A quick snapshot while hiking out of the park, the moon rising behind saguaros in the east, the sun minutes from setting in the west. In a world that can be so relentlessly awful I’m thankful for the places that cradle me in its beauty.
Tag: saguaro
A Love of Nature Trails
They may not be the best for exercise or for feeling like you’re alone in the wilderness, but I’m a huge fan of nature / interpretive trails. They’re accessible to a wide range of people and are great if you’re short on time, and often have a good sampling of the local flora. This is Bear at the Jane Rau Trail in February, I wanted to see how he’d do going over the bridge over the wash (he was unfazed). This loop is really short but a nice addition to the start or end of a longer hike and can offer up some pretty cool wildlife, I’ve seen a bobcat and a gila monster here.
You Got Peanut Butter In My Saguaro
I believe the artists who created this scene are termites, the left side showing the protective mud layer they place over the hardened black areas at the base of old saguaros, the right showing where they have recycled most of the bark-like material and returned its nutrients to the desert soil.
Not a Candidate
It’s Fat Bear Week at the National Park Service where you can vote for your favorite chonk fattened up for the Alaskan winter. No matter how much you love him you can’t vote for this Bear however as he’s lost over 20 pounds since we adopted him. I didn’t take him hiking much over the summer since you have to be up pretty early to beat the heat and I couldn’t manage it. We’re back at it now but he’s gotten pretty out of shape and is gassed by the end of our normal hikes, so I’ve switched him to shorter hikes while he builds back his endurance.
Thankfully he does ask to lie down when he wants a break and on this occasion when we stopped for water it gave me a chance to photograph him as though he was paying homage to my favorite saguaro, which I call The Green Elephant. In truth he still isn’t interested in her, putting her in good company as he’s also not interested in bobcats, rattlesnakes, and tarantulas. He is interested in just about anything that moves in front of him but I’ll say this for the great matriarch, she doesn’t move much.
Consolation Prize
This picture is a little bittersweet as while watching animals feed on saguaros is one of my favorite things, I shouldn’t have been there. It was a Thursday and a succinct note in my hiking journal says “Couldn’t sleep, so a quick hike before work”. I’m thankful I have trails nearby as after a short drive and hike I got to watch this white-winged dove enjoying breakfast for quite a while. Too soon it was time to leave and get ready for work with hopes the next night would be more restful.
The Powder Room
One of my favorite sights of spring in the Sonoran Desert is when the birds have faces completely pancaked with saguaro pollen. When I finally got around to getting my first Nikon so I could do more macro photography I wanted to get a close-up of these large flowers, the desert’s powder rooms. However each saguaro blossom only lasts for about a day and I needed to find one on a day off when I was up early and with no wind and with a saguaro with an arm that bent towards the ground and was right next to the trail and which wasn’t covered in bees. It proved to be a tall order but on Memorial Day I was up before sunrise and found an obliging giant.
Due to some mix of the early hour and lack of practice and a general tendency to forget to setup the camera properly when I get excited, I left the shutter speed far too low and even with almost no breeze ended up with a little motion blur. Plus I should have stopped down one more stop so there would be less blur in the focus stack due to the large separation between stigma and stamens.
Nevertheless these shots will bring a smile to my face for years to come. As I wrote in my hiking journal while lamenting my mistake but hoping the pictures would come out: “It was great fun regardless”. The breeze soon picked up so I went home and got Bear and came back for a hike out to see the saguaro I call Witch Hazel, my first time seeing her in bloom.
Just a lovely day all around.
The Bird & The Bee
Diffuse light from the rising sun falls on a white-winged dove and a bee and the very tops of the saguaro flowers, but not yet on the ripening fruit or the saguaro below. One of a seemingly infinite set of pictures as I play with light arriving or departing the desert, taken on a rare pre-sunrise hike without Bear a couple of months ago.
One Last Step
While his siblings nearby practiced flying on a breezy spring evening, one last kestrel wasn’t quite sure about entering the wide world beyond. I feel such sympathy for the last-to-fledge, on the precipice between the only life they’ve known, the comfortable life that must end, and the dangerous path ahead where they can live their fullest lives. Taken near sunset in 2021.
A New If Old Leash
Another picture of Bear and The Elephant, taken towards the end of an afternoon hike a few months ago. It’s hot enough now that such walks are verboten, it’s early morning or nothing. Evening swims are now on the table though! I have switched back to this leash, which we bought on the day we adopted Ellie in 2009. We have fancier leashes but I’ve always come back to this one.
Fruit Stand
A gilded flicker uses saguaro fruit as a perch, taken a couple of weeks ago while the fruit was ripening. Taken at the end of a short sunrise hike after barely sleeping the night before.
Boolie 