Parker Canyon Lake

Sonoita is one of those places that seems to have it all. Stunning mountain vistas, amazing grasslands and lots an lots of blue skies. On this trip out there we decided to take the drive through Coronado National Forest to Parker Canyon Lake. The lake which is man made covers 130 acres and is surrounded by hiking and camping opportunities and also seems like a pretty good place to bird watch although the winds were blowing at a pretty good clip keeping allot of the smaller species grounded.

This first pic is of the Santa Ritas from route 83. I believe that the tall peak is Mt Wrightson with Madera Canyon on the other side. Mt Wrightson is quite impressive especially from Madera Canyon.

We did not see any Pronghorn Antelope on this trip but we have seen them on several other trips to the area. I love the visuals of the sweeping gasses blowing in the wind and being able to see sometimes for miles without interruption.

One of the ways that this area has moved away from cattle ranching is it's wineries of which their are quite a few. We have not visited any of them but the ones that we have driven by offer wine tasting and tours which should be interesting.

I can never resist stopping to photograph horses and this drive through Elgin Arizona takes you past Whisper's Sanctuary a non profit featuring 26 acres referred to by it's owners as "a place of peace and healing for horses and other animals".

The sanctuary is located at the Double R Heart Ranch in Elgin and as you can see from the pictures it was very windy. You can read more about Whisper's here: www.rrheartranch.com/index.html

The lake is really nice and is only a few hours from Tucson but I will warn you at times the road feels endless and there is not much out there once you get into Coronado National Forrest.  Just the way I like It.

The wind was strong enough to produce white caps and the larger birds including about a dozen Turkey Vultures and at least one Gray Hawk spent their day soaring in the wind and having a grand old time doing it.

We also spotted one Great Blue and a dozen or so American Coots on the water. Unfortunately I did not get a pic of the Great Blue as the coots scared him off chasing each other across the water.

The views of the Huachuca Mountains are spectacular and just about everywhere you look is something to photograph. There are amazing examples of Arizona Ash and Oak along the road and the High Desert Grasslands are expansive and beautiful.

I should caution you to keep your speed down as the road is not that great and occasionally you will come across a cow or two laying in the road as some of this is still open range which means the cattle are free to roam even in the roadway.

This is the Canelo Cowboy Church which used to be the old school house. Just one of those pieces of history that are dotted across the countryside here in extreme Southern Arizona.

Day 3 Nest Building

The nest building has been proceeding at a pretty good clip. You can see that the ingredient that holds everything together is spider webs. We have a hummingbird aviary close by and the people taking care of it decided to clean out all the spider webs. This caused an immediate shortage of webbing to bind the nests and hold them in place and nests were falling apart and being blown out of place. Once the spiders were reintroduced the problem solved.

Day Three- Work Continues

I have an unusual looking hummingbird that has started feeding at the house on a regular basis and I will try to get a photo to add to the blog so you can see it. Not sure what it is but it is possibly an immature Costas. We'll see.

Here is a photo of the nest as it sits at 7:54 MST on May 2, 2012. Be sure to click on the photo to see the enlarged version. I haven't gotten close enough to measure the nest but it is just a little over an inch and a quarter as near as I can tell.

Nest Building Outside My Window...

I have decided it's time to add video to my blog so I set out the other day to practice in the yard shooting Hummingbirds at my feeder. There are several regulars that feed during the day so it's really not long before one of them shows up. I have several Costas that visit each day and I can tell the males apart by their physical characteristics and their behaviors at the feeder. For example one male who we call Rocky lands on the perch to feed while another male stays in flight to feed. They do not deviate from this pattern very often and coupled with body size and coloring it.s pretty easy to tell who's who.

Day One- Discovery

The females are much harder to identify and although they also have certain behaviors and markings that help to identify individuals it can still be challenging. Female Costas and female Black-chinned are very similar making an identification extremely difficult.
As I was shooting practice video I noticed this one female retuning to the same spot in an Oleander that is situated right outside the bedroom window. Curiosity lead me to investigate and I discovered the very tiny beginnings of a nest. Not wanting to stress the hummingbird during nesting I set up my camera in the bedroom behind the blind to watch this amazing process unfold. I will be capturing video daily to show progress on the nest which usually takes 5 or 6 days to complete and then hopefully be able to watch as the eggs are laid and hatched. Watching the tiny birds grow over the few weeks from hatching to fledging is the goal but it seems a little late in the season for success and anything can happen.
Nest building is done by the female and the males do not involve themselves in the process.

