Days 17-22 of 365

I don't really like doing these multi-day updates, but since I'm still at training and have limited access to the hotel's internet tubes it's just gonna have to be that way. So here are the photos from days 17-22.

Day 17
Raven Over Lake Powell

Day 18
Engine 2

Day 19
Badge of Honor

That's soot on my helmet from my first live fire exercise!

Day 20
Horseshoe Bend on the Colorado River

Day 21
Lake Powell's "Wildlife"

Day 22
Inferno

Today was our "propane tree" exercise. The objectives were to give us experience working with a large, hot propane fire, demonstrate how to envelope a fire within a cone of water, and build confidence in our equipment's ability to protect us. Seeing as how I was able to stand less than 2 feet from that blazing "tree" without much discomfort I think the stuff works. This shot is of one of our instructors observing the exercise.

Days 13-16 of 365

Playing catch-up...

Day 13
Storm clouds over Page, AZ

Day 14

Day 15
After a tough day

Day 16

Organ Pipes and Cactus Wrens

I just got back from spending four days at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument helping with their seasonal interpretive training. It was my first time to the southwestern corner of Arizona. While it's still part of the Sonoran Desert, it's much more lush than other places I've been in the state. A tremendous variety of cacti, including the rare organ pipe cactus pictured above, and scrub bushes like mesquite and creosote. The organ pipes themselves are pretty darn cool. And a lot bigger than I had expected them to be. While they don't get nearly as tall as a 30-40 foot saguaro, they can easily reach heights of ten to fifteen feet.

Even though I didn't see any new birds (they just don't get the number of unique Mexican species that you can find in southeastern Arizona), the personality of the birds they did have more than made up for it.

This Cactus Wren (which happens to be the Arizona state bird) decided to come check out my can of soda while I was coaching some of the park's employees at a picnic table behind the visitor center. I think he wins the prize for the most charismatic wren I've ever encountered.

How can you compete with something like this? As cool as Canyon Wrens are, there's just no contest.

Escaping the Heat

Sonja and I thought it would be prudent to head up and out of the intense heat that has been blasting the Verde Valley for the last week. So we decided to take the dogs to 8,500' on the slopes of Mt. Humphrey, outside of Flagstaff. The temperature was unbelievably pleasant once we reached an elevation over a mile higher than where we're at in Rimrock. Easily 20 degrees cooler. However, because the sun is still pretty intense, the sandy trail got a big hot for Harvey's feet, cutting our hike shorter than we had anticipated. It was still a nice afternoon, though.

And it doesn't look like it's going to be cooling down anytime soon...

At least we got our swamp cooler fixed, so the house stays pretty mild, even when it is unbearably hot outside. As a result, I have a feeling we'll be spending most of the summer hanging out inside. Which isn't so bad, really, particularly since the evenings are so nice.

Not much else going on. But next week I'll be hosting the 52nd edition of "I and the Bird", an online blogging carnival. So if anyone has any posts involving our many feathered friends, let me know if you'd like me to include it in my IatB post and send it my way no later than Tuesday (June 26).

Birding the Huachucas

On Thursday, Sonja and I took our first trip to the Huachuca Mountains of extreme southeastern Arizona. These mountain ranges, in the heart of the deep Sonoran Desert, are often called “Sky Islands” for the incredible variety of temperate mixed forest habitats they provide. They tend to be refuges for a huge number of migratory birds and resident mammals that normally wouldn’t be able to survive in the arid desert ecosystem. In many cases, they are also hot-spots for Mexican species that, for one reason or another (range expansion due to global climate change, straying off course during migration, etc) can sometimes be surprisingly common in the lush canyons cutting into the mountains.

While this trip didn’t yield a tremendous list of total species seen (41), we both recorded a good number of lifers (Sonja: 13; me: 9). We saw six different species of hummingbirds, three of which were lifers for both of us, including a Magnificent and a Blue-throated Hummingbird, both of which were almost twice the size of the more common Anna’s and Black-chinned hummers that we normally get at our feeders.

