Day 3 - Around Patagonia

Today we spent the day around Patagonia.  In the morning we drove 30 minutes out to Lake Patagonia (a very well vegetated reservoir).  On the way, Mark pulled over and we all piled out of the van and stood in a line with our bins up in the beautiful morning light.   We were looking for the Botteri sparrow, which according to our Sibley Guide is “uncommon and local in extensive dense grass with scattered shrubs.”  Its habitat, range and voice are used to identify the bird, not its field markings.  So, Mark played its call and as if on cue the bird popped up out of the grass and flew up to a mesquite near us.  It is truly a Plain Jane little sparrow.  We drove on to Lake Patagonia where lots of RV’s were camped and two Border Patrol vehicles were parked next to us.  Four agents set off with packs, making us wonder what was up.  We are probably less than 10 miles from the wall that divides Nogales, AZ from Nogales, Mexico.  We walked the shady path through mesquite to the willow forest by the edge of the water.  There were some fresh water birds -a great blue heron, nootropic cormorants, coots and so on.  The cattails were thick and there were signs of cattle everywhere.  As we came to a clearing, Mark pointed out the hundred or maybe thousands of tiny gnats flying around.  They were lit up by the sun and the air was thick with them.  They are all males, he told us, waiting around for some females to come by.  When the females appear, the males get very active swirling in fast moving vortices and the females choose the male they like.  It is an example of sexual selection.  Who knew?  We watched many tiny Blue Mariner butterflies sipping minerals from the wet mud.  We studied cow pies with all the flies and beetles on them.  And of course there were many birds.  We saw the Dusky Capped Flycatcher and learned that here in SE Arizona is the only place in the US to see it.  Even though it isn’t that rare, I’m always thrilled to see the Vermillion Flycatcher.  We heard bullfrogs that have wiped out all the fish and frogs in the reservoir.  I was asked by one of the participants if I’d kill the bullfrogs?  Of course I answered, “it depends,” but I’m still wondering what I’d do.

We stopped at a locally famous birding spot - The Patagonia Roadside Rest Area - where we were looking for the Thick billed Kingbird.  We found it perched on the very top of a high tree.  Mark said there are probably fewer than 20 of these birds in the whole US.  What was interesting is there is a phenomena among birders known as the Patagonia Rare Bird Effect.  What happened was that the word got out that a rare bird could be seen at this particular Roadside Rest Area and as birders came to see it, they also spotted other rare birds.  

Lunch was super delicious at the local bakery.  And after we did the bird list, we had a couple of hours free.  We strolled through a couple of local art shops and then Bob set out to find the local blacksmith whose work he admired at the B and B and at the Velvet Elvis Pizzeria last night.  I took a nap.

In the late afternoon, we headed out to Harshaw Canyon Road, a beautiful sycamore and oak canyon with red rock mountains towering over it and a stream running through it. It was a pleasure to walk along in the shade of the late afternoon.   The big excitement was spotting a Black Phoebe nest in a cave in the crumbling rocks.  We watched as the two babies flew in and out of the nest.  Mark was excited because it is very rare to find Black Phoebes nesting not attached to human habitation.  It was a lovely relaxing day.  And oh yes, Bob found the blacksmith and had a wonderful time chatting about metalworking and admiring the guy’s work.   

Day 2 - Madera Canyon and Beyond

The storm arrived in the night with lightning, thunder and lots of rain.  In the morning, the air smelled to me of animals.  I imagined wet javelinas in the wash.  Mark said it was the smell of the first summer rain on the dry dry grass.  It is very unusual, we are told, for it to rain in May in Arizona.  After a huge breakfast, served at 6 AM, we went back to the pond we’d seen the previous afternoon.  It began to pour, raining harder and harder until it was hailing.  We stayed in the van, marveling over the many swallows flying low over the pond and sitting on the wire but before too long we fled the rain, driving south to Tubac where we found lush habitat by the Santa Cruz River bed—willow, cottonwood, mesquite, elderberry and lots and lots of birds.  We spotted a flock of cedar waxwings feeding in a tall mulberry tree on the juicy ripe berries.  There were more than a dozen different kinds that came to the tree, delicious eye candy, that kept us peering into the tree for more than an hour.  As we left, we were serenaded by white winged doves calling “who, who, who” —the sound of summer in Arizona.

