Corralitas Drive: Wildlife!

Photo: Corralitas Neighbor, September 24, 2017.  A neighbor placed empty and rinsed recyclables on the stairs to take to the bin.  Five minutes later, a young raccoon was already looking for snacks.  There's a reason we endlessly preach about keeping recycle and trash bins closed tightly.  Urban wildlife is opportunistic.

Corralitas Drive: It's That Time Of Year, Raccoons In The Rubber Trees

Photo: Diane Edwardson, September 27, 2014.  A very large raccoon was way up in the rubber tree eating the tiny figs that are dropping like rain in the yard these days.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

Wildlife can't resist the fruit of the rubber tree.  At night, raccoons, rats & opossums are up in the trees, while the skunks forage on the ground below.  By day, all manner of birds, including parrots, make a stop for the tasty & abundant fruit they can't seem to get enough of (but there is still plenty of fruit on the ground that has to be swept up daily).

Disclaimer: The Corralitas Red Car Property Blog prefers to quote reliable sources, such as CalFlora and California Poison Control on the issue of toxicity.  We often get email suggesting some plants are edible. If you are eating your way through the Red Car Property, we DO NOT recommend you eat any plant you find in the Red Car Property neighborhood without first doing your own research.

Corralitas Drive: Wasp Gall Snatched Quickly By Predators

Photo: Diane Edwardson, August 4, 2014.  A huge, tennis ball-sized gall (a woody growth containing wasp larvae) appeared, seeming overnight, on the Blue Elderberry Tree in our backyard.  The next day, it was gone.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

Galls are formed by trees in reaction to a gall wasp laying eggs in the branch.  The larvae grow in the gall (which does not harm the tree) until they break out of the gall as mature adult wasps.  According to Bug Guide, there are more than 750 species of gall wasps in North America.  In this area, you usually find galls on Coast Live Oaks.  I'd never seen a gall on Blue Elderberry.

Photo: Diane Edwardson, August 4, 2014.  Since this gall was so large, I noticed it immediately.  The next day,  it was completely missing.  I suspect the marauding raccoons found an good source of protein in the larvae.  (Raccoons stripped the fruit trees in our yard this summer.)

Red Car Canyon: 2013 Hangover, Critter Cam! Stuff You Missed Last Year

Photos: © Miguel Ordeñana, some rights reserved,  Los Angeles County Natural Museum camera trap, May 2013.  Coyote.  (Click on photos to enlarge.)

For a week last May, Wildlife on the Red Car Property was documented with a remote critter camera on the LA Nature Map.  Ordeñana is a field biologist & lead gallery interpreter at the LA County Natural History Museum.
 
Jonathan Vandiveer, Red Car Property neighbor & blog contributor, commented (when I sent him the link last summer), "The timestamp on the coyote photo indicates I'd just jogged through the canyon.  I never saw him.  The close angle and expression on his face is one you'd only get with a remote camera."    

Striped Skunk

Raccoon

Virginia Opossum

Eastern Fox Squirrel

Domestic Cat.  From the size of his neck, I'd say it's an intact male.

Stuff you missed last year: we shoot & collect tons of photos.  So we try to wrap up the year with some interesting ones we never got a chance to run.

Red Car Canyon: Dead Tree, Fire Hazard Since 2010, Finally Removed

Photo: Jonathan Vandiveer, October 19, 2013.  One month after neighbors toured the property with CD13 deputy Adam Bass, the dead Eucalyptus tree, that fell in January 2010, was finally cleared.  (Click on photos to enlarge.)

Photo: Jonathan Vandiveer, October 19, 2013.  Years of dead & dry trees, branches & build up of fire hazard were cleared form the canyon area.  Sadly it also seemed to claim a raccoon (lower right corner).

Photo: Jonathan Vandiveer, October 19, 2013.  Yep, it's really dead; not a zombie raccoon. 

Corralitas Drive: Rubber Tree Fruit

Photo: Diane Edwardson, July 4, 2012.  Fruit from Rubber Trees (Ficus elastica) turns brown on the outside when ripe.  It smells a bit like Kiwi fruit.  (Click on photos to enlarge.)

Apparently, fruit of the Rubber Trees in my yard is like crack to animals.  After watching skunks, opossum, raccoons, rats, parrots, birds, squirrels and dogs obsessively eating the tiny fruit, I had to look investigate further.  (I had been calling them beans, because that's what they looked like.)  