The undisputed highlight of the whole day, however, took place in the afternoon (normally not a good time of day for birding) on Fort Huachuca, an army base in Sierra Vista, AZ. After getting our day-pass (and a dirty look from the guy giving it to us after he noticed the “No Nukes North 2003 Peace Camp” t-shirt), we proceeded to get lost twice before finding our way past all the grenade assault courses to Garden Canyon, one of these forested valleys I mentioned. We parked alongside several large vans, then noticed that everyone piling out of one of them were wearing binoculars and carrying field guides. I overheard one member of this group getting directions from another binocular-clad guy from the other van. So I butted in and asked what they had seen up the trail. The group that was just finishing their hike had seen a pair of Mexican Spotted Owls about a half-hour hike up the trail from where we were standing. They doubted whether or not we would be able to locate them, considering they were have a very difficult time trying to describe where to look, but we headed up the trail anyway.

Once we got to the area they had described, we also began doubting whether we would actually see the owls. Searching a 100 yard section of trail scanning incredibly dense, jungle-like vegetation for a pair of non-descript brown birds that could be perched pretty much anywhere was beginning to feel like an impossible mission. Particularly once Sonja discovered that I neglected to ask what side of the trail the birds were located, not to mention how high they were perched or on what kind of tree. But I got lucky. Sonja decided to head up the trail a bit and work her way back while I lagged behind. I nonchalantly turned my head to look back down the trail when I saw them. Two large, nondescript brown birds perched on a nondescript branch, next to a nondescript rock in a nondescript part of the forest.

“Oh, there they are,” is all I said, trying to sound as casual as possible. Couldn’t let Sonja think that I had agreed with her that there was no way in hell we were going to find them. The birds just sat there, preening themselves and each other, while we sat on a couple rocks not 30 feet away and watched them. We stayed for almost a half hour admiring their beautiful plumage and the meticulous way they went about cleaning their feathers one by one. They were in the perfect position to get some amazing “through the binoculars” photographs…if I had remembered to put the camera in my pocket before we left the car. But the image of those two owls will forever be etched in my memory, even without the pictures I might have taken.

We did fail to find any Elegant Trogons, a species that can ONLY be seen (outside of Mexico) in these tiny canyons in this out-of-the-way corner of Arizona. Oh well, next time.

Here’s our complete list for the day. Lifers are identified by an asterisk (*) and either a P if it was a lifer for me, an S for Sonja, or both.

Turkey Vulture
Cooper's Hawk (on nest)
Red-tailed Hawk
Wild Turkey
Scaled Quail* (P, S)
White-winged Dove
Mourning Dove
Spotted Owl* (P, S)
Whip-poor-will* (S)
White-throated Swift
Broad-billed Hummingbird* (P, S)
Blue-throated Hummingbird* (P, S)
Magnificent Hummingbird* (P, S)
Black-chinned Hummingbird
Anna's Hummingbird
Broad-tailed Hummingbird
Gila Woodpecker
Arizona Woodpecker* (P, S)
Western Wood Peewee* (S)
Hammond's Flycatcher
Dusky-capped Flycatcher* (P, S)
Cassin's Kingbird* (P, S)
Vireo sp. (probably a plumbeous, but not quite sure)
Mexican Jay* (P, S)
Common Raven
Bridled Titmouse
Bushtit* (S)
White-breasted Nuthatch
Cactus Wren
Curve-billed Trasher
Northern Parula* (S - a little outside of its normal range…say, about 1,000 miles outside)
Townsend's Warbler
Wilson's Warbler
Painted Redstart
Western Tanager
Black-headed Grosbeak
Green-tailed Towhee
Great-tailed Grackle
Spotted Towhee
House Finch
Lesser Goldfinch

Our next birding trip will probably be to Madera Canyon to finally see the trogons plus a Flame-colored Tanager that’s been spotted there the last couple years. But we might need a couple weeks for Sonja to build back up her birding bug.

Oh, and we also got to see the world's largest asparagus. Well, that's not what the sign called it, but we think it was mislabled.

Hoodoos? You doos!

Went hiking today up in the San Francisco Volcanic Field area of Coconino National Forest near Flagstaff. It was a really neat hike into a cinder cone volcano, complete with all sorts of obsidian, cinders and hoodoos. I don't feel much like posting pictures, so instead I'll just let you watch a video. For some reason, YouTube has been messing up the sound on its videos, so the audio is a bit off with the timing. But you still get the general idea.

