Armadillo

Armadillo, Dasypus novemcinctus,  Dragging Leaves into Den.

At dawn while brewing my tea, I saw an armadillo crossing my back yard.  It stopped when it got to some ground cover by a pine stump and began arching its back, jumping up slightly and moving backwards.  My first thought was it got in a mound of fire ants.  But this action continued all the way across the yard.  Even in the low light, I finally figured that it was gathering and dragging leaves back to its den beneath my shed.  I grabbed the camera and hurried out to get a shot just before it went under the building.  I guess we will be having quadruplets soon, as armadillos have same sex litters of four.  Raccoons can also have four; one of my favorite pictures is of a mother raccoon nursing 4 cubs.

Raccoon,  Procyon lotor, nurses quadruplets in hollow tree.