Buffalo Field Campaign Comes to Arizona

                         
I had the opportunity on Thursday evening to attend Mike Meese's presentation on the treatment of Yellowstone National Parks wild buffalo herd at the hands of the Interagency Bison Management Plan. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the IBMP it does a great deal to protect local ranchers access to public lands and cheap grazing at the expense of the Yellowstone bison and the American taxpayer. Under the guise of disease prevention the last wild buffalo herd has been slaughtered, experimented on, hazed and generally mistreated in a way that can only be described as abusive.
The video presentation was at times hard to watch as well as maddening but it was also at times uplifting in ways that I didn't expect. Images of injured newborn calves struggling to keep up with the herd as they were being hazed by agents of the government forced to run 15 miles in a single day will stick with me for a long, long time but so will the images and words of the BFC volunteers.
The amazing level of commitment Mike and the other BFC volunteers exhibit is nothing short of inspiring. Willing to endure all kinds of weather and to place themselves in harms way to bear witness to the treatment of these magnificent animals while at the same time forsaking the creature comforts that most of us enjoy is frankly one of the most selfless acts I can recall. Bringing the plight of the Yellowstone Bison into public view has slowed their killing to a trickle to the credit of the BFC but BFC marches on not satisfied with their enormous success, concerned only with the work that still needs to be done to protect the bison. After more than a decade of advocating for the buffalo at Yellowstone BFC's commitment has not wavered and I have no doubt that they will continue until the buffalo can roam free.
The buffalo's instinct's lead them to return to their ancestral lands but they are seeking more than just food. They are seeking their heritage, their place in a world that at least on public lands, lands that belong to you and me, should be guaranteed to them. Public lands should not be in the sole control of an industry that seeks only to enrich itself by removing native wildlife to make way for cattle grazing, an immoral and unjust act that should be outlawed.
Buffalo Field Campaign continues to fight for the right of the last wild bison in America to exist. They are  fighting in the field and in the media as well as in the courts and they need our support. The first step is to contact BFC and become educated about what is really going on in Montana. Spread the word in support of BFC and the buffalo and make a donation to this amazing group.
The Buffalo Field Campaign can be reached via: www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/ and don't miss these very compelling videos documenting the treatment of the buffalo. www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/media/bisonvideogallery.html

On a personal note I would like to thank Mike and Stephany and all the other volunteers for their hard work and dedication to the buffalo. You guys are awesome!

Ray Goodwin
Sonoran Connection

A Beautiful Day at Madera

We took a walk in the lower canyon just to get outside on a beautiful spring day. The temperature was perfect and although it was somewhat quiet in the birdwatching category we just enjoyed being at Madera. On Whitehouse Road on the way in this Red-tailed Hawk flew up with what I think is a Whip Snake in it's talons from along side the road. It landed on a power pole and we watched as the snake tried desperately to free itself from the hawks grasp to no avail.
www.desertmuseum.org/books/nhsd_whipsnake.php

I tried not to disturb the drama taking place but I got just a little too close for the hawks comfort and it moved to the next pole with the snake still trying to bite. It was a good reminder of how in nature that it is survival of the fittest and death is not always swift or kind. Red-tailed Hawks are the most common hawk in the country and are perhaps the easiest to identify because of their namesake "red" tail. www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-tailed_Hawk/id

On the trail we met a couple from Canada who were adding birds to their life lists at a rate that seemed to make them very excited. This Canyon Towhee was a first for them as was  a Zone-tailed Hawk and the Ash-throated Flycatcher seen below. One of the most rewarding aspects of birding is the chance to meet people from far away places that have never seen some of the birds that we take for granted. It gives me a perspective that makes me want to travel to other places so that I may see birds that while common to the locals are new to me.
identify.whatbird.com/obj/661/_/Canyon_Towhee.aspx
www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Zone-tailed_Hawk/id

Ash-throated Flycatcher  www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/ash-throated_flycatcher/lifehistory

In an unrelated story the other day at Sweetwater Wetlands in Tucson Nan and I took our friend Bosque Bill from New Mexico on a tour in hopes of seeing the Red Phalarope that has been spotted there lately. As luck would have it we easily found the phalarope as well as Long-billed Dowitchers and Black-necked Stilts all mingling together in one of the retention ponds. It was amazing to me and everyone else how small the Phalarope is.
Up to this point it's all good and then I had what I consider to be an incredibly close call with a large Western Diamondback Rattlesnake. Like most birdwatchers my focus is in the trees and ponds and not so much on the path. As we approached the settling ponds I was out in front by 100 feet or so and all of the sudden I was aware of hissing and rattling and coiling at my feet. Well as Nan likes to say "for an old guy you sure can jump high and fast". It must have been my lucky day because the snake let me off with a warning and slithered away into the underbrush. I spent the rest of our visit with one eye on the sky and the other  on the ground!
birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/red_phalarope
www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Long-billed_Dowitcher/id
www.desertmuseum.org/kids/oz/long-fact-sheets/Diamondback%20Rattlesnake.php

Doing the Right Thing...