Photo: Diane Edwardson, July , 2012.  The Rubber Trees in my yard bear fruit year-round. However right now, it must be extra tasty due to the warm weather because the dogs have never been so interested in it.

It is a non-native species that grows 98 - 130' tall.  It is a drought tolerant species, but it will knock a house off its foundation to get to water; its roots will break into water and sewer lines.  They are very hard to completely remove once established.  In this neighborhood, they must have been a landscape trend because so many neighbors have these large mature trees near planted too close to their houses (built in 1910 - 1960). 

Disclaimer: The Corralitas Red Car Property Blog prefers to quote reliable sources, such as CalFlora and California Poison Control, on the issue of toxicity. We often get email suggesting some plants are edible. If you are eating your way through the Red Car Property, we DO NOT recommend you eat any plant you find in the Red Car Property neighborhood without first doing your own research.



Corralitas Drive: Raccoon Family Foraging Together

Photo: Diane Edwardson, November 19, 2011, 10:28 PM.  The raccoon on the left is the same one who posed in Monday's post.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

Five or six raccoons were foraging high up in the branches of the huge rubber tree in my yard Saturday. These three are likely this year's offspring still learning where to forage from mom. They kept looking to the largest raccoon for guidance before making their escape. There were two or possibly three more raccoons way up in the tree as I was shooting these photos.

Photo: Diane Edwardson, November 19, 2011.  Three of the five (or six) raccoons paused on the fence before making their escape to my neighbor's yard.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

This family is most likely responsible for the rather large holes dug under two different parts of the yard in the past week.   Raccoons are omnivorous and carry disease transmissible to dogs and cats.  Read more about living with raccoons and other wildlife on the City's Animal Services website.    

Corralitas Drive: Raccoon Posing

Photo: Diane Edwardson, November 19, 10:25 PM.  This raccoon just took to the camera, posing calmly.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

Saturday night my dog alerted me to something about 20' up in the rubber tree.  The wind and the weight of the animal had the tree branch moving considerably. When it finally caught the light, I could see it was not a fat-assed cat.  

I grabbed my camera, left the dog inside and I headed out to shoot in the dark. I soon realized there was more than one raccoon in the tree.  There were at least five picking and eating the small fruit in the rubber tree. 

Photo: Diane Edwardson, November 19, 2011.  Of the 5 raccoons in the tree, this was the only one who kept posing and did not try to hide.  Perhaps it was friends with the skunk who struck poses for my camera this summer.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

These are the first raccoon photos I've been able to get.  I usually encounter raccoons late at night, with no camera in my pocket.  Do not let your dogs go after a raccoon as they are capable of killing a dog.  Keep your dogs on a leash.  They also carry diseases transmissible to cats and dogs.  So keep your pets vaccinations up to date.  Never feed wildlife.

LA River: Raccoon Remains, Tales & Serious Health Warnings

Photo: Diane Edwardson, July 29, 2011.  Walking down in the the riverbed, through Elysian Valley, we came across a long since dead raccoon.  (Click on photo to enlarge.)

More Raccoon Tales:

Last week, a Corralitas Drive neighbor said raccoons were the likely culprit of a raid on her worm farm.  The tight fitting lid on the foot-high box was completely removed, pushed aside and all the worms were missing.  If it requires manual dexterity to get to food, raccoons will find a way.

A few years ago, another Corralitas neighbor had to secure chicken wire just under the surface of his garden ponds after the raccoons kept coming back for all his fish.  The final straw was when a raccoon caught "Elvis," the fat goldfish who had eluded the raccoons for a few years.   Apparently "Elvis" wasn't very tasty, as the raccoon discarded "Elvis" after only eating half of him.   

Learn more about living with raccoons and other urban wildlife on the City's Animal Services website.

Heath Warnings:

In 2009-2010, there was a distemper outbreak in Los Angeles raccoons.  The disease can be spread to dogs.  Keep your all your pets' vaccinations up to date.  Read more about the 2010 distemper outbreak on the Los Angeles County Public Heath Services website.

While we're on the subject of disease, read about the rabies outbreak in bats on the County's website.    A higher number than usual of rabid bats have been confirmed this year, including one in Glendale and one in Downtown LA.  LA County recently issued a public heath advisory due to the outbreak. 

Bat Tale:

Around 11PM Thursday, I watched a good sized bat swoop down to (probably) catch a bug near my backyard fence.  We don't see bats too often but, it was a reminder, they help control the insect population.