Wunderkind

This has been a crazy busy month so far.  Gotta say that 3 is a bit of a challenging age.  Quinn is very opinionated and likes to complain LOUDLY when things don't go exactly according to plan.  But that said, he's also a lot more fun, communicative and has very sweet moments.  He's not the most confident child, so we've been encouraging him to try things on his own more and more.  He recently mastered riding his bike with no training wheels and is currently enrolled in swimming lessons.  He's far from the greatest swimmer, but we celebrate every little victory.  He's starting to really enjoy it and you can see the pride on his face when he does something new!  I love it!

Recent trip to the Dino Museum (Natural History Museum) with Towhee the bunny

Another thing Quinn has been really interested in lately is letter and words.  We got him a little magnetic board with letters and he'll spend up to an hour sitting and playing with them, writing all of our names.  

Last week he was playing by himself and he came out very excited telling us that he'd spelled his name all by himself.  This is what we found.  

But this week he tried again and got it right!  And when I tried to turn the Q right-side-up he quickly turned it back on its side and exclaimed that's how he wanted it. 

 We'll end with a couple of very flattering shots and a video of the swimmer in action.

Birds birds and more birds!

This year instead of being stuck in the office 100% of the time from September on, the USGS crew has continued to get in weekly trips out into the field.  We're conducting a genetic study on two really cool species:  The Coastal Cactus Wren and the California Gnatcatcher.  

Taking a genetic sample from one of these birds involves: 1. Finding the birds; 2. Catching them in a mist net (very thin net that is virtually invisible to the birds); and 3. Pulling either a growing body feather or extracting a drop of blood from a trimmed toenail.  In the photos below you see Scarlett Howell taking a pin feather from a Cactus Wren and me trying to find a pin feather on a Gnatcatcher.

Both of these species are year-round residents of southern California and reside on arid hillsides in coastal sage scrub or cactus sage scrub (for the cactus wrens).  The Cactus Wren is a species of special concern in California, because the coastal subspecies is isolated and declining in numbers.  The California Gnatcatcher is a federally endangered species with a range that is restricted to southern California.  With all of the development happening in this part of the state there is growing concern that the remaining populations of both species may become genetically isolated from one another, which could impair their ability to adapt to changing conditions, etc.

Anyway, my whole point here was that it's nice to get out of the office a little bit each week!  And aren't those cute little guys?  

OK, so this one might not be so cute, but it was the first scorpion I've seen here.  This female was carrying her larval young on her back, but was fighting to protect them from the predatory ants that were attempting to eat them.  A pretty cool sight, albeit a little bit sad for the mama.