Some Desert Wildlife

I just love taking walks in the desert in the spring. It's not too hot and there is so much going on! Here's a sampling from one of my recent walks near EskDale. Above is a clouded sulphur butterfly munching on some blue mustard. On calm days, it is easy to see hundreds, if not thousands, of sulphurs around alfalfa fields, and apparently they occasionally want the taste of something a little different.

This is a very large western fence lizard. It was hanging out on the dark rock, sunbathing. It looked like a pretty good idea. He wouldn't let me join him, though, he kept darting away.

Here's another view of the western fence lizard. You can see the faint horizontal bands going across the lizard's body and tail.


Hiding under a bush was a baby horned lizard, just a few inches long. They blend in so well with their surroundings that it's nearly impossible to find one unless it races from one bush to another.

The Western kingbirds were having fun flitting around on the greasewood, but they sat still long enough for me to snap this photo, with the Deep Creek Range in the background. I am really thankful I live in such a beautiful place. Just looking at these photos makes me ready to go back out for another desert walk!

Adventure Walk in the Gorge

We started an adventure walk the other day with a beautiful sight--a flock of ibis flying overhead. These slightly-funny looking birds looked so graceful flying in a flock, all turning and swooping at the same moment.

They flew over our destination, a gorge just a few miles from our house. There are wonderful little canyons (or ravines, depending on your perspective) and badland-like formations. I had never really explored the gully, and it seemed like it would be a great time to do it while we had our adventurous company visiting.

We started off going down a steep path to get down into the gully. Then we found a way across the creek and started hiking with the steep, sandy walls rising above us.

Maria enjoyed the obstacles in the narrow ravines and got a little help now and then to surpass them.

She did the tunnel all by herself, though, in both directions. Sometimes it's really good to be small.

We enjoyed looking at a layer of sea shells in the ravine walls, indicating wetter times.

We also got a nature experience when we noticed Henry chasing tiny baby rabbits. Although he scared them, he fortunately didn't cause long-lasting damage. They were really cute and found places to hide from him relatively fast. The ravine was full of little burrows and hiding spots. It would be interesting to go at night and see what else was there.

My sister-in-law Sarah looking for more wildlife. I love her pose! She was truly awesome on this hike, squeezing through the tight side canyons, climbing up and over the stream, carrying Maria at times, and all this while she's seven months pregnant!

Maria was having a blast, and she even ventured fairly far from her parents to go see what else was in the canyon.

I missed seeing an owl fly from this hole, but the white droppings extending below it show that it's active.

After a while, my brother decided to climb out of the ravine, and he found a fun bone yard.

Desert Boy and Maria had fun checking out more "dinosaur" bones.

Some of them were heavy. They must have been big dinosaurs.

We found another fun-looking ravine to descend into the main gorge. It was tremendous fun going up and down, and the erosion patterns on the walls were fascinating. There were several small soil-pipe caves, where the water had eroded crawling-size holes through the softer sediments.

Once we got down into the main gorge and headed back to the van, we found that the bushes were too dense. So we found another ravine to head back up. Then we went across and found another place to go down, cross the side ravine, and then another gully to head back up. It was even more exciting than what "the map*" had told us.

*"The map" refers to Dora the Explorer, which has played a big role in many of our adventure hikes. This time we got out "the map" when we reached the dinosaur bones. It told us we had to go through the bushes, down a deep, dark gully, and then up a sandy hill to get to the van. What do you know, the map was right again!

My brother and Maria against a gorgeous background. We had such a good time and were never far from where we parked. This will definitely be a place to go back to for more adventures.

We made it back safely. Hurray, we did it! Lo hicimos! (Sorry, that's more Dora-speak. I've been indoctrinated.) And for a fitting end, we concluded the adventure walk with a snack. After all, we needed some energy for our next adventure, which was just around the corner (literally).

Two-tailed Swallowtail

I saw a beautiful swallowtail on our golden currant bush and couldn't resist snapping a few photos.

They came out well enough that I realized I would be able to identify the butterfly. A couple years ago I wanted to learn all the butterflies in the area, but once I learned there were more than a hundred species, I felt a bit overwhelmed and didn't learn much. Now I'm ready to try again.

When I came in the house, I went on the internet to my favorite butterflies website. One of the neatest things about the website is that it has a list of butterflies and moths by county, so that quickly narrows down what you see. I found that there were about six different swallowtails, and by checking out the photos, I learned that this one is a Two-tailed Swallowtail (Papilio multicaudata). In the photo above you can clearly see the secondary protrusion on the tail, along with the pretty blue and orange coloring near the tail.

The two-tailed swallowtail uses nectar from a variety of plants and is fairly common in western North America. I really enjoyed watching it get that nectar--the butterfly balanced delicately as it sipped the nectar, then swooped to the next flower.

One down, quite a few more to go...

Now we've seen it all

Before this big snowstorm blew in and buried us in several inches of snow, we had some beautiful weather and were able to get out and even do a little hiking. There have been a lot of signs of spring: frogs laying eggs, birds returning from their winter vacations, and animals munching away on the green grasses that are popping up through the earth. We spend a lot of time looking at animals, and Desert Boy even has some little binoculars to discover the world around him (never mind that he usually holds them upside down). We keep going on adventure hikes to explore the world around us, and lately we've been going all over the meadows. Anyway, I was finally able to see an animal that I've been wanting to check off my list: the jackalope.This jackalope was quite the beauty, with a beautiful, thick coat of hair, and a good rack. It hopped away before I could get really close, but fortunately an 18x zoom and post-processing cropping left me with a rather good image that I can share with you. If you haven't ever seen a jackalope in the wild, it is a magical experience. I sure hope I can see another one some time, although they're quite rare. My husband, who grew up out here, still has never seen one. I guess I'm just lucky.

