Fauna

Purple is the only color I really dislike, so it's unfortunate that the previous owners were so PATHOLOGICALLY obsessed with it. This Bougainvillea is so massive and happy that I can't really get rid of it. And now that is trained on the south-facing wall, it flowers constantly and abundantly. God I wish it were red. Still I have to admire its floriferousness. The frost slowed it down for about a week. And the hummingbird will actually visit it periodically.

Speaking of Skippy (as we've named him), I've recently observed him sampling some flowers he'd been ignoring to punish me for destroying his favorite salvia, including Echevaria and "Sacred flower of the Incas," my current favorite common name (= Cantua buxifolia). I'm still on the fence about this plant, but it was quite amusing to watch him trying to figure out the flower. It's definitely designed for hummingbird pollination, but Skippy's southern cousins appear to be... better endowed (cf. Ensifera ensifera and Calypte anna).

It seems odd to see hummingbirds in the nondescript white flowers of the bougainvillea (the hideous purple showy parts are bracts not flowers), but I saw one the other day checking out Pittosporum tobira, which is obviously designed for moths.

I was hanging up some coats in the hallway the other night when I was suddenly surrounded by an almost-too-sweet hyacinthish scent. "But there aren't even any plants in here," I thought before seeing the lowly Sansevieria. Pretty amazing (obvs. moth-pollinated) flowers, which I'd never seen before. Not bad for a houseplant. They only lasted a day or two.

Anyone know what possum shit looks like? Pardon the abrupt transition, but it appears the evidence for my war on cats may not in fact have been a "slam dunk." I was out killing slugs by flashlight a few nights ago when I observed said marsupial rustling around behind the compost. What do possums eat? Worse, said slugs were observed munching some poppies and ratibia (of all things) in a pattern suspiciously similar to what befell the tulip.