Two days: First winter weather approaching piñon/juniper country.
Two days: First winter weather approaching piñon/juniper country.
It’s become part of the morning routine: Checking the smoke map. As I clear my head and loosen old joints, the daily drill is this: Fill the birds’ water dish, make coffee, feed Cowboy and check the smoke reports. I’ve already seen from bed that the smoke has blown in again. I can’t see the …
Saturday. Last of the yellow aspen leaves on North Peak and way up Del Agua. Just whisps of clouds with no forecast for rain. Most I’ve seen of Cabezon in a couple of weeks, with wildfire smoke from other states clearing slightly. Drought, smoke and pandemic make some critters grumpy. Others stay busy, looking for …
First mountain bluebird I’ve seen at my elevation this morning. Been seeing plenty of Western bluebirds with the turn of the season but this was the first visit of their taller, sleeker, more thoroughly blue male cousins. Yesterday and today, the dark-eyed juncos started showing up. And the robins have been coming in growing numbers …
I had hope for a clearer day when I saw a streak of golden light from bed but was reminded how dry the ground was as I rose. I absorbed various facts as I put water out for the birds, made coffee, fed Cowboy, read the news. It’s still smoky to the west, over the …
Wildfire smoke from Colorado and Wyoming cleared some Sunday morning and more birds stopped by, including this Williamson’s sapsucker, the guy with the red throat and yellow chest. I wonder why he evolved with such colors, why God made him the way he did. I don’t see the questions as mutually exclusive. They come to …
Cooler weather. Fall traffic picking up. Non-migratory robins seem to have moved down the mountain. Still trying to get good focus and identify what I think is a very colorful sapsucker. I can’t tell whether it actually has some yellow on its breast, like a Williamson’s sapsucker, or whether that is morning light reflecting off …
