Return to Capilla Peak, Manzano Mtns. Hawkwatch Site, Sept. 2017

 Juvenile Cooper's Hawk, 9/20.

 Abert's squirrel, Capilla Peak.

 Banded female Cooper's Hawk ready for release, 9/20.

 Migrating Osprey passes overhead, 9/20.

Steller's Jay, Capilla Pk., 9/20

Birds at Bitter Lake NWR, September 2017

 Great egrets hunting, 9/19.

 Snowy egrets and White-faced ibis feeding, 9/19.

 Greater Yellowlegs, 9/19.

Osprey, alarm calling as another osprey flies by, 9/19.

Southeast New Mexico. September 2017.

 Juv. Western Black-necked garter snake at Sitting Bull Falls S. P., 9/19.

 Hunting in the algae.

 Bitter Lake NWR, near Roswell NM.

White pelicans and ducks, Bitter Lake NWR, 9/19.

Scorpion, snake, Sitting Bull Falls, and Bottomless Lakes, SE New Mexico, Sptember 2017.

 Found under my ground cloth when I woke up! 9/19.

 Mountain patch-nosed snake at Sitting Bull Falls, 9/19.

 Sitting Bull Falls, another beautiful desert oasis.

And a great swimming hole, Bottomless Lakes State Park.

And then the object of my quest. Mexican Free-tailed Bats by the thousands!

On my first night there, I sat with everyone else in the amphitheater at the cave entrance and got to witness their incredible counterclockwise swirling emergence from the deep, up close, but photography is not allowed. So the next night I watched and photographed without a flash from the parking lot area.

They travel out in long wavering lines, heading south and southeast towards the Black and Pecos Rivers.

The Rangers I asked said there were maybe a half million, but no one was counting.

Crevice Spiny lizard, Carlsbad Caverns, Sept. 18, 2017

Emerging from the underworld, I spotted this band-tailed lizard on the rock wall above the cave entrance.

 And then another. This one about 8 -10 in. long

Sceloporus poinsettii up close.

Black River, and Carlsbad Caverns, Sept. 2017

 Black River, 9/18.

 Side-blotched lizard, Black R., 9/18.

 Carlsbad Cavern natural entrance, 9/18.

 Cave swallows nesting just inside the entrance, some fledglings of second brood still being fed, 9/18.

"Draperies" deep within the cavern, 9/18. A hushed world of fantastic formations.