The sky became lighter to the north, so we headed to Madera Canyon in the Santa Rita Mountains.  We walked up a paved trail up the Canyon, with the sound of a burbling creek nearby. As desert scrub changed to sycamore, oak, juniper forest, we learned about many plants (always a treat for me).  We spotted a beautiful Bridled titmouse with a big fat caterpillar in his mouth and watched as he flitted here and there until he popped in his nest cavity in a tall tree.  Because he didn’t eat the bug himself right away, we knew he was feeding young in the nest.  There were many wildflowers which I had to photograph.  I very much appreciated that all the plants, including all the grasses, are native here.  The squirrel tail grass was golden glowing as it swayed in the breeze.  At the top of the trail was a picnic area where we ate our lunch.  As we finished, we could feel the air change, the breeze pick up and by the time we were all in the van, a torrential downpour began.  We drove to the next site, the Lodge, and sat in the van waiting for the rain to stop.  It didn’t.  It even began to snow, so we went on to our next adventure which was a drive across a dirt road over the crest of the Mountains.  Bumping along, Mark suddenly stopped and we all got out.  He’d heard a bird singing.  It was a 5-striped Sparrow, a very rare bird found only occasionally in S. Arizona.  Though the weather was dramatic, windy, cold, with spattering of rain, we all got many good views of this rare bird.  It was exciting.   Over the mountains, we drove along a valley to Patagonia, a town time seems to have forgotten.  The Main Street  is wide with no traffic.  There was a old building with an old old sign on it that said “Patagonia Lumber” but in the window was a sign that said “Pilates.”  We checked into our very quaint B and B.  It’s in an old adobe building and very brightly decorated in Mexican hand weaving and carvings with a beautiful big garden.  After settling in, we went for our late afternoon birding to a famous spot - the home of Wayne and Marion Paton.  In the 70’s they retired to Patagonia and began feeding the hummingbirds.  As they put out more and more feeders, flocks of hummingbirds began to frequent them and people began to come to see the birds.  Though the couple have since died, their work is continued by Tucson Audubon.  We spent a couple of hours sitting comfortably on benches, watching birds come to

the many many feeders.  Right at the end we saw  the iconic and very rare violet crowned hummingbird.  It was a good day made dramatic by the rain and wind.  We had a wonderful pizza dinner and now it’s time for me to throw the 12 pillows off the bed and get into it.

Day 1 - South of Tucson

We’re on the road again, with Mark Pretti exploring SE Arizona.  Hooray.  We met at the Tucson Airport at 11 am.  After we piled into the crowded van, we headed to Sweetwater Wetlands, a wastewater treatment facility north of Tucson.  In the van, we heard Mark’s introduction about the special areas we are going to visit.  It has a great diversity of plants and animals because of 4 factors:  the climate (4 distinct seasons with mainly summer rain); the basin and range terrain; the huge amount of open space with almost entirely native plants and animals and lastly the overlap of 4 different Bio regions that come together here (the Rocky Mountains to the north, the Sierra Madre mountains to the south, the Chihuahuan desert to the east and the Sonoran desert to the west).  Sweetwater is an environmentally friendly “marsh” created by the wastewater.  There were cottonwood and willow trees as well as large acacia trees providing sought after shade as welll as a huge cattail bordered marsh.  Interesting factoids from this first stop:  there are over 1000 species of bees within 40 miles of Tucson - it’s a bee hotspot; of the three special endemic lizards we saw two of them here—the Tiger Whiptail (a 7 inch long lizard with as you’d guess a long whip tail) and the Zebra Tail lizard with an orange splotch on the chest with green belly and white under the tail with black bars.  The most unusual bird we saw was the Abert’s Towhee - an endemic with a really narrow range.  The coolest bird we saw was a large Great Horned Owl with a nest.  The most unusual fact was about the poop of the Phainopepla (a cardinal size black bird with a black crest).  It eats mostly mistletoe berries and when it poops after eating the berries, the poop is very sticky and the bird has to rub it off on the branches which is a great way for mistletoe to make sure it’s seeds stay up in the trees.

We drove south on Highway 19 to another Waste Treatment Pond near Amado where we looked for birds.  The neatest bird, I thought, were the Black Winged Whistling Ducks we saw standing on a big aerator.  They didn’t look like ducks because their legs were so long.  We watched a Red-Tailed Hawk tear flesh off something it caught.  At the lovely B and B, the Amado Territory Inn, we got our rooms, then sat on a comfortable porch sipping a glass of wine watching birds at the many bird feeders.  When we got tired of that, we wandered around the place spotting some wonderful birds.  A few that stand out were Lucy’s Warbler, the only desert breeding warbler and a big

roadrunner.  What fun this is!!!  We had a most delicious dinner and now it’s time to go to bed early because we meet for breakfast tomorrow morning at 6 AM.  It’s been a very good day.