BUFFALO FIELD CAMPAIGN

There are a couple of events taking place next week that have to do with endangered species that I wanted to highlight here at Sonoran Connection. The first has to do with the last wild herd of buffalo at Yellowstone National Park. Next week Mike Meese co-founder and President of the Buffalo Field Campaign will be coming to the University of Arizona in Tucson to give presentations about the work of his group in Yellowstone. I have long been concerned about the treatment of the Yellowstone herd and have followed the Buffalo Field Campaign's struggle to save the bison against powerful anti buffalo interests in Montana.
I will be attending at least one of the presentations and look forward to meeting Mike and hearing about this important issue.
The dates and times are as follows:    4/18/12 @ 6 P.M.
                                                          Nugent Building Room 205
                                                          University of Arizona
                                                          Tucson, Arizona

                                                          4/19/12 @7 P.M.
                                                          The Historic Courtyard
                                                          300 East University Blvd.
                                                          University of Arizona
                                                          Tucson, Arizona
                                 
BORDERLANDS HABITAT INITIATIVE

The second is Borderlands Habitat Initiative sponsored by he Friends of Buenos Aries National Wildlife Refuge which will take place at the Arivaca Community Center. The guest speaker will be Ron Pulliam Professor of Ecology at the University of Georgia. Details below:

                                                          4/18/12 @ 6P.M. to & P.M.
                                                          Arivaca Community Center
                                                          Arivaca, Arizona

Tohono Chul

 While my foot is still recovering, a process that's taking far too long, I continue to take my camera to places that are close by and don't require long periods on my feet. Tohono Chul fits the bill and is worth a visit just to see the gardens and do a little bird watching. Spending a couple of hours there on Saturday morning was quite uplifting.

  I feel like my photography has suffered from being so immobile and spending so much time sitting around but I have put some of the time to good use studying both technical and creative aspects of the craft with an eye to improving my images. Of course this kind of self evaluation inevitably leads to wanting better equipment and really points out the weaknesses of my current equipment especially in the lens category.

My current Canon 70-300 USM IS Telephoto take good images at 70mm but at 300mm it's much harder to achieve good results and I shoot allot of images at 300mm in the field. My goal is to upgrade to an L series telephoto which from everything I read will help me to produce better images at this distance. I have rediscovered my 55mm lens lately and am enjoying using it it on the 7D which for some reason I had not done that much.

I have to say at this point that I don't really enjoy working with a tripod because of all the missed shots that get away especially birds and animals. however I would like a new tripod that is much lighter than my current one which was made for studio work and is very cumbersome in the field. 

As you can see in the photo above a good polarizer would have improved the sky and the overall effect of the picture. It's on the list for multiple lenses as is a lens hood for the 55mm which for some reason I never purchased.

You can access Tohono Chul's website here and I encourage you to take the time if you have it to visit as it is well worth the admission which is $8. They have a tea room and green houses which add to the experience. www.tohonochulpark.org/wordpress/

This hummingbird feeding was taken with my 70-300mm  at the maximum focal length of 300mm with an aperture setting of 5.6 and a shutter speed of 800 and an ISO set at 200.  Although it's a nice shot it's not the result I had hoped for.

Spring is sprung.....

One of the most pleasant aspects of living close to the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum is being able to take a ten minute ride through the Saguaro forest and find almost unlimited opportunities for photography. At the present many of the cacti are in full bloom and I was able to take a few shots that I hope will help people who have never experienced the "desert" to realize this place is more than a pile of sand.

The cacti at the museum have decided to put on quite a show this year and all of these photos were taken within an hour of just walking around a small area within the grounds. I find it somewhat unusual that a plant that has the ability to go long periods without water and is very painful to touch ( I can vouch for this personally) produces such amazing flowers.

The photos here represent a small portion of the flowers that bloom in the desert and it is not uncommon to see blossoms along the roadside or places that you would swear that nothing could grow let alone produce such amazing beauty.

Most of the cacti do not bloom for very long and it is not unusual to see a blossom one day and not the next.

 I love the colors and the symmetry and even the fact that most plants here have vicious thorns, a tactic that has allowed many of these plants to survive in this place that can be very, very harsh.

