Acorn Season!

Post date: Oct 04, 2014 10:34:37 PM

It's fall for sure...even though it's hot - we are in a Santa Ana weather event, where we get hot, dry, windy weather, common this time of year. Our high temp yesterday was 99. Fortunately these

events are interspersed with cooler periods, and the sunlight, especially in the afternoon, is very slanty and autumn-ish.

The other morning I could see a few Navajo-Churro and Santa Cruz Island sheep and a llama under a coast live oak tree that shades the corners of two pastures... the sheep were eating something off the ground so of course I had to go see what they were getting. When I got there, the oak tree was full of scrub jays and acorn woodpeckers excitedly flying through the branches (to get acorns, an important food for them). They were knocking down oak leaves and more acorns and the sheep and Sahne the white llama were "vacuuming" them up as you can see in the photo. I tried to get a

photo of the birds, but they moved so fast it was difficult, but here's one, hopefully you can pick out the scrub jay between branches and leaves.