A Visit to Tucson

At least once a year, I come to Tucson to visit my sister.  We arrived a few days ago and have been enjoying ourselves very much here.  It’s so fun to just to hang out with her— to sit out on her porch, put my feet up and sip a glass of wine.  The desert here is totally in bloom.  The rocky hillsides and gullies are covered with yellow blossomed Palo Verde trees and the Prickly Pear cactus plants that have many beautiful yellow flowers too.  I can’t stop taking photos because everything is so beautiful.  Yesterday we went to Tohono Chul Park, a botanical garden filled with desert plants and art work.  After strolling along the beautiful paths ooohing and aaahing at all the plants but especially the Saguro cactus with crowns of white flowers, we went to the restaurant and had a lovely lunch.  For me, the lunch hit was Quesadillas filled with calabacitas (squash, onions and eggplant cooked together).  In the evening, we met Randy, Christie , Riley and Desiree at the Gregory School where the kids go.  There was “An Expo” of the students projects and we enjoyed seeing their schoolwork.  Then, we saw the Middle School play “James and the Giant Peach”, a funny play with amazing sets made by the creative students.  Today we journeyed out to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.  I first visited this amazing museum in 1961 on a Spring trip with a college class.  It’s one of the best zoos in the country and filled with marvelous cactuses, Palo Verdes, Ajaves, jojobas, wonderful exhibits, a great variety of habitats found in the Desert.  I still marvel at the wonderful adaptations the plants have to survive in the arid environment.  My favorite part was the Hummingbird Aviary where we saw nesting hummingbirds.  The birds were so adapted to

people that they would fly right up to us or allow us to come very close to where they were sitting.  The energy in this house was wonderful.  Tomorrow we begin our week long birding trip in SE Arizona.

Pre-Trip Thoughts

I have been extremely busy the last several weeks volunteering at the Botanical Garden and going to the gym where I enrolled in their once yearly Commit to Get Fit Program.  In this program, you get points for attending exercise classes, doing exercise in the pool, gym or even walking a nearby park as well as attending demonstrations of exercise equipment and attending seminars.  With these points you are awarded prizes.  I find each year it brings out something compulsive in me and I turn into a gym rat.  It all takes time.  I reached my goal of a free massage and now I’m finished with the gym for the month of May.  We leave tomorrow to visit my sister in Tucson and then to join a 6 day birding trip in Southeastern Arizona.  I’m finding it hard to slow down, to focus on what needs to be done before leaving.  I find my mind rushing to worries:  will it be too hot?  Will the birding group be compatible?  Will I forget something (inevitably)?  Will my new garden by ok while I’m gone?  Will Bob get a good enough seat on the airplane?   I know worrying is wasted energy, but my mind just races from one possible problem to another.  I take a few deep breaths.  I try to focus on what I’m looking forward to:  being with my sister, the joy of birding and being in beautiful nature, eating out every night, seeing beautiful places, the blue blue sky of Arizona.  All will be well and soon we’ll be off.

One Small Thing

This morning while washing out an icky plastic cream cheese container so I could recycle it, I wondered to myself if it really makes a difference whether I recycle this container or just throw it in the garbage?  Does one small act even make a little dent in the huge problem we have with waste, with global warming?  I read the other day that what we choose to eat makes a difference.  We should be eating less red meat (I’ve known that for decades) but we should also eat less cheese and dairy products because cows make so much methane and are to blame for deforestation of the rain forest.  It takes ten gallons of milk to make a pound of cheese.  I read that we shouldn’t have gas stoves in our kitchens because of the carbon monoxide they release.  I get discouraged.  Is there nothing I can do that doesn’t have an impact?  Then I remember the biological principle that everything is connected to everything else.  Any action has a consequence.  I try to live a simpler life.  Every little change I make, every cream cheese container I recycle does make a difference.  I believe that.

What Makes the Difference?

This morning and yesterday morning, I lead a tours at the Botanical Garden for 2nd graders.  Even though they were the same age students and the tour topic was the same, the tours couldn’t have been more different.  Yesterday, I had 5 2nd grade students from a Berkeley Public School.  They were super energetic and only wanted to run around and play in the sprinklers.  It was hard to get them all to pay attention at the same time.  Walking along between stops, I saw one girl carrying another piggy-back.  I had to ask them to calm down, to walk behind me, to not run or stand in the Garden beds.  They weren’t bad, they just weren’t interested in what I had to show them.  When I get a rambunctious group, my strategy is to keep them walking and exploring by going to out of the way corners of the Garden.  After the tour, I realized that not one student had asked me a question.  Today’s tour had the same tour topic and the same age students, but they were from a local Montessori School.  They were calm, focused, very curious and interested in whatever I showed them.  The tour was a great pleasure for me.  So I’ve been wondering what makes the difference?  Is it the students or the teacher or the culture of the school?  One might say,  it’s a little bit of all three, but in my experience, it is the teacher, as the leader of the classroom, that sets the behavior standards and expectations for the students.  Just like any leader does this for the company or organization or country she/he leads.  The leader is the one responsible, the one that sets the tone.  Like my old father used to say:  “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”  As I think about the two tours, I realize I really have no idea what the students thought about the tour or got from the experience at the Botanical Garden.  I hope all of them experienced joy being in the Garden and saw plants in a new way.