Alluring, but not Quite Enough

The pea flower blooms of one of our indicator legume trees, the Ironwood

We're short-timers here, at least so far as the summer goes.  Two weeks from today the house-minders will be in place and we'll be headed north on I-25 to Albuquerque for a quick overnight enroute to our summer abode in the Colorado Rocky Mountains.  The temp here just ticked over to 100.0 degrees this afternoon, though the mornings are still wonderful and you can open the house up at some point overnight to let in the cool night air and sounds of the howling coyotes.

Black-headed Grosbeak eyeing the bird bath (he did) from the creosote

The smothering yellow has faded considerably, being replaced by the more subtle mauve blossoms of the ironwood and desert willow trees.  It seems to be a heyday for birds, either residents or migrants, and we feel like we're being flirted with in hopes of keeping us here.  Tempting, but no -- and some of you, like the gorgeous fresh Black-headed Grosbeak who has visited us as we sit outside in the mornings and the brilliant male Summer Tanager that has flashed by, we'll see at the cabin.

Quail eggs in the petunias...

Others, like the Gambel Quail, we're trying to get our fill of as they are resident to this area.  Our faithful mother quail who sat so diligently on her eleven eggs in a large petunia filled pot in the busy barrio garden, hatched her brood during an exciting haboob (crazy wind storm) we had a few days ago.  They huddled in the pot, easily viewed from our kitchen window, all that afternoon and night but departed sometime the next morning a few hours after dawn.  This morning as we walked out the back gate to get a look at two coyotes passing through I startled some young quail chicks sending them scattering  They were about the right age for "ours" and I was glad the coyotes had cleared off by then.

We're doing our best to enjoy the last couple of weeks here in the Sonoran desert (we do love it, even when it's triple digits), but can't help dreaming of sweaters and wood-fires on chilly cabin mornings and wondering if the aspens will be leafed by the time we arrive or if we'll see the newly resident moose (!!!) around the cabin.  In the meanwhile we'll enjoy our Tucson friends, the early mornings, and our volunteer days at the Desert Museum before saying adios for the duration.
 

Tough love at this time of the year

F**cked

Now that I have your attention.

Flocked.
This palo verde has dropped its sesame seed sized leaves and put on this sulfurous mantle.

If you are in the Sonoran desert now and not in a coma, yellow is an inescapable fact of life, and who'd want to escape this?!  As I sat down to make this post I had to laugh.  I checked my email first and had a message from a friend and fellow docent (whom I greatly admire) at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum announcing a new post on her wonderful desert blog In the Sonoran Sun.  Her blog post topic?  The Yellow Moment.  Carole couldn't be more right.  This is a moment we anticipate annually, but I somehow always forget just how YELLOW it is.  It is a bittersweet time; most of the yellow blossoms will soon disappear under the searing platinum sun of summer in the Sonoran desert.

Here are some images I took this morning on a walk around our garden.

A Gila Woodpecker breakfasting on the hummingbird nectar

Golden Columbines in the barrio garden

Desert marigold tangled in a barrel cactus

An eruption of Mexican sunflowers

The scent from this chocolate flower can induce a relapse in a chocoholic

The fruit from last year's barrel cactus flowers

Prickly pear bloom, lemon yellow on the aqua and lavender pads

Variegated agave...what big, and purple, teeth you have!

Palo brea blossoms

Just Another Fabulous Friday at the Desert Museum

A Cactus Wren going for an easy insect meal in a prickly pear cactus flower

Bunny bingeing on primroses

I was assigned to lead the Bird Walk at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum today.  These walks are led every morning just as the museum opens, 7:30 AM in the summer.  As I drove into staff parking I passed a woman peering into some bushes in the parking lot, binoculars in hand, and I knew I'd be seeing her soon. Two Canadian couples, unknown to each other, showed up for the bird walk, and yes, one of the women was the one from the parking lot.  We had a laugh about my having ID'd her early on before heading off.  I always preface my bird walks by explaining that while I have a good grasp on the common and obvious birds in this part of the Sonoran Desert -- Gila Woodpeckers, Cactus Wrens, Gambel's Quail, various doves, etc. -- I am not an expert birder, but do know where to take them on the grounds for the best bird watching.  They were fine with that, and then they proceeded to give me the best birding experience ever at the Desert Museum.

Hooded Oriole

We wound our way down to the Desert Garden, pausing at the Pollinator Garden for my first good look at a Green-tailed Towee.  A brilliantly red Cardinal met us at the Desert Garden entrance and then we were off to the races.  Some highlights were the Black-headed Grosbeak, the Ruby-crowned Kinglet, a Bullocks Oriole and a Hooded Oriole, and a Lazuli Bunting.  They were thrilled to spot a Costa's Hummingbird, and we were amused by a Desert Cottontail who couldn't get his fill of primroses.  A Desert Spiny lizard in full breeding colors enticed a mate to join him on the garden wall.

