These cats look cute, but they’re wild and feral cats are something of an issue on the island. Besides the usual problems, their feces can carry Toxoplasma gondii, a microscopic protozoan parasite, which can be washed into the water in runoff. This parasite is potentially fatal to monk seals with several deaths attributed to it.
A pair of horses forage in dry grass at the Hawi Wind Farm. The turbines are driven mostly by northeast trade winds whistling off the ocean.
I previously posted about the anoles who live in one of the windows (here). They’re still very much in residence and on a recent morning things got a bit backed up in there. Their entry and exit point is in that top corner of the window. At the bottom of this threesome is the alpha male of the group who looked like he was getting a mite ticked off. I didn’t stick around to see what happened since, from experience, I know these encounters can take a good while to resolve.
For more information about green anoles, go to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolina_anole.
The Hawaiian monarch butterfly comes from the same stock as the mainland variety. It made its way to Hawaii in the mid 1800s, shortly after the milkweed plant (one of the Monarch’s host plants) was introduced. There’s a white variant that’s been seen on Oahu, but not on the Big Island as far as I know.
OK, so the headline is just clickbait (well, for some strange people maybe), but the big anole that lives in one of the windows recently shed his skin. The old layer had a lovely lacy look as it peeled away in the morning sun. When I next saw him, a couple of hours later, he was all done and looking splendid in his new outfit.
For more information about green anoles, go to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolina_anole.
What’s this then?
Perhaps it hasn’t seen me.
Should I or shouldn’t I?
Here goes.
So far, so good.
Rats!
This gecko initially wasn’t quite sure what to make of such a large moth (that’s a 2×4 the moth is sitting on). But geckos are nothing if not optimists and dreams of glory spurred him on (well, I like to think so.). Ultimately a case of so near, and yet so far.
A green anole casting shadows on a window.
For more information about green anoles, go to en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carolina_anole.
I’m not sure why this little grasshopper sitting on the trail caught my eye, but it’s probably a good thing it did because it was about to be stepped on. I took some photos and thought, ‘Maybe I can get one of it jumping away.’ So I scuffed a foot in its direction. I knocked my water bottle over with a thud. I leaned in, casting an ominous shadow its way. It twitched a couple of times, skittered to face a different way, but no jump. Of course, I knew exactly what would happen. I straightened, putting my camera away and admitting defeat and the grasshopper duly pinged away into the grass.
With those kind of survival skills it will have a good chance of attaining the size of the grasshopper below, which I saw on the lanai some time ago. When I got close, it leapt straight into a railing, but it too survived. They’re both Schistocerca nitens I think. It’s one of those troublesome invasive species so common in Hawaii.
Graham's Island 