Things are not as they seem

Yesterday we took a walk out back to enjoy the day. Things were not as they seemed. We found a few mysteries along the way as you shall see. We walked along the large natural slough at the back where all was quiet, a few resting ducks and geese swam there. We were careful not to disturb them since my place is one of the safe stopovers on their flights. We stood and watched flock after flock fly over, their wings drumming the air, and their voices humming softly to one another.

I mentioned that we have had a lot of treefall lately, perhaps a result of the recent seven years of dry weather. This year's rainfall was not enough to restore damaged roots. We found this looking like an abandoned totem.

Inside was a cache of... mushrooms!  We don't have squirrels or chipmunks here, too many owls, hawks, and coyotes, so what is storing mushrooms?  It must be a bird, maybe a magpie. Every hole was filled with mushrooms.

Chewy heard something in the trees and listened carefully, then went chasing, caught a scent, but it vanished.

 We found several hawks' nests. This is the biggest. Some of the others were destroyed by falling trees. We have a healthy population of red-tailed hawks and they come every year to nest in these trees.

To me, this looks a bit like a porcupine. But it's an anthill, about 2 feet high and 3 feet long.

And this is a kind of fungus, quite a long span, about 8 feet.

Now here is a mystery. Look at the anomaly in these three photographs. I don't know what it is. I took a hundred pictures that day, some into the sun like this, but these three were the only ones with the little green light. It moves with me in the pictures. I thought maybe we had caught a ghost, wouldn't that be nice to know that Miranda or Cricket was with us on the walk.

And these are not blue feathers on the path, they are willow leaves.

As we headed home, someone started shooting in the next pond over. I hate hunting season, it seems to last for months, it's like living in a war zone some days. I never know if we're completely safe from men with guns out here -- I've had people pull up along the front yard and point rifles out the window toward something (gophers usually) in my front pasture! When I appear on the porch like a crazy old lady, they take off. Imagine that happening to you in the city! I've been missed by bullets three times out here so far -- from people not knowing how to shoot. Twice bullets hit the fence behind me (once between my dad and me), and once someone shot right across my front yard. What is it with men and guns? I wish they would learn to knit instead.