Comment by duxup | Hacker News Reader

Comment by duxup | Hacker News Reader

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I'm fortunate enough to have a pond and some marshy area bordering my house.

My neighbors sometimes wondered why I don't trim it up and make it look "nice" right up to the water like some folks do.

I like it wild, lots of trees and wildlife. I even let the wildness take a bit more of the yard than when i moved in. A few big trees quickly sprung up, no maintenance (compared to a yard) it looks great wild.

Perhaps if only out of laziness (yard work is kinda a pain). A few other neighbors who were maliciously caring for their lawn right up to the marsh (well the area you can do that to legally) have done the same as I have and we've got a much larger wild area now. It's full of blue jays, finches, cardinals, rabbits, owl visitors. We even get visited by some beautiful red foxes from time to time (i suspect quite often but they are very sneaky).

The kids mostly play in the front yard anyway where I actually bother to do more yard work to make it looks nice so a big lawn in the back makes no sense if nobody is really enjoying it.

> We even get visited by some beautiful red foxes from time to time

It's funny how urban adaptation affects perceptions of rarity. I live in fairly-central London and you can hardly set foot outside after dark without tripping over a red fox or three. Out in the countryside they're still pretty wary (with reason, since farmers will shoot them).

Are urban foxes a thing in the US too, or is this still a UK phenomenon?

Saw some urban foxes in Montreal - a tourist left a backpack with his dinner (rotisserie chicken) on the ground while the group went to take photos, upon their return they discovered that the foxes were already splitting the “catch”.

California has some raccoons and coyotes. Haven’t seen foxes in cities, but we do have them in the countryside.

There are some suburban ones but they tend to be pretty skittish - you generally see them through windows or cameras. I had one funny experience where they apparently moved stealthily enough that the motion activation mode on a security camera had them appear to teleport - it showed up for a few frames, appeared elsewhere in frame and then disappeared.

Really it is tameness that does it as they don't scatter before we even see them. The woods being quiet is because we scare the hell out of nearly everything, constantly walking on two legs like a bear ready to fight. Leave cameras behind and it gets noiser and more active.

I routinely come across coyotes in my neighborhood. Just this past week, I was out walking my dogs at 11AM and had one emerge from the bushes in the middle of a residential neighborhood. It was being harassed by a Blue Jay. It came within about 5 meters of my dogs and I, while we stood off the to the side to let it get past us and head towards the dry creek bed that they use to navigate the area. They're in our neighborhood for the rabbits.

I'm on the edge of the urban and rural suburban world so most wildlife is still a bit more wary, but yeah the urban foxes a few miles from me are far far less shy.

We have coyotes in many suburban areas.

Chicago at least has many _urban_ coyotes. I see them at least once a month walking my dog & I live in a pretty dense area.

Which neighborhood? I'm downtown and I only ever see rats. I've never seen a coyote anywhere in the metro area.

Hyde Park

I live in Minneapolis Minnesota. We have raccoons, opossums, squirrels, rabbits. That's all I have seen for small ground critters that aren't living in parks.

Skunks, there must be skunks. They are really thriving in (y)our neck of the woods due to milder winters.

Not so much, I think. In the upper Midwest, it’s mostly squirrels and rabbits.

We get squirrels too. (Squirrels are awesome.) Rabbits, never.

> A few other neighbors who were maliciously caring for their lawn

I think you meant meticulously, but it works either way. :)

It gets malicious real quick when they invoke the power of the HOA to force you to tame the wilderness in your back yard. :(

The next part is "have done the same as I have and we've got a much larger wild area now" so I suspect it was not "malicious"

The invertebrates that occupy that pond and its surrounds really appreciate that you're leaving it that condition.

The enormous snapping turtle that visits has chosen not to eat my children, I like that.

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