Sunset

As the sun sets on the month and the year, I am posting this photo of one of the sunsets we have enjoyed through the windshield of our coach here in our site at Buckskin Mountain State Park. It has been a good month for us here in Arizona, and we wish for everyone a successful finish of 2009.

Birds of the Neighborhood

This is a Phainopepla, one of the birds we see daily in our corner of the park here at Buckskin Mountain State Park. Actually there are a number of birds we see on a daily basis, the most numerous and most vocal are the Great-tailed Grackles as they search the campsites for tidbits. The busiest and brightest bird would be a Vermilion Flycatcher that flitters out after insects all day long. Keeping a lower profile is another flycatcher a Black Phoebe. Possibly the prettiest are a pair of Gila Woodpeckers. And by evening a number of Eurasian Collared Doves roost in our Ficus trees.

Greening of the Desert

In the month that we have been here in Arizona there have only been a couple of days with rain, but evidently it has been enough to encourage new life. Shown here are the new green leaves unfurling on a Brittlebush. Everyday I notice a little more greening as more leaves appear and give a green appearance to the dead looking Brittlebush. Soon it will appear as a green mound in the desert instead of a pale dead looking pile of sticks.

Questions

When I head up the trail each morning, I usually take a shovel with me. I use it to make improvements along the trail to water bars and culverts, but I get asked the darndest questions. Here are a few: “What are you digging for?” “Are you actually mining?” and “What are you mining for?” This one on my return trip ---“Did you bury a body up there?” And my favorite - - -“What is so special about that shovel that you carry it everywhere?”

Gila Woodpecker

This male Gila Woodpecker, with his red Christmas cap, just snatched a fig from the Ficus tree in our site. Jeanette suggested that perhaps he has some figgy pudding in mind. ---- Merry Christmas

Brrrrr!

We have had a couple of cold days with some rain and wind and daytime tempatures down in the fifties. Buster likes it a little warmer and enjoys being wrapped up in his blanky.

Wild Burros

Last night as we were sitting down to dinner Jeanette noticed what she thought might be burros across the river. We grabbed our binoculars and sure enough there across the river on top of a ridge silhouetted against the sky were at least three wild burros. We knew they existed over there because a couple of weeks ago when we were exploring that side of the river, at Quail Hollow a BLM day-use park, we saw lots of hoof prints, trails, and manure. The burros are left over from earlier mining days, they now hide out and roam wild in the canyons and washes here along the Colorado River. Unfortunately, because of the distance and the fading light, I was not able to get a good enough photo last night to post.