch (dark area) toward the front of the right flank with what appeared to be a thin white scar. We wondered if this was due to a fighting injury or perhaps to an encounter with heavy duty wire. We've noticed lately quite a few adults with rumpled flanks and when they have territorial encounters they tend to bite in the hind flank. Could that dead one we saw actually have died from such an aggressive encounter? Checking articles on line I found answer to be yes, fights can be fatal. Because population density is so high now it's no surprise there are so many signs of fighting. Amazingly female hyraxes have as much if not more testosterone than males, tend to be more dominant in the colony and are actually more likely to fight.

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2006/05/22/hyrax_ani.html

No gazelle sighted today.

Birds about: Hooded crows, feral pigeons, laughing doves (cooing in the garden), house sparrows, white spectacled bulbuls (repetitive hoarse calls on the bank), sunbirds (in eucalyptus near the pistaccio orchard), a bunch of finches up there too but could not make them out but in silhouette, forked tails, that I could tell. More goldfinches? Didn't sound like greenfinches, sharper calls. Turtle dove coos, stone curlew calls, bee-eater quite large flocksomewhere north west gazelle field area. Syrian woodpecker (male) on a LINE over the middle of east valley pines. first time I've seen one perched for so long, he seemed quite settled there, wiped his bill a few times, looked around, groomed. Farther down was a turtle dove.. also collared doves around, some cooing. Graceful warblers calls. Eurasian jays about.

Night walks lately: another cricket seen, many heard as usual, the usual black millipedes, prolific throughout the summer, many up to around 15 cm (Moshe picked up a nice long one by the bat cave and this one actually nipped him with its mouthparts though not strongly.. he said that had never happened before), another scorpion, thinner tail, much broader pincer base, very dark but not black.

The fruit of the caper Capparis spinosa is pretty much ripe now. These are edible and often pickled though are not as popular as the buds. Look out for those nasty yellow spines, very sharp! . Most of the flowers are spent though there are still a few late flowers around. Mullein flowers also almost spent though Israeli thyme is still blooming cheerfully blue in many places. Grass where the gazelle usually graze is very dried out now and yellowish, but the gazelle may also be using the occasional more green shrub here and there. Tough grazing now.