BurningbirdAs part of a story I’m doing for MissouriGreen, a first set of photos of the famous Gringo Jones Import and Other Stuff near the Botanical Garden. The sign out front says it all: Business Sucks. Come in and deal.
Welcome to Gringo Jones, one of the funnest, funkiest places in St. Louis.
Everything is for sale.
Except the four dogs and three cats. Or is that four cats and three dogs?
The card reads, Fur coat … Somewhere between mink and West county road kill
The St. Louis Zoo had an exceptional year when it came to zoo babies. As a Christmas treat, I give you the cute, the furry, the frolicking, and the fun.
Kalama was born in August, 2008. There are now only 2,200 Grevy’s Zebras in the wild, but there’s a healthy population in zoos. The same can also be said of our next baby, a giraffe who was famous literally from birth.
Typically giraffes will give birth in private, but not this time. This little guy was born in June, in front of an audience of hundreds. There’s even a YouTube video of his birth.
The St. Louis Zoo giraffes share an enclosure with Speke’s gazelles and the zoo’s sole ostrich. The ostrich and the baby have had a fascination each other from the beginning, and will take turns following each other around the enclosure. However, both are motivated by curiosity, not friendship, as the ostrich will peck at the giraffe, and the giraffe kick at the ostrich. However, neither hurts the other and they do seem to keep each other entertained.
Domestic asses are common, but wild asses are critically endangered. That’s why the zoo’s breeding program is so important. And successful, too! The zoo didn’t have one Somalia Wild Ass baby this year, it had three, including this little one, born in June.
The President of the zoo, Dr. Bonner, wrote that one of the problems the zoo has with the Somalia Wild Ass is their name— leaders of school groups aren’t sure about saying their name because of the negative connotations associated with “ass”. After reading this, every time I stop by the enclosure I chant, “Say it loud, say it proud: Ass! Ass! Ass!”
I have not been kicked out of the zoo. Yet.
The stars this year at the zoo have been the five Amur tiger cubs born April 28, and named Peter, Ivan, Andrea, Zhanna, and Tikva. The two males and three females have consistently been a hit with the crowds, and no wonder: they’re fascinating to watch. If you’re not familiar with Amur tiger, this species was originally named the Siberian tiger. They’re the largest cat in the world, and one of the rarest, so these five babies were greeted with relief, as well as delight.
The cubs’ Mom, Kalista is a first time mother, but has proven to be exceptional— managing to care for her rather large brood with only a small assist from the veterinary staff for a couple of the lower weight cubs.
Then there’s Sofiya. Sofiya is an Amur Leopard cub, the rarest cat in the world. She was a twin, but her brother did not survive birth. In addition, first time mother, Mona, rejected her daughter, and so Sofiya was hand raised by zoo staff.
Sofiya is lovable and charming, playful and clever. She’s fearless and funny, and astute and will stalk birds flying overhead and enamored photographers with equal enthusiasm.
Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year.
Autumn has finally arrived in our year of odd weather. We’re ten degrees above normal, but should return to 60s by Thursday. We’re in the 4th wettest year on record, and if we get our normal rainfall for the rest of the year, we’ll end up the wettest year on record.
We’re also a toss up in the election, and I’ve fielded over 20 calls today from various organizations. Can’t swing a dead cat without hitting someone campaigning in our state. I think Obama and his wife are in the state tonight, Biden was here yesterday, Palin Monday, I hear a rumor about Rudy Giuliani, though I don’t think McCain’s been here. That’s because Palin is more popular here than he is.
All over by Wednesday, when we can sink back into our normal obscurity. In the meantime, all our visitors have been seeing the state at its best. I wonder if they’ve even noticed?
Finally, after a summer of high humidity and warm temperatures, and seemingly endless crowds, yesterday brought a return to the St. Louis that I know and love. The temperatures were cool, the sky darkly overcast, and with the threat of rains, the people stayed home. A perfect day to visit the Missouri Botanical Gardens.
