Sunday 31 January 2021

It's about the absence of heat!

 I've had to switch up trailcams. My old one doesn't like our temperatures! I brought it indoors to thaw.


It was sunny yesterday, and we both took walks. Back indoors, some TV, a thriller/murder mystery, and some sketching. (More on that another day!)

I saw the Irwin family being interviewed on TV. Brother Robert, mother Terri, Bindi, her husband Chandler. They were married in 2020, they said it brought joy to them in a horrid year of Australian fires and the pandemic. She's having a baby this year, too!

Bindi Irwin's books we bought for the grandies. They are a great series. It's based on their animal shelter in Australia, where they rescued and rehabilitated hundreds of thousands of animals, including koalas, and kangaroos after the fire. Many were homeless due to habitat loss after the fires. 



It is so cold here. I cannot complain, though. We are safe, warm, and dry. They have had to close the Ottawa shelters to new clients due to COVID–19. It's terribly difficult for all those who provide support for those who so desperately need it.
As of Saturday, one unnamed shelter had 72 cases, with 62 residents and 10 staff testing positive for the virus. 

Speaking of the homeless, we're still getting visits from the feral cat, Oregano. I put out cat crunchies, but I'm not sure it touched them. Wet cat food would freeze. I've not seen him in the heated cat shelter, so I unplugged it. He's here for the mice friends.

In this one, if you look beside the shovel handle, you can see Oregano's eyes. 

Down to the trailcams. There were bunny tracks, nowhere near the trailcam, though! The trees are creaking, the snow is deep. 


I still cannot find my snowshoes, the snow cover is getting deeper. I often leave them out in the sun to dry, but they are nowhere to be found. It's discouraging. The kids bought them for me about 20 years ago. Jesse was working at Bushtukah in Ottawa.  

The wetland is frozen enough for me to cross over to the island. There were several deer beds there. 

People with trailcams know how much fun it is to fetch the SD Cards and bring them back to the house to discover the critters. We're still debating what this is. I went down to try and track it, but all I could see were deer tracks. It looked more like a coyote to me. mystery in the dark  

 


12 comments:

Anvilcloud said...

I hadn't heard about the shelters before. Such a shame.

Tom said...

...yep, you have been a bit colder than here, stay warm.

Yamini MacLean said...

Hari OM
I was able to pause that vid at a point where the critter is bounding between trees - and see a very bushy tail of the sort I would associate with fox rather than coyote - that bouncing action is also more fox-like, I would surmise, coyotes tending more to the 'slink'! YAM xx

Yogi♪♪♪ said...

I'm thinking that the mystery critter might be a coyote. They kind of have that loping stride sometimes. Not sure though.
Lots of people here have trail cams on public lands which is cool except they turn up missing sometimes.

Karen said...

I was horrified to hear about the shelter issues in Ottawa. Where are those poor souls sheltering in this cold? One of my daughters works at a big shelter in Toronto trying to find places for people. I don't know how she stays sane at times.

Nancy J said...

Something leaping?? Could it be a flying bat? Oregano wasn't venturing out while the deer were so close, looks perishingly cold. Batteries hate the cold, as did my sewing machine years ago when I had it in the basement of another home. The oil clogged up.

DUTA said...

I suppose that both California and Australia wildfires are the subjects of many books and movies. The rescue of animals from the fire hell is especially fascinating!

Cloudia said...

Enjoying our visits, J! Stay warm

RedPat said...

I'm glad that you are safe and warm. It hasn't been that cold down here yet.

NatureFootstep said...

cool, loks like an hare or something to me. :) Strange one.

Covid really messed things up :(

Lowcarb team member said...

Brrr that is cold.
A shame that the shelters have been closed.

All the best Jan

William Kendall said...

I had heard about the shelter issue here.