The sun was beating down as we pushed through waist high weeds—reeds, grasses, and wild licorice with its Velcro stickers. I gulped another mouthful of warm water from my nearly empty bottle and swatted at a pesky deer fly as it flew off with a chunk of my arm.
Why would I choose such an inhospitable place to go for a walk? In a word—Odes. Odes is short for Odonata, the biological order containing dragonflies and damselflies.
If you’ve just joined us, we’ve been taking a hike to look at some early summer wildflowers. See last week’s post for plants along the dry, sunny trail.
We wake from our unintended nap, eager to continue on our hike. After a couple of miles, we finally reach the stream we’ve been hearing. The trail steadily gains in elevation as we move upstream, and we find ourselves breathing a bit harder. The plants here are more adapted to partial shade, and thrive in damp conditions.
The first flowers we notice are a scattering of Shooting Stars (Dodecatheon pulchellum). May’s rain has resulted in a profusion of their delicate blooms, and they grow in the saturated stream-side soil.
The soggy May we endured may have been dismal and frustrating, but now we’re reaping the rewards of all that rain. As the sun has come out and the weather has warmed, we’ve been gifted with an abundance of wildflowers. This is the perfect time of year for a wildflower walk. Let’s take a hike up the mountain and see what we can find.
A huge new mall is being built about 40 minutes north of where we live. The site was formerly home to one of the largest prairie dog towns in the state of Colorado. In order to start construction, the prairie dogs had to go. The colony was poisoned and hundreds of prairie dogs died.
Public response to this mass execution has varied from demonstrations against the cruelty of a prolonged, painful death, to cheers that one more population of pests has been eliminated from the prairie. Some of my friends participated in the demonstrations. Others planned future shopping excursions.
What are huge and blubbery and make outlandish snorting sounds? And what were they doing on a beach in California?
We recently spent a week back in our old haunts—Silicon Valley, Monterey and Pacific Grove, the central California coast, southern California. Aside from some great times visiting friends and an abundance of scrumptious meals, the trip mostly reminded me how grateful I am to live in Colorado now. However, I do miss the ocean!
You’re cruising through one of our national parks when you come across a traffic jam. Cars are pulled to the side, their occupants pointing at… something. More people are darting between vehicles, cameras in hand. What in the world has caught their attention? Bears? Elk?
No, it’s a single female mule deer.
I promised you some answers to last week’s quiz, and they’re at the bottom of the page. First, however, here are some pictures to remind you that Saturday is Valentine’s Day.
I concluded 2013 with some “parting shots” from my trip to Swaziland. In the same vein, here are my parting shots for 2014. These were all taken right here near our home in Colorado. Happy New Year!
Today it’s time for my once-a-year photography promotion. Does someone on your gift list go wild for wildlife or bonkers for birds? Do they laud landscapes? Are they passionate about plants? How about giving them a photo expressing their special interest?
You can visit my online store at mountain-plover.com, view my line of blank greeting cards here, or contact me directly for prints of any of my photos that appear anywhere on this blog. (Note that prints not in stock will take a few extra days.)
I have a post all ready to go for today, but when a friend shared this news report with me, I just had to share it with you. Be sure to read the comments! This is why we need science education.
