cactus – Page 29 – Boolie

Home Work

A Gila woodpecker pecks above the entrance to his current nest with an older nest around the corner. I couldn’t tell if he was grabbing an insect or if he was doing some home improvement. I haven’t posted much lately as I’ve been busy doing home work of my own, we’ve started looking for a house in earnest and I’ve been doing a lot of research on our various options. We’ve narrowed the search down to our two favorites and I think we’ll make an offer on one of them tomorrow. One of the two is a bit further from work than I’d like but it is only about 10 to 15 minutes away from several of my favorite hiking locations, including Brown’s Ranch where I took this picture back in April.

Redtails at Morning, Creatures Take Warning

My goal is to photograph every animal on a saguaro, I can now add red-tailed hawks to the list! This adult was keeping an eye out for potential prey moving about on a sunny winter morning in the Sonoran Desert. Hard to believe this is the same species that I watched so often on rainy winter mornings in the Pacific Northwest.

Goodnight Moon

With the day safely in the hands of the sun, the moon prepares to dip below the hills of the Sonoran Desert.

Up on the Rooftop, Click Click Click

Ketchup & Mustard

Verdin remind me of ketchup and mustard with their yellow heads and red shoulders. On this summer morning there was an extra dose of red as one of the diminutive birds perched to feed on an open saguaro fruit.

Fruit Purchase

Saguaro fruits provide a handy perch for a young cactus wren, now fully fledged, born in a nest in the arms of this self-same cactus.

Red is the Color Of

Early on a summer morning, a white-winged dove uses its tongue to eat from deep within the fruit of a saguaro. The red covering many of the spines atop the cactus is not blood but rather pulp and juice from already-eaten fruit.

Ragged

A cactus wren sings amidst mostly eaten fruit atop a saguaro on the Latigo Trail. Its feathers were looking rather ragged, understandably so, it had just raised its young in the harsh desert environment.

At Home in the Cholla

A young cactus wren perches in the middle of a buckhorn cholla on the Latigo Trail. It was actively exploring its desert home but never strayed too far from the nest in the saguaro where it was born.

Who Doesn’t Enjoy Fruit for Breakfast?

A white-winged dove eats the red fruit of a saguaro early on a summer morning. The doves make the most of the short-lived bounty of the fruiting saguaros before migrating further south.