Monday, August 27, 2007

Visitors


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Another good topic for Illustration Friday. I've been playing hostess to many reptile, amphibian, and insect "visitors" lately. Some far more welcome than others. I was out doing some yard work yesterday, and had my Parrot sitting on the patio table. Suddenly she started screaming like a Banshee. I looked over and saw one huge grand daddy Diamondback sauntering up towards my sweet bird. I didn't run in to grab my camera as usual, because this guy was right up by my sliding glass door. I decided to blast the varmint (with the power nozzle on the hose). I managed to shoo him off, but he took his sweet time wandering off. He's probably got the cleanest, shiniest rattle in the whole Southwest right now. I'm so very grateful to have Palapa's (my parrot) keen vision looking out for me while I'm out doing yard work. Had I not noticed him on the porch, things could have gotten ugly when I came back for a water break. So thats what inspired the Rattler in the motif. As for the Scorpions, well I've had more than my fair share of Scorpion party crashers as well. About a month ago, I found three in the house. They are Bark Scorpions which are notorious for having the most toxic sting of any species in North America. The discovery made me edgy and miserable for a couple of weeks. I had just moved in and still had cardboard boxes, and other items on the floor that must have appeared as a delightful condo's to those little nasties. I had laundry baskets and such on the floor of the closet where one was discovered napping under my camera bag. I ran to the store and got some long cooking tongs and goat leather gloves, because I was too chicken sh*t to reach my hands in the laundry after that. I was not as forgiving with a couple of the Scorpions as I was with the snake. One Scorpion got stomped, one got released back into the wild down by the wash, and one wound up in the vacuum bag. Unlike most other folks I managed to allow one Scorpion to live, and I've calmed down since then from the stinger jitters. So any further discoveries will spark a catch and release project. The Diamondback was lucky he showed up in my yard and not someone else's. In another's yard he would have left in a bag without his head. In my yard he just left without his dignity. I just discovered that blogger has now made it possible to upload video. As soon as I finish publishing this post, I'm going to try to post a video I took of a Rattler earlier this Summer. Well I hope you enjoyed your visit to this post. I have a few more shots of some of my other very interesting visitors under this post on my home page here. Thank you for stopping in! Come back soon to check if the video uploaded OK.

11 comments:

Vhrsti said...

Wow! Mysterious mandala!

Focus_ret said...

Beautiful art - but a scary story to go with it.

shaky mouse said...

this is wonderful.. really intricate and rich..

thanks for stopping by my blog :)

Anonymous said...

I DO love this illustration! It makes the little critters seem a lot more loveable than they really are! I think I would be feeling "slithery" for a long, long time after encountering the diamondback and scorpions like you did! But at least it inspired you to create such a fine piece!

And thank you for your positive comments on my IF: Visitors piece. It's a honor to hear such things from a fellow artist!

Heather said...

Even if the critters are unwelcome they make a beautiful design. I love it.

HARDWAX said...

My heart was racing reading your narrative, whoa, and I think under the circumstances you were brave.
I can't tell you how fantastic this piece is. Okey, how about a stunner, wow, and beautiful work!

lisagloria said...

Ack! your story gave me heebie jeebies! You're way more charitable than I - catch and release for scorpions? yeesh. i love the illustration tho!!

Digital Scott's Illustrationblog said...

I like the style of this! Unique and very cool. And a great story to go with it!

MIKE said...

the shape given by this illo is great. the way you have done the snakes looks almost like aboriginal artwork..

arxo said...

excellent piece...

Anonymous said...

a wonderful illustration. nice work!!