Elk Crossing

I'm cleaning out my photos and found these that I took in December. We were on our way to Ely with a light snow falling when we spotted an elk crossing the road. He was joining some elk on the other side. (I feel like I should have some witty repartee about 'Why did the elk cross the road?' but my brain is functioning rather slowly today. If you can think of something, leave it in the comments!)

The highway department has recognized this area as a deer and elk crossing and even has it posted. If my photo came out better I would send it to them.

One of the most impressive things about elk is just how big they are. They are about double the size of mule deer, with elk cows (females) weighing around 500 pounds and mature elk bulls (males) weighing around 700 pounds. For more info about elk, click here.

Pronghorn Antelope

The other day we caught a glimpse of this pronghorn antelope.

Then a few more joined it.

And even more. Usually pronghorn are a little more leery of humans, but these have been hanging around the fields and pastures and are used to noisy vehicles traveling nearby.

I really enjoy seeing pronghorn antelope and thinking about how they evolved with the sagebrush that is ubiquitous in this part of the world. The pronghorn can digest this shrub better than about any other animal because of its long relationship with it.

Eventually the pronghorn got nervous of us watching them and took off. They are the fastest land animal in the Americas, reaching speeds of over 70 km/hr. If you want to learn more, click here.

Wildlife Photos

Here are a few wildlife photos. Hopefully soon I'll get around to downloading more photos!

I think this is a crab spider. It was about two inches long.

I saw this Great Blue Heron flying around the meadows, and then it landed on the road. It won't be around too much longer as the temperatures keep getting cooler. 

Gopher Snake

Part of Desert Boy's recent fascination with snakes stems from seeing two gopher snakes near our house recently. 

Although seeing a snake usually makes me jump initially, once I realize that it's just a gopher snake I relax and am grateful it's there. Grateful? Yep, because gopher snakes eat mice, and when you have them around, it generally means you don't have a mouse problem!

We walked past this gopher snake several times and it didn't move at all.

A little further down the way we saw a second one in the grass. It was also quite calm and didn't seem to mind our presence. 

Now Desert Boy wants to see snakes frequently. We have several different snake species in the area, but only one poisonous one, the Great Basin rattlesnake. I am concerned about Desert Boy unwittingly getting too close to one, so I keep a close eye on him as we trek out in the bushes. Overall, though, I hope he will appreciate snakes. They don't get much credit for doing some important ecosystem work!

More Breeding Birds

I've gotten to see some more interesting birds early in the morning lately. One is the Long-billed Curlew. It definitely has a long bill. And its voice sounds sort of like cur-lew. If more birds were named like this, I think more people might get interested in bird watching. When you have names like Sprague's Pipit or King Rail, it's just hard to visualize a bird.

The long-billed curlew put up quite a ruckus when I stopped for ten minutes to document all the birds that were around me. It flew close, making me wonder how strong that long bill is. It fluttered around on the ground. It was doing a good job distracting me, which, of course, was its goal. Somewhere nearby is a little nest with eggs, and the long-billed curlew didn't want me to find it. (I didn't.)

And it wasn't just one bird, there were several. They were a noisy gang. I really enjoy watching long-billed curlews, though, and overall their population is declining due to reduced habitat. So I feel good that they are doing well out here.

With that long bill, they are even easy to recognize in flight.

On a different survey, I was walking along listening to the million and one meadowlarks when I came upon this silent bird at the water's edge. It's a Wilson's Phalarope, and it was all by its lonesome.

It likes to hunt for insects in the mud, and its longish bill helps it probe the water bottom. 

It never made a sound as I watched, just hopped here and there.

It's quite an interesting-looking bird, and it was fun seeing something out of the ordinary.

Something else out of the ordinary was the sky. The clouds moved fast overhead, and at one point I saw strange striations up above the greasewood. My imagination quickly moved to aliens...

I forced myself to go back to birds and was rewarded seeing  a mother mallard and her little ducklings. Last year I saw mallard ducklings in almost the exact same place. Perhaps next year I will see some again? Although life is full of change, it's nice to have a few things stay the same.

Birds of Prey

We had the opportunity to go to an interesting program about Birds of Prey presented by Martin Tyler of the Southwest Wildlife Foundation. After showing pictures of birds, he brought out a magnificent Harris' hawk.

The hawk looked so stately and was well behaved. 

Then it was time for a prairie falcon. These are fairly common birds in this area, but I had never seen one up so close.

The prairie falcon didn't particularly like being in the limelight for long. He started talking back and wiggling (sounds like a little toddler I know).

But once he had his hood on, he was happy again. Out of sight, out of mind.

The little mask makes him look a bit strange, but he was calm as could be with it on.

Then came the last and biggest bird, a golden eagle. He was truly marvelous.

The Southwest Wildlife Foundation is a non-profit organization that works to rehabilitate wildlife and present educational programs. 

Martin provided lots of interesting information about each bird. One of the interesting tidbits is the number of mice each bird eats every day. How many would you guess?

The wingspan of the golden eagle is enormous.

The Southwest Wildlife Foundation has a website and offers programs and field trips. They are also trying to build a nature center in Cedar City, Utah.

It's nice to know that someone is carrying for the injured birds. Seeing some up close definitely gives one a different perspective of their power and size.