Twice last week, while our daughter and granddaughter were walking to school in their north Austin neighborhood, they spotted an armadillo right in the middle of the urban sprawl. We’ve seen possums and lots of squirrels in Austin before, but the only time I’ve spotted armadillos was in the Texas countryside. We thought this was pretty interesting and immediately claimed it was a sign of good luck, which (for what it’s worth) seemed to be verified through a quick search of the internet.
In addition to good luck, spotting an armadillo also seems to be a harbinger of wealth, fertility and protection, according to various websites.
She managed to snap a picture of most of its armored body rooting around a ground cover landscape.
We’ve always told our kids that spotting a roadrunner in our native New Mexico is a sign of good luck, also verified through a search of the internet. Roadrunners also seem to embody strength, courage, endurance and speed, according to legend. So without any roadrunners nearby, our family in Austin can now look forward to spotting armadillos for good luck.
Native Americans seemed to think that roadrunners were especially crafty because their feet have four toes– two pointing forward and two pointing backwards — which make it difficult for predators to know which way the birds were running. The technical term for their toe arrangement is “zygodactyl.”
After our excitement about the Austin armadillo, two stories about other animals in urban settings popped up in our own state.
The first involved the spotting of a 900-pound, fully-antlered bull moose in the middle of Santa Fe near Fort Marcy Park, where Zozobra had just been burned a few days prior. This really large animal was eventually captured by New Mexico Game and Fish Department officials and relocated closer to wilderness in the northern part of the state.
I have to admit that in all my years of tramping around New Mexico’s forests and wild lands, I never thought I would see a moose here. From what I’ve been able to determine, they were once fairly common in the northern part of the state, but migrated north at some point because of climate change or increasing human presence. However, in recent years, they apparently have moved back into the region, apparently thinking that this was not such a bad place after all.
Friends in Santa Fe say a younger moose was spotted on the road to the Santa Fe Ski Basin last spring. There is speculation that the 900-pound bruiser spotted around Fort Marcy Park was the same animal, but pumped up over some tasty noshing over the summer. Given that moose can be fairly ornery and fast, I would have given this guy a lot of distance had I spotted it.
And then to top things off, a high school football game in Rio Rancho had to be postponed last weekend because a ground squirrel tunneled too deeply into an underground electrical box and chewed up some live wires that resulted in shorting out the field lights. The squirrel apparently was vaporized in the process of chewing on the hot wires and the game had to be moved to another (squirrel free) stadium while repairs were made.
These animal capers reminded me of a women’s softball game at New Mexico State University that I attended some years ago that was delayed when prairie dogs from a colony adjacent to the ball field began scampering around the diamond during a game. The critters were eventually chased back down their tunnels and remained there until the ninth inning was over. I think steps were taken to permanently move them to another location. There was also a time when plans to install new artificial turf at the NMSU football field had to be delayed because a colony of burrowing owls had taken up residence in the stadium.
As I think I’ve mentioned before, our own neighborhood has hosted foxes, raccoons, skunks and even a pack of javelinas in the past. It makes you realize that nature is never too far away — which I think is a good and entertaining thing.
And if you have any urban animal encounters, let me know and I’ll share them.
aero-cordero.com 