Weekend Walkabout: Only a Few Years Ago

What a difference a mere handful of years can make in the 21st century on Earth. Here are a few photos from my island "back then":

The Always Charming Florida Marsh Rabbit, MRobb

Florida Dunes in Bloom, MRobb

The Florida Marsh Rabbits and nearly all the flowers are gone now after being Cuisinarted by 2 strong hurricanes. I do not think they will return. Of course, a friend of mine who's been here longer than I have reminded me that my island is a human-created dune. It's only existed for a handful of decades-- so is its return to the sea less sad because of that? I miss the way it used to be, even if that was only the bat of an eyelash in Gaia-time.

Sometimes I feel that when I'm uploading these images to Google, I'm uploading images of our fragile, changing world to the New Virtual Ark. Will Google's AI find them interesting enough to preserve? Will Google's AI survive on a planet where humans cannot? I don't know! And I do remain optimistic, which is perhaps silly at this point, but we've come through crises before. Still, I do feel like uploading some more photos of my little island each week....

Weekend Walkabout: A Marsh Rabbit in the Sun

Ah, the Marsh Rabbit, one of my all-time favorite lagomorphs:

Marsh Rabbit in the Meadow, MRobb, 2015

Sylvilagus palustris

Have a Wonderful Weekend!

 

Weekend Walkabout (With Bunny Love)

The jet stream's been messing with our weather again, throwing out some amazingly weird loops and creating some very peculiar storms across the country. Fortunately, we got rain, not snow. Our own storm system from the Gulf of Mexico tried so hard to go tropical cyclone on us, and it almost made it. It was banding and spinning before it spun out.  Here's a lovely cumulonimbus that formed off the beach as the system spun out to sea:

All the rain really brought out the wildflowers, birds, and the wild bunnies. We have two species here, the Florida Marsh Rabbit (smaller, with a chubby body, short legs, small ears, and reddish fur), and the Eastern Cottontail (larger and leggier, brown agouti fur, white tail).  Here's the Marsh Rabbit:

And here's the Eastern Cottontail, also enjoying the flowers:

I'll be back with plenty of Lithops and Tillie news soon, as soon as I can stop photographing bunnies, that is!