Hi from Montana!

[Big Lou]

Our painter is from Philly. What a talker! Loves Texas and his Texas wife. He even out yaks me. Staining cedar today. All of the painting is beautiful. The young helper is a nice pure Texas country fellow.

 

[CountryEscape]

Lou, I assume you are saying the bobcats are beautiful creatures. I totally agree. I love all the "big cats". When I was a kid, I dreamed of having a black panther as a pet someday! Not anymore, trust you, but when I was young and foolish, that was my dream. :banana: I still think they are gorgeous animals, so much power. But, I would never try to tame one, they are meant for the wild, and too unpredictable for pets, even if raised as kittens. You might get me to raise a kitten from a 3rd or 4th generation captive bred animal, but before that! I did love raising the baby raccoons, though. Did it with the full knowledge that they would go back to the wild, and prepared them for that from Day 1. Sure wish I knew if they made it or not, though.

 

[j.w]

With a mother like you CE I'm sure they made it out there in the big world just fine. I always wanted a monkey when I was a kid. There was this article in a magazine when I was a kid that said that if you sold so many something or others that you would win a monkey. I did what I was supposed to do and then when my mother thought I might really get this monkey she put the kabosh on it all! Dog gone it I really wanted that little monkey! Prolly was more to it than I realized anyway but I sure had my hopes up high :biggrin:

 

[CountryEscape]

I saw those "Sea Monkeys" in comic books, thought they would be so cute. Turns out they are just some type of bug. When I realized that, I would sit and stare at the water in the ditch down the street from our house, and I found all sorts of "sea monkeys". LOL Yeah, a monkey would have been soooo cute, but they are like children, they take all your attention, wear diapers until they are pretty old, and need you around far more than any dog or cat. Your mother was very smart! My sister has parrots, and they live a very long time, too. At least they don't require you to hold them all the time, or wear diapers! I had fish, and now realize how much I DIDN'T know about them!

 

[j.w]

My mother was not anything like me. I loved all the critters and wanted one of each. She only liked her little dog and that was it. I brought home rats, fish, turtles, frogs, kittens, dogs, birds and anything that crawled on the face of the earth. She was horrified by most of it and I loved that :biggrinangelA:

 

[Big Lou]

Poor monkey loving JW. Tell you what do. Get yourself one of those cute knitted monkeys that appeared in the Kia commericals. Name it "Cotton" after which you can say "Wish Cotton was a monkey.". Hope my wee silliness puts a smile on your face.

 

[Big Lou]

JW, you were a pure wildlife rebel. LOL

 

[j.w]

I had one of those sock monkeys!

I loved him!

 

[Big Lou]

I'm jealous. They tell me it is considered a bit odd for a 60 year old man to have a sock monkey. I spit in the face of what "they" consider. LOL

 

[j.w]

I think it is in to be odd nowadays Lou so I say go for it :biggrin:

 

[callingcolleen1]

cute little sock monkey JW! We have cougars here too and they have been spotted in town a few times, The coyotes give me much more trouble tho...

 

[j.w]

I am constantly on the lookout for coyotes here too Colleen as they will eat up my kitties if they catch them. I don't let kitties out till 8am now but in Spring when we set the clocks ahead I don't let them out till 9am. Have watched a coyote come along the fence line during Spring/Summer at latest in mornings around 8:30am and never see them again but know they are out after dark cuz I hear them howling so have to get kitties in before dark time. Have done it this way for 13 yrs so far and one night long ago they chased my one cat into my neighbors garage where the lady sits out there w/ the door up a few inches so she can smoke out there w/o bothering her smokeless hubby. She said those darn coyotes were making a racket trying to get under her door like crazy to catch my kitty. Since then we take the special precautions.

 

[Big Lou]

We do the same with our now mature cat. Cayotes roaming and howling throughout the night. Oh how we worried over the years when our young cats would break their curfew and stay out into the early morning hours. Sometimes all night. Everytime the curfew was broken the feline was restricted to the inside for a day or more. Lecturing our young cats about those big bad creatures of the night did nothing. We were so relieved when each kitty grew up.

 

[addy1]

The coyote took my yorkie at 1pm on a weekday, right out of our yard with a 6 foot block fence. The sucker walked the fence until it found what it wanted.

 

[CountryEscape]

I spotted a HUGE coyote out in the middle of the field across road from my house this afternoon, broad daylight. I thought it was a wolf, looked black, but it was the shadow on the side closest to me that I was seeing. That was a large male, though, I'm certain. Cannot imagine where he was going or where he had come from. Small stand of trees in the middle of that field, and the open field is 1 mile wide by 1.5 miles long!!!! Just that one narrow stand of trees in that whole area, so you can see why I wondered about his common sense this afternoon. The hunters, after about Jan. 1, will be on the look out for this guy, and if he's caught out in the middle of that field while they are hunting, he is dead meat. They surround this "block" with trucks and one way or another, he will run right into a hunter's gun. I don't call that fair hunting myself .... Same as spotlighting deer at nighttime.