The Swarm!

I'l admit, I don't know what the official term for a flock of hummingbirds is. However, after filling the feeders this morning I have decided that calling it a swarm is perfectly appropriate. Within seconds of carrying the feeder out into the yard I was attacked. They didn't even wait for me to hang the darn feeder.


While I was outside enjoying the feel of wings beating at over 70 times a second only inches away from my ears and tiny little feet perching on my fingers, I only noticed the Anna's Hummingbirds. But then, I was a bit preoccupied with holding the feeder still and taking pictures. It wasn't until I downloaded the pictures that I realized there were actually two species mobbing me. The other was a Black-chinned Hummingbird.

Here are some of the pictures I was able to capture from this morning's action. Be sure to click on the pictures to be able to see these beautiful little birds more closely.

I didn't get very good photos of the male Anna's. But I did get a couple that show off their brilliant throats and crowns shining in the sunshine.

Here's an action shot of an Anna's swooping down to the feeder. He was one of the bullies of the group, and as a result, the other hummers ended up allowing him to perch on my finger unmolested for almost two minutes. It was on the finger behind the feeder, though, so I couldn't get any pictures of it.

This is a female Black-chinned Hummingbird. You can tell her apart from the female Anna's by the greyish crown and the white spot behind the eye. If you look to the left you'll also see a tiny hummingbird tongue from a second female who just finished drinking.

Here's a nice shot of one of the male Black-chinned Hummingbirds. Too bad I clipped his wing off. If I had turned the camera just an inch more to the right this would have been a damn good shot.

So, if you ever plan to feed hummers in your own yard, it's really important to make sure that you always have fresh food out for them. Sugar-water can go bad fairly quickly, particularly if you live in a warm climate, so it's good to change them out every few days. And once the hummers in your area find your feeders, they'll empty them rather quickly. Don't bother getting the "hummingbird food" you can buy in the store. It's loaded with food coloring to make it look red, and this does absolutely nothing for the birds. Instead, just make them a mixture of sugar water (1/4 cup sugar for every cup of water). If your feeder has a little bit of red near the feeding holes, the hummers will find it. They don't need a whole container of red liquid to know there is food present.

When you do get hummers coming to your yard you will have a great time watching them. You'll also be amazed at how close you can get and how easy it is to get a hummer to perch on your finger. All it takes is some sugar-water and a little patience.

A Colorful Evening

It was a colorful evening tonight. The contrails were lit up like big magenta arrows all pointing toward Los Angeles. It was also an exciting birding day for Sonja, with four life species. This morning, when she dropped me off at work we spent a couple minutes strolling the trails looking for a Painted Redstart that has been seen displaying for the past three days. No luck on the redstart, but we did spot three life species for Sonja. They included a Bewick's Wren, several Lucy's Warblers, and a Common Black Hawk that we watched fly down to the stream bank to pounce on some unsuspecting invertebrate. That last one was a particularly cool sighting.

And this evening, just minutes before I snapped that picture of the sunset, Sonja saw her first ever Vermillion Flycatcher. I attempted to get a picture of it, but with the dim light, the distance to the bird (it was about 50 yards off), and the fact that I was taking it through binoculars, the results weren't as dramatic as I had hoped.

You can see the brilliant red on this beautiful bird even from this distance. Certainly, if there is any bird that doesn't need a close-up to demonstrate how striking its plumage is, it's this one. Even so, here's a photo of it a little closer so you can see what you're looking at.

We also got to watch a pocket gopher excavating its burrow with a mouth full of dirt.

I took a movie of this little guy, too, but it's even more boring than all the other movies I post on here. So I decided to spare you.

Cowpies and Saddle Mittens

Sonja and I took the dogs for a hike this morning. It had been a while since we took them on a really good walk, and since Harvey's arthritis seemed to be under control, opted for a nice 4 mile round trip into the red rocks of Sedona. We also chose this hike because it was so close to Sonja's work that we could go pick up some meds for the dogs to help get rid of these. But I didn't write this post to talk about fleas, as interesting as they are. I had no idea they were so hard to squish. They're heavily armored little suckas.

