Winter in Hollywood

Three pics from the neighborhood.  We have autumn colors in winter as the days grow short.

The last week was cold for us with highs in the 50s.  It rained on the morning of Dec. 7.  Then the sky cleared.  The Hollywood sign is in the distance.  Pic below shot about noon from the upper parking level of the local Home Depot where we bought our house a Christmas gift - a new kitchen faucet!

Our Dog Pebbles

What's a neighborhood without a dog?  In our case - same with many neighbors - our houses are built on hills - and there are no yards, just slopes covered with ivy or more drought resistant plants.

So - a lot of dog walking in our streets.  Imagine the miles per year when you walk a dog three times a day.  

Pebbles is our second dog.  She was probably 4 when we adopted her from Pets for Friends in Sun Valley.

Pebbles has shared our lives for nearly 10 years.  And it's taking me a long time to put together the story of her past life which, I slowly realized, included years with a circus clown named Beppo.

 

An Orphaned Owl in our Hollywood Hills Neighborhood

Last week we saw a baby owl - actually a truck driver from city sanitation pointed it out to us. He was delivering new garbage bins for a new neighbor who was moving in soon.  The worker was trying not to disturb the baby bird which looked like a ball of fluffy yarn with eyes.  After two days of seeing and then not seeing the little owl, hoping that the mother owl had found it, we saw it again, tight against the foundation of the neighbor's house and between garbage bins.  This is coyote country - last summer another neighbor's dog, a Chihuahua named Pedro, was attacked and nearly killed by a coyote in the same property's carport. So, Bill went home to get gloves and carried the owlet to our carport.  We put the bird inside a plastic container that held a cherry tomato plant on our deck last year - on the bottom some leaves and toweling for nest and for protection covered the bin with a dome of wire mesh that we used last year over the same planter to keep squirrels from eating fruit from the tomato bush.

Either a Screech Owl or a Great Horned Owl because of its yellow eyes, but I'm guessing Horned Owl after looking at photos of baby owls on the web.

I don't know the end of the story yet.  After a day and a half with us the bird is now in the hands of Valley Wildlife Care. I  hope to hear from the organization's director this week about the owlet's health.  If so I will write more about this adventure.