The flowers are ending their reign at the Gardens, but without passing their baton on to the trees. I thought with all the rain we had this year, we’d have a great autumn. However, it turned out we had too much water. The trees developed leaf rot, and most trees are just dropping their leaves. Still, there was still a little color yesterday, including the last of the dahlias. Such a floozy of a flower—wanton, shameless.
Nothing like the last of the sweet, demure roses. Mama Nature’s precious little princesses.
Yesterday had all the elements to make a perfect picture day. Not picture perfect, perfect picture. Overcast skies brings out the richness of the colors, and reduce the harsh highlights, and dark shadows that sunny days bring. The Gardens were almost deserted, which always seems to bring out the magic that hides away when the crowds come around.
Taking pictures in a local place removes the stress of having to find the perfect shots to capture the scene before you quickly move on to the next. The Gardens are beautiful, but not so much that the photos take themselves. It’s hard to screw up a photo of the Grand Canyon, which kind of removes all the fun of even trying. Either the photo will be great, but it’s the Grand Canyon. Of course the photo is beautiful. Or the photo will be awful, invoking thoughts of how could anyone possibly take a bad photo of the Grand Canyon? No, the Gardens are just interesting enough to provide possibilities, but with no guarantees.
Oh what joy, too, to walk around the Park talking to all of the critters without having to worry about whoever is around to overhear. I’ve thought about getting a fake cellphone with ear buds, so that I when I talk to animals, or myself, people will just assume I’m talking on the phone. However, such action is a lie, and uncomfortable, too—and how can you hear the birds with your ears stuffed? No best be thought mad, than rude.
If all the rain this year threatens to rob us of a colorful fall, it made up for it by providing a rich bounty of berry and nut for the animals this year. The fruit bearing trees, like the Japanese crab apples, were practically falling over, so loaded with fruit. To add to yesterday’s magic, a huge flock of robins, preparing for their migration, filled the woodlands, stuffing themselves on a cornucopia of rich offering. I wondered the feather balls could still fly.
The birds weren’t the only animals out enjoying the bounty of the fall harvest. The other day I was at the zoo when I saw a chipmunk with its cheeks so full, its little head was weighed down and almost dragging on the ground. Yesterday, nothing was going to stop the squirrel I met up with from finishing its luscious nutmeat—remnants of earlier meals scattered about as crumbs.
With such delights scattered about, I wasn’t surprised to come upon a red tailed hawk, but the one yesterday was different than others I’ve met over the years. It didn’t fly off as I approached it with camera, and seemed as interested in me, as I was in it. If I truly believed in magic, I could imagine a prince in flowing white velvet and copper, ensorcelled into the shape of a bird, just waiting a princess to see the humanity looking out from hawk eyes.
If so, the poor prince would be disappointed in me, because I would prefer bird to prince.
Recovered from the Wayback Machine.
The majority of my photos posted recently are from the Missouri Botanical Gardens, or the St. Louis Zoo. I’ve not explored outside of the St. Louis area this last year primarily because of all the rain and flooding we’ve had. Though I was not, personally, directly impacted by the flooding, I’ve been indirectly impacted because of the extremely high mold content. I wasn’t aware until recently that I’m allergic to mold pollen, go figure. Add to this my allergic reaction to even the most innocuous Missouri bug bites, and I’ve spent most of the summer on paved paths and close to home.
A happy byproduct of my restricted explorations, though, is how much I’ve come to look beyond the obvious in my local walks at the St. Louis Zoo. So much so that I’m starting a new category of writings on the Zoo over at my personal web site, Just Shelley. There is much we can learn about ourselves, as well as the animals, at a zoo.
In the meantime, I have been posting photos from both the Botanical Gardens and the Zoo to the MissouriGreen image galleries. Posted below are some representative examples. Now that the weather is getting cooler, I may expand my explorations again, perhaps even include some fall color photos.
From the Gardens:
The Gardens aren’t just flowers and insects, as these snakes sunning themselves on branches demonstrate:
A few photos from the Zoo:
