There is also an
abundance of wildlife—besides the loud, chaotic, extremely annoying parties,
which are, thankfully, a thing of the past and future—which includes a few
feral cats; at least 16 types of birds (thanks to a nearby bird sanctuary)
including cardinals, a red hawk family (watching them court was amazing),
chickadees, blue jays (very annoying), a woodpecker (Woodie wasn’t joking: they
really do laugh!), and others and an unknown quantity of squirrels.
And then, there are two
more animals, both of which tend to be a little shy. That’s fine, I don’t need
to be on a first name basis with the raccoons (there is one that is enormous
and a little bit scary; it’s pretty old, I think, and it’s been through the
mill a few times, which is probably how it lost its tail) and there are the opossums.
I like the opossums,
probably because the ones that come are usually pretty young. I think their
moms bring them and then leave. The poor babies are so ugly they’re cute and
they win over my heart every single time. Actually, I haven’t seen an opossum
for a couple of years. In fact, the last time I did, I even took a picture of
him. For some reason, Opossums look like their name should be Gertrude or Joseph,
or at least in my opinion.
I’d like to share the
story that I wrote on Facebook that accompanied the photo of Joseph:
“Last night I was sitting in the kitchen when I
heard this shriek and I thought one of the cats had caught a bird (it was
definitely not a mouse--too loud and low-pitched). I didn't think anything else
about it until I heard this giant bag of leaves I have on my porch, rustling.
The poor little guy, whose name should probably be changed to
Snoopy, had gotten his tail all tangled up in the bag. He knows me &
usually isn't afraid, but this time, when I grabbed the bag to help him, he
pulled until he got free and then took off. Of course, opossums don't take off
very quickly, but still...
See, this is one of the reasons we should NEVER
leave plastic bags out in nature: nature is curious and tries to check things
out, and very often gets into trouble. Snoopy Joseph was lucky that I was there
and could help him. Most aren't that lucky. The photo is a slightly younger
Joseph.”
A funny thing happened
about six months later. First, though, I have to mention that Missy Prissy
tends to climb up my window screens to let me know she’d like to come in. That
being said, one night a terrible racket on the porch caused me to jerk awake
and bang my head on the ceiling about 10 feet or so above my bed. I looked over
whence came the noise and saw this big form splatted on the screen on my
bedroom window.
My first thought was “What
the heck is that?” and then, I started to laugh: it was Joseph. The only reason
that I could think of that might explain his being on the screen was that he
had seen Missy Prissy climbing the screens and she got to come in. I guess he
figured that if it worked for her, why shouldn’t it work for him. He tried all
three screens and, as I think about it now, that may have been the last time I
saw him.
Anyway, now that you
know what the wildlife of Brooklyn, New York is really about, maybe you’ll have
a different perspective about this crazy, wildlife city. I sure do.
Copyright
© 17 April 17, 2021. Mary E. Purpari.
All Rights reserved