So, anyway, back to our hike. After a slow drive up a "high clearance vehicles only" road in our not-quite-high-clearance-Subaru, we started our way down toward the Cowpies. Actually, what we saw are a bit different than what you may be familiar with. According to this site, Sedona's Cowpies tend to be rather "swirly" and "vortex-y", not squishy and flattishly brownish-green. We only skirted the edges of the Cowpies on our way up to Mitten Ridge Saddle. For a little change of pace, I'll let most of the photos speak for themselves today (but, as always, you can click on the images for a larger version).

Luna, Sonja and Harvey on the edge of a Cowpie.
Happy dogs!
Mitten Ridge Saddle.

The rest of these are photos of some of the plants living on the edge of the Colorado Plateau.

Lichens on Slickrock.
I've titled this one,
"Little Yellow Flowers with Stick"
(haven't gotten an Arizona flower guide, yet)
Little Yellow Flower Without Stick.
Century Plant
Agave parryi
As you can probably tell, it was a very enjoyable way to spend a morning. Next month we're planning a hike down into the heart of the Sonoran Desert to try to catch the saguaro bloom that is forecast to occur within the next couple weeks.

But, it's a DRY heat!

The past couple of days have given us our first taste of "real" Arizona heat since arriving in the state. Today, at the castle the high was 88 degrees. Considering that the highest temps we ever saw in Seward maxed out around 79 degrees, this is pretty significant. Not that I'm complaining, yet, of course. But to tell you the truth, it hasn't been all that bad. And that means that the temps during the peak of summer only get another 20 degrees above this. I could do another 20 degrees. I think.

The heat we've been experiencing also means that my first ever encounter with one of these is approaching. My coworkers are even looking forward to my first rattlesnake experience. In fact, just this morning as I opened the visitor center I discovered a little present left behind by last night's closing staff. Yeah, I guess they figure leaving a fake snake inside the cash drawer of the register for me to find first thing in the morning is their way of prepping me for the real thing. It's not that I'm freaked out by rattlesnakes. On the contrary, I think they are way cool. . . an amazing example of evolutionary adaptation. How can you not think an animal that sees the world like the Predator from one of the best Ah-nold movies ever is neato? I'm actually looking forward to hearing the ominous rattle for the first time. Seriously, I think this is one of the only times that a human being can experience a primal instinctual reaction, at least in North America. Well, I suppose coming face-to-face with a grizzly might produce the same visceral reaction, but I've already done that. So this is all I've got left. I'll be sure to let you know how it goes.

Anyway, that's not why I was posting this evening. Instead, I uploaded some pictures Sonja took on Sunday of her hike with the dogs on the Wet Beaver Creek Trail near our place.

This is actually the first time I've seen them. Here's a pretty flower she found. Looks sorta rose-ish or rhododendronny to me. Honestly, though, I haven't got a clue. Besides, it's not like it's anything important like a bird or something.

And a happy, post-swimming hole encountering Luna near the pretty flowery bush thing. Isn't she awesome? Best. Dog. Ever.

And, finally...

I figured it was about time I try to stop all the moaning and complaining that I haven't posted any pictures of the inside of our house, yet. So, I'll start tonight with our livingroom.

It's our couch. Well, not really our couch. More like the house's couch. Or the park's couch. Ok, so it is A couch. With a Luna attached. That's not our table or chairs, either. But the pictures on the wall are ours.

Not our TV, either. Nor is that our coffee table or entertainment center standy thingy. But the plants belong to us. As does all the crap sitting on the coffee table. I think the light bulb in the ceiling light may actually be ours, as well. But I could be mistaken. The house doesn't belong to us, either. But many of you already knew that. And I think the carpetting will probably stay with the house. But I've heard we get to keep any dust bunnies we collect. Which is pretty cool, since they make pretty good pets!

Red Tank Draw and the GBBC

Your guess is as good as mine as to what the name of today's hiking spot means. I get the whole "red" part, and perhaps if you call a stream a draw, that makes sense, too. Oh well. At least it was a fun hike.

There wasn't much in the way of a trail, though. Which meant that most of the hike involved navigating our way over large river rocks and underneath/around/through assorted prickly things. Lots and lots of prickly things. Everything we encountered seemed to be armored with some sort of burr, prickle, thorn, spine or dagger. You'd think we were living in a desert or something.

