More visitors to my yard

Over the years I have had deer, raccoons, opossums, fox, coyotes, bear, and pheasants in my yard right in town. Here is what I saw when I looked out my window this morning. The gander was on guard duty while his mate fed in the neighbor's yard. You can also see how the almost daily visits by the deer have nearly stripped some of my shrubs.

That's cool! Were they migrating thru or strayed over from someplace nearby?

I've had to wrap all my pine trees with tree wrap to prevent them from killing them when they rub their antlers on my trees (is this molting?). It has helped a lot.

We have similar wildlife thru here (but I'm in the country) minus the bear, plus bobcats. We get the occasional cow that breaks out of their fenced area and poops on our lawn.

Our back yard is right on a bay, so the geese often feed down on the tideflats just beyond our property and we can see them from the house. They used to be regular visitors years ago before we had the back yard landscaped, but this is the first I've seen them in the landscaped yard.

We also can often see the harbor seals from the house, but they are so far off that one really needs binoculars to make out what it is one is seeing. They often lounge on a small island which forms in the bay as the tide goes out. Some of our neighbors have also seen whale from their homes, but I never have.

We also get visitors (raccoons, possums, skunks, coyotes, the occasional deer and a duck or 2). Some of them I don't mind but other's I wish would go away. We live pretty close to a river so that's why we have them.

Cool!

Skunks? Whew! I'm glad we don't seem to have those! I've lived here almost 18 years now and have never seen or smelled a skunk in the area, not even one dead on the road in the county. That's not to say they might not be here, but they certainly must not be common if they are here at all. The one that bothers me the most is the coyotes, because I let two of my cats outdoors. The third one was a rescue from a large colony, so she tries to escape out every chance she gets, too. I try to keep my "children" in at night, but one in particular doesn't always obey. Even thought he is neutered, he used to be a real "man about town." I guess that is what one can expect when he spent the first three years of his life as an outdoor cat before I got him.