We love our off grid acreage in Cochise County, Arizona. Where else could you find a spider or insect or WHATEVER IT IS that you've never even HEARD of before? Just five days ago, Pam and I spotted the wildest bit of wildlife we'd ever seen. It looked like a bit of fast moving dandelion fluff, sort of a mini-cotton ball with legs. The critter was fast. Traveling mostly over open, bare ground, it eventually moved into a clump of bunchgrass and, after a while, disappeared from view.

In the meantime, I'd been on my feet, out front of the camp trailer, hollering for Pam to get the camera while I kept an eye on this alien from Planet Dandelion. She did get the camera to me in time. Not in time to catch the beastie in the open, but at least quickly enough to snap a few shots before it disappeared entirely.

Here are the few shots of that particular individual. If any reader knows what it is, please let me know! (And no, this is not a hoax put together with household lint and/or PhotoShop. I don't even have PhotoShop.)

Note: We're not sure just how many legs this thing has--there are indications of legs in the photos, we think, but the count remains in question. Eight would mean spider, obviously, and six would mean insect, but those long whitish "hairs" provide an amazing amount of camouflage. As for other aids to identification, it does look to have a narrow waist like spiders do, but then again, so do many insects.

Time wounds all heels, as they say. Or something like that. I hadn't thought about the Mutated Dandelion Fluff for a while, at least a couple of days due to having plenty on my plate, beginning with Pam's doctor related problems. Late this afternoon, a second Creature From Planet Cotton Ball grabbed my attention by both ears once again.

Fortunately, this time around I had the camera in my pocket. I was just returning from a brief walk around a portion of our property. Suddenly, skittering about on one of the numerous patches of bare ground scattered throughout stands of mesquite and bunchgrass, a second little hairy white monster showed its stuff. Again, that little thing--maybe three quarters of an inch long at most, maybe no more than half an inch--was fast. The pictures of Individual #2 (shown below) are mostly blurrier than those of the first specimen. This is due to the extra turn of speed displayed by #2: Where #1 would pause for long seconds between short dashes of a foot or two at a time, today's mini-monster sprinted from place to place almost nonstop.

What stops were made, such as one near the entrance to an anthill, suggested hunting behavior to the naked eye. No single stop lasted for more than a second or two, then off again to the races. It was a super challenge to find it in the viewfinder and ten times as hard to keep it there. Most of the shots were taken hastily in an effort to get something recorded. Even so, blurry or not, the photos were worth taking. For one thing, the legs show more clearly than they do on #1. Can't see eight of 'em, possibly eliminating spiders from consideration...but I'm not sure I can count six, either, so is it an insect? Really?

You may ask why I've repeatedly called this thing a "monster". There's a reason: It broadcasts a sense of menace I feel strongly. Pam feels it as well. Although neither specimen has shown the slightest interest in being aggressive toward humans, I would definitely not want to meet up with one were it to be the size of, oh, say, a German Shepherd...let alone an African lion. It would not surprise us in the least to discover the thing was so venomous that a single contact with one of those long white hairs could kill a battalion of combat hardened soldiers.

Or maybe not. In any case, we do most sincerely hope our readers can help identify this Arizona Alien.

Thanks for reading,

Ghost32