Desert Spiny lizard showing his breeding colors

It worked!  She climbed up to join him on the top of the wall

As we left the Desert Garden we had an excellent view into the high elevation Life Zones area with oak and pine.  It was alive with warblers -- Yellow-rumped, Common Yellowthroat, Wilson's, Townsend's, and a life list bird for one couple, an Olive Warbler.  There was also a beautiful Western Tanager flitting from branch tip to branch tip.  Moving on to the beaver pond in the Riparian Area yielded a Townsend's Warbler and Black-throated Gray Warbler.

Western Tanager feeding 

One of the couples was desperate to see a Gilded Flicker.  I sent them off suggesting they keep their eyes on the holes in the top three or four feet of the saguaros as the Gilded Flickers like the penthouses.  I headed off on the rest of my morning assignments which included interpreting horns and antlers at the Big Horn Sheep exhibit.  They were out and about, grazing on their morning meal, as was a wild Spiny Tailed Iguana, a lizard from much further south in the Sonoran Desert that we have a wild population of on the grounds where water and lush foliage are available.

This Spiny Tailed Iguana exceeded two feet in length

Spotted after this photo op with a lizard tail hanging out of his mouth

Desert Willow blossom

All in all, just another fabulous day as a docent at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum.

Cienega

The cienega and a majestic cottonwood near Arivaca

One of the wonderful perks of being a docent at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is the monthly "birding" trip arranged by the Friday docent captains, Martha Mount and Buzz Hoffmann.  Actually "birding" trip is insufficient -- it should be "birding, mammaling, entomologying, botanying, herpetologying, geologying, etcetera'ing".  It's a grab bag of indulgences for those with a passion for nature, and the chance to experience these rambles with folks with loads of Sonoran Desert knowledge makes it not only a real pleasure, but a real learning experience.

Male Vermillion Flycatcher between snagging flying insects

Male Summer Tanager, just looking red 

Cattail lined nest

A few days ago we headed to Arivaca, well south of Tucson, to visit the cienega in the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge.  Here the rare southern Arizona experience of surface water draws in incredible birds, some permanent, some migrating, and not a little wildlife.  We saw everything from a coyote pouncing again and again in the tall grasses, probably hunting mice, to three Gray Hawks circling overhead.  To give you an idea of the range of birds and other animals, insects, and plants (and poop) we saw, here's Martha's list of the day's sightings:

Birds:

Great Blue Heron

Black Vulture

Turkey Vulture

Mallard

Cooper’s Hawk

Gray Hawk

Swainson’s Hawk

Zone-tailed Hawk

American Kestrel

Mourning Dove

White-winged Dove

Great Horned Owl

Broad-billed Hummingbird

Ladder-backed Woodpecker (heard)

Gila Woodpecker

Small flycatcher (not identified)

Black Phoebe

Says Phoebe

Vermillion Flycatcher

Cassin’s Kingbird

Western Kingbird

Bell’s Vireo (heard)

Plumbeous Vireo

Common Raven

Violet-green Swallow

Barn Swallow

Bewick’s Wren

Northern Mockingbird

Phainopepla

Yellow Warbler

Yellow-rumped Warbler

MacGillivray’s Warbler

Common Yellowthroat

Wilson’s Warbler

Yellow-breasted Chat

Summer Tanager

Song Sparrow

White-crowned Sparrow

Red-winged Blackbird

House Finch

House Sparrow
Roadrunner

Mammals:

Coyote

Arthropods:

Sow Bug

Pinacate Beetle

Pepsis Wasp

Pipevine Swalowtail

Fatal Metal Mark

Golden-headed Scallopwing

Reptiles/Amphibians/Fish:

Ornate Tree Lizard

Elegant Earless Lizard

Mosquito Fish

Bullfrog

Fat Herp (you’ll have to ask Glen about this one)

Plants:

Fleabane

Fiddleneck

Verbena

Willows w/Catkins

Mexicn Elderberry

Hackberry

Barberry

Cattails

Lots of grasses

Other Cool Stuff:

Hearing the Gray Hawks and Red-winged Blackbirds

Watching the coyote hunting

Coyote Scat

Javelina Scat

An extraordinary list for a day's outing, which only goes to show the incredible diversity that is the Sonoran Desert.