But the dogs were having a great time playing in the stream and running around on the sandstone formations.

Sonja even found an old bear skull that Luna seemed to like the taste of.

So I dared Sonja to try a bite.

It was really cool to see the contrast between the flat, red sandstone and the round volcanic basalt. We were hoping to find some petroglyphs that are supposed to be down in that area, but after two hours of hiking in we decided we'd try again some other time. And rather than bushwack our way along the streambed and risk a sprained/broken ankle, we opted to climb up onto the ridge and take the "easy" way back to the car.

Ok, so let's just say we didn't think this plan through all the way. At least by the time we got back to the car the dogs had learned the fine art of cacti maneuvering. Well, sort of. But it only took us twenty minutes to pull all of the spines off of the two of them.

We also took part in the Great Backyard Bird Count today. We missed a few species I was hoping for (like a Greater Roadrunner), but overall not a bad showing for only a couple hours. No lifers, but it was fun to keep track during our hike. Here's our list of the 23 species we saw, in roughly taxonomic order:

American Coot: 6
Hooded Merganser: 1
American Widgeon: 32
Ring-necked Duck: 2
Red-tailed Hawk: 2
Cooper's Hawk: 1
Northern Flicker: 1
Ladder-backed Woodpecker: 1
Gila Woodpecker: 2
Common Raven: 2
Mourning Dove: 3
Western Bluebird: 6
American Robin: 1
Ruby-crowned Kinglet: 1
Bushtit: 3
Bridled Titmouse: 2
Canyon Wren: 1
Rock Wren: 2
Northern Cardinal: 1
White-crowned Sparrow: 3
Dark-eyed Junco: 27
House Finch: 8
Lesser Goldfinch: 6

There's still another day and a half if any of you are interested in participating. All you have to do is watch birds anywhere you want to for at least fifteen minutes before the end of tomorrow (Monday). Record the species you see and the number of individuals you can identify for each. Go here for more detailed info on the rules and how to submit your list. And happy birding!

Old Stuff is Cool

So our hike yesterday was really cool. Despite the heat (yup, I'm rubbing it in), the dogs did pretty darn well on the hike to the top of the "mountain", although they need to learn how to avoid running into, stepping on, and sticking their noses into cacti. Here are some neat pictures of our little adventure.

First, we took the dogs for a little swim in Beaver Creek, part of Coconino National Forest, and only ten minutes from our house.

Here's one of the cacti (I think this is a variety of cholla) that is beginning to bloom.

As we approached the summit, we encountered our first evidence of the ancient Sinaguans who lived here over 1,000 years ago. We were amazed that there were as many potsherds as there were laying around. Obviously, this site isn't very well known, or the whole mountain would have been torn apart by vandals and thieves. Sonja spent a good amount of time hiding all of the really cool pieces under rocks and inside cacti to keep people from taking them off the mountain.

In fact, the ground was literally covered with pieces of prehistoric pottery. The presence of so many artifacts was humbling...and almost spiritual. We could almost feel the presence of the ancient Sinaguans. Here's a short movie showing some of the more interesting pieces we found:



The ruins of the pueblo were pretty torn apart, however. You can sort of make out some of the rooms behind Sonja in this picture.

And this is the view looking out across the Verde Valley from the summit. We live about half-way up the picture from Sonja and the dogs, but just out of the frame to the right.

And finally, here are a couple obligatory bird pictures from our feeders. It's been fun seeing all the winter residents hanging out, including Gambel's Quail, Say's Phoebes and Western Bluebirds.

These are a pair of male Lesser Goldfinch, a southwestern specialty.

And, one of our more exciting neighbors, another bird you can't see anywhere else in the country, a Gila Woodpecker. I can't wait for all the neotropical migrants to start showing up in April. Hopefully I'll get some good pictures of a Vermillion Flycatcher, or if I'm really lucky a Painted Bunting. Even if I don't get one of those, I'm sure the eight species of hummingbirds sure to be visiting our feeders will keep me busy for a while.

Oh, and for those of you who, for one reason or another, weren't able to view those slideshows from our trip down the Alaska Highway, you can just click here to simply view the photos in the album.