A quick trip to California

                                         Needles, AZ, a favorite spot.

                                         Rainbow Basin near Barstow
                                        

                                         Joshua tree
                                      

                                         Classic California landscape at Tehachapi

                                          Kern River
                                        

                                          Local color

Driving a U-haul from wintry New Mexico just before Christmas and arriving in the Mojave desert was a treat.

Spotted salamander crossing the road

This big spotted salamander found crossing Big Hole Rd, Harwich. A treacherous journey. Moved to side of road.

Cape Cod

This is a kind of deciduous azalea blooming now.

Cape Cod

March 30- The male Cardinals are proclaiming their territories in the neighborhood.

Which way do the snow geese go?

Today it is snowing and it puts me in mind of the snow geese. It occured to me that I have never seen or heard them in migration. Why not? Do they fly at night and in silence? Or so high they cannot be seen or heard? I started to ask around, but the answers are not readily available, at least among a few friends and on the internet. This seems odd considering that they are such a major wintering species here. At the peak of the season some 30-40,000 Light geese (including Blue and Ross' geese) are in the Middle Rio Grande Valley. Someone must have studied their routes.

I got in touch with Christopher Rustay and he shed some light, mentioning that he thought some must fly over the Manzanos to join the flocks flying up the Pecos and continuing up the front range. He sent me a map of the Sandhill crane migration routes made by NMDGF, and referred me to Joseph Sands at the

Department.

2nd lizard, March 7th

March 7, Moving a trash bin I find another Plateau lizard in a pile of dead leaves under it. Later I see my first butterfly, a Mourning cloak, flying behind the barn. There are also swarms of Box-elder bugs all over the south-facing wall of the barn.

I learn that the lizard is actually a Plateau lizard, Sceloporus tristichus, and not a subspecies of the Eastern fence lizard.(If the online source can be trusted.)

First Lizard of the year, Santa Fe, NM, March 5, 2012

March 5, 2012 – Out working in the garden, I was surprised to find the first lizard of the year! It was warm but I wasn’t quite prepared to see a lizard. I think he/she wasn’t prepared to see me either and it made a hasty retreat under a wood pile when I got too close. I had always called these common lizards Western Fence Lizards but looking in my Stebbins Field Guide, I see from the range map that it is actually a subspecies of the Eastern Fence Lizard, the Southern Plateau Lizard, Sceloporus undulatus tristichus. It looked to have over-wintered in good condition. It was an odd feeling knowing that he/she had just woken from its long sleep of at least 4 months, and now was being watched by this strange and very large creature. No wonder it scurried out of sight.