All of the pictures in this post are the result of my experimentation with different lenses and manual settings so I did not spend time identifying the plants. The great thing about photography is you are never done learning and changing equipment or light can cause a whole new set of challenges. Hope you enjoy the images.

Flanders Fields where the Poppies Blow

When I was a child many years ago I heard someone recite this poem written by a Lieutenant Colonel who was also a medical doctor in the Canadian military. It had such a profound effect on me that I never forgot it and every time I see poppies growing it takes me back to earlier times.

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Weekly Photographs-Sonoran Birds

My adventures into the desert have been curtailed for some time now by my inability to walk long distances. There is however a glimmer of hope that this may be changing for the better and frankly it will be a welcome improvement. In the last few months, a period where I had planned to hike and get into shape, I have had to spend my time sitting around putting on weight and wishing I could get back in the field and discover new and exciting places. I have stayed close to home but have managed to do a little photography which I'm happy to share here.

Birds generally are the most difficult subject that I photograph. They seldom pose and some of them never stop moving in a relentless search for food. None of this is true of the Curved-billed Thrasher who always seems to stick around until you get the shot. More information on Curved-billed Thrashers can be found at: www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Curve-billed_Thrasher/id/ac

Most people associate the Northern Cardinal with Christmas cards and snow but I see and hear lots of Cardinals here in the Sonoran Desert. Information on this female Cardinal can be found at: www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Northern_cardinal/id/ac 

There are many hummingbirds here in the southern part of Arizona including the Costa's that you see here sitting on her nest. I have a feeder outside my window where I sit at the computer and currently count 7 different individuals that are regulars. I have Costa's, Anna's, Black Chinned and recently have spotted a new young fledgling that is just learning the ropes. Information on the Costa's Hummingbird can be found here: www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Costas_Hummingbird/id/ac .

On a positive note one of my Mexican Gray Wolf photos was chosen to be included in an educational sign at a museum in Sierra Vista. I'll share the proofs as soon as I receive them from the museum.

Arivaca Cienega- I Hear the Cottonwoods Calling...

Each spring the cienega goes though an amazing transformation and standing there is this one particular Fremont Cottonwood that acts as the unofficial greeter to those us fortunate enough to visit this unusual and captivating place. As most of you are aware water in the Sonoran Desert can be hard to find especially in quantities that will support cottonwood trees. The large size that some of these trees attain is truly colossal and if you care to know more about them you can check them out at: www.arizonensis.org/.

On our visit to the cienega this week the water levels were somewhat less than I expected and the cottonwoods were beginning to leaf out which means that the demand for moisture will increase rapidly as their canopies fill out and provide cover for the many nesting hawks and other birds that make the cienega home. We spotted a Gray Hawk sitting in a tree overlooking the trail but did not see a mate. There are approximately 100 breeding pairs of Gray Hawks in Arizona and we have been fortunate enough to see about a dozen of these birds in our travels along the Mexican border.

The 1 1/4 mile trail is an easy walk and you never know what you might encounter. We have spotted many different hawks including Northern Harrier, White-tailed Kite, Swainson's Hawk, Red Tailed Hawks and many Turkey Vultures along the path. There are usually Black Phoebes and Vermillion Flycatchers as well as Phainopepla, Eastern Meadow Larks, and Summer Tanagers at different times during the year to name just a few.

I always enjoy my visits to the Arivaca Cienega which is a small part of Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge and on my next visit to the area I will check our Arivaca Creek where we saw nesting Gray Hawks a couple of years ago.

Picture of the Week-Desert Bloom

The desert has many faces. Some are foreboding and hostile while others are breathtakingly beautiful. Spring in the Sonoran Desert can put on quite a display of wildflowers depending on the winter rainfall amounts. This year has been a fairly reasonable year for rain and so far the flowers are nothing short of spectacular.

The Brittlebush has been blossoming for a while and when in full color is amazing to see. Information on brittlebush can be found at: www.saguaro-juniper.com/i_and_i/flowers/brittlebush/brittlebush.html

One of the most delicate looking plants here in the Sonoran Desert is known as Fairy Dusters and it is not what I expected to see when I first visited the desert. Information on Fairy Duster can be found at: www.fireflyforest.com/flowers/299/calliandra-eriophylla-fairyduster/

A broken foot has kept me in slow motion for quite some time but I will be out this weekend in the southern most  part of Arizona photographing flowers and of course doing a little nature watching along the way. For those of you who have never visited the Tucson area in the spring it is the best weather anywhere, dry and cool to warm, in short pleasant  and great for being out of doors.