Interesting Evening in the Yard

It was a beautiful evening here in the Mojave! I took off my shoes and hobbled around on my teeny lawn in the backyard, admiring the tomatoes and the geraniums. The vegetables we planted the last week of February are happy and setting flowers for fruit. The one plant CoolGuy put in a pot has surged into growth. It gets the most sun. Our early planting didn't quite turn out as desired, because we've apparently positioned the garden box a little too much southward. If it were only three feet further north, all the tomatoes would look like this one:

It is two feet high and loaded with flowers. But, this one is in the sun from the moment Old Sol comes up, to the moment it sets, and the garden box won't have that until a few more weeks. The garden box doesn't get the full sun until about 10:30 A.M. till the end of day. Rats...

But all the patio flowers are blooming and lush, and the lawn is greening up, and the lantana that was cut back from its wintery twiggy-ness is getting leafed out nicely. This is a great time of year to live here. I read about the usual Springtime manic swings of weather in other climate zones, and I'm glad I'm not experiencing them.

As I was admiring the lovely lawn and flowers, I noticed something lying under the tree. It was little dead bat. Every night I see them swooping and flitting around in the fading twilight, scooping up bugs from the air. They're really fun to watch in the summer as I lay in the pool. But here was a little friend, dead on the grass.

 He's soft as a mouse and about the same size. One wing was extended, but the other was crushed up against his side. He has amazingly long claws on his feet, and two big curved claws on the folded tip of his wings.You could pin him to your shirt lapel.

 

 Can you see his huge ears? There doesn't seem to be any obvious injury to him. He hasn't been dead very long, because none of the "recyclers" (ants, worms, etc.) have started in on him. 

 

This gives you a great view of his ears and how large they are in comparison to the rest of his body. His whole little body is just an amazing work of flying art. We're going to put him out in the shed to decompose so we will have a bat skeleton to examine some day. 

(And in case you ever wondered if we were completely odd...now you have proof.)