The Dream of Docenting

Next month will mark the 10th anniversary of my first trip to Tucson. Restless after 11 years in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, which I strongly suspected was just a way point on my journey, a casual suggestion from a good friend led to four hours on the Internet, resulting in my "deciding" I was moving to Tucson.   Shortly after this momentous decision I brought my daughter here on a post-college graduation trip.  I suspected I might be crazy to give up my well paid, if terminally boring job, my passive solar home on an acre of forested land, and leave all my good friends to make this huge leap of faith move.  I trusted my daughter to help me figure out if I was having a mid-life crisis, or if my gut instinct to shake my life up with a whole new exciting landscape was worth the risk.  She told me she had never seen me so excited and alive and insisted I make the move.

One of our first adventures in Tucson was a visit to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, a well known, internationally respected, and much loved zoo and botanic gardens that features animals and plants found in the Sonoran desert in which it  is located.  It was late May and the saguaros were in bloom.  Strings of Gambel's quail chicks scurried after their parents.  It was warm verging on hot under the intense late spring sun.  We hadn't gotten off the entrance patio before I noticed people in white shirts and beige pants with official looking patches indicating they were docents.  I wasn't quite sure what a docent was, but I was sure that I wanted to be one.

Interpreting a magnificent raptor, the barn owl

It took me over nine years to fulfill the Desert Museum docent dream, mainly because I was working most of that time.  When I retired late in 2008, thanks to my wonderful husband (who just happened to have been my first Tucson neighbor -- another "meant to be" sign), I was dismayed to discover that the Desert Museum wouldn't hold their next docent class until the fall of 2010.  Rather than wait to become involved with docenting at the museum, I volunteered there, working as a keeper's assistant with the Interpretive Animal Collection, the animals that are used on and off the grounds (often by the docents) for education.  I spent a happy year and a half handling many of the animals in the collection -- snakes and salamanders, falcons and owls, parrots, porcupines, and pelicans -- cleaning pens and perches, preparing diets, hand feeding, and helping with the Running Wild shows.  My husband, who is still working full time, volunteers with the botany department one day a week.  There are so many fascinating volunteer opportunities at the Desert Museum.

A botanic garden

Docent classes started late in August of last year and ran to near Christmas.  We were in class two days a week, all morning and sometimes into the afternoon, being instructed by curators and other Sonoran Desert experts on staff.  Our presence was required at other times each week, researching information available on the grounds and observing the docents at work interpreting the Sonoran Desert for visitors.  There were take home quizzes that took many hours, writing our own interpretations, thousands of pages of material to absorb, a midterm and a final exam.  It was demanding and an incredible gift to learn from such experts.  Forty new docents graduated early in January, joining the ranks of nearly 200 experienced docents, many of whom had inspired me on that first visit to the Desert Museum almost a decade earlier.

A zoo

I knew that becoming a docent at one of my favorite places on Earth would be wonderful, but I didn't expect it to be as extraordinary as it is.  The docents are a fascinating group of people from all walks of life, but we have the common thread of having an almost insatiable interest in our desert environment and a desire to share what we have learned and experienced with others, hoping to influence them to value and protect this and other natural places.

The mission of the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum is to inspire people to live in harmony with the natural world by fostering love, appreciation, and understanding of the Sonoran Desert.


For docents, the learning never stops.  Advanced Docent Classes are held one morning each month, nine months of the year, and all docents are expected to attend.  Docents are updated on relevant Desert Museum business and on animal and plant collections and exhibits, followed by expert presentations on everything from wild flowers to the Mexican Grey Wolf program.  There are birding (and whatever else crops up) trips once a month, and special organized docent trips to such places as The Living Desert in Palm Desert, California (more about that in a separate post) and the Galapagos Islands.  Lunch time is lively as docents consult with one another and pull down reference books to identify the wild birds, reptiles, and insects seen on the grounds.  And docents with special experiences or expertise often hold trainings for other docents.

Docent training docents

Docent sharing a passion for moths

Birding trip to southeastern Arizona to see the Sandhill Cranes at Whitewater Draw

Sometimes the socializing is taken off the grounds.  Most docents volunteer one day a week, and those groups get to know each other quite well.  Last weekend one of the Friday docents invited all the other Friday docents (and their spouses) to a barbecue and wagon ride at his ranch south of Tucson.  A huge group showed up at his place, potluck sides in hand, and had a great afternoon visiting and eating and riding in the mule pulled wagon.

Wagon ride after the BBQ

Some of these volunteers have been docents at the Desert Museum for 30 years, racking up over 20,000 hours of donated time.  It is clear that many important relationships have bridged those years, and the support system for docents, especially by docents, is enormously significant to those with many years invested.  The existing docents have been so welcoming to the new docents, mentoring us formally or informally since we first became docents in training.  Docenting is an act of generosity is so many ways, to the Desert Museum itself, to its visitors, its staff, and to other docents, but the biggest gift is undoubtedly to yourself.