The Long Journey...

This last Monday (October 15, 2007) I was sitting in my chair when I glanced out the window and saw something on the tree in my yard that wasn't there before. I put on my shoes, don't wear them around the house, and went outside to investigate what it was on the tree that had caught my attention.

It was a rather large caterpillar climbing up the trunk of my tree. You know me I just had to have a couple hundred photos of this invader of my yard. I go back inside to retrieve my camera equipment and return to see the invader now coming back down the tree. I guess my tree leaves were not to its liking or it decided it really didn't want to set up shop there. What ever its little brain decided it had a long journey back to the trees in the woods behind my home.

I set up my tripod and started taking photos of this stranger to my neck of the woods. It slowly inched its way back down the trunk of the tree. Finally after what seemed like ages it reaches the ground and starts its journey toward the trees about thirty or so feet away.

Hmmm, ever wonder how they know where they are going? It had traveled from the woods to the only tree within thirty feet of the woods and now in a rather straight line it was headed back to the same woods it had recently left to venture to the lonely tree in my yard.

I followed it across most of my open yard taking photos of it's journey. That journey took close to an hour. While I was making a record of it's journey I realized that two of the feral kittens I have been feeding were waiting and watching the caterpillar as it crawled slowly along. They were waiting until I wasn't close enough to the strange creature so they could investigate what it was and maybe find a new plaything.

I decided that I had enough photos, over two hundred of it crawling along the ground, so I picked it up and helped it to reach the trees without being examined by the curious kittens. It will never know how close it came to being a toy of two very curious kittens. I placed it on a limb of a tree so it could finish it's journey in relative safety.

I took a few more photos of it as it examined the leaves and out of the corner of my eye I see leaves with the sun behind them. Forget the caterpillar I'm off to take more photos of leaves and nuts and what ever else I see.

I guess the caterpillar did alright after that since I didn't see the kittens playing with a colorful object on the ground any time later. I did get some great photos of nuts that had fallen to the ground and of leaves with the sun shining through them. I'll bore you with the other photos later...