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We invite you to note what you are seeing around you in your own part of the world, and to share your observations in the comments below.
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I am new to this madness hobby of nature and wildlife photography, in that for the first time in my life, having recently retired, I now have the time and opportunities to frustrate myself to the point of insanity pursue and enjoy it. However, since I live in Reno, Nevada, and I don’t drive I have to give my excursions a bit of forethought and planning. There are limits to the when, where and how of getting there and back. Fortunately, Reno is right on the eastern edge of the northern Sierra Nevada mountains and there are places I can get to “on foot”, as it were. The Mt. Rose Wilderness is one of them. That being the case, I recently made what was intended to be a two-night backpack trip up the Jones-Whites Creek Loop Trail to Church’s Pond. My primary intention was to get some photographs of nature and wildlife worthy of the Daily Bucket. Secondarily, I just enjoy backpacking and the adventure of it all. You never know what you might see. You never know just how you might be surprised. All that said then, let’s go!
Taking off Monday morning July 31, by city bus and then a relatively short taxi ride I was soon up on the trail.
My first opportunity to photograph wildlife came soon enough:
Then my first scenic vista:
And lots of wildflowers:
So, moderate success so far you might say. Whence the frustration then?
For me the frustration is the elusiveness of wildlife. I heard a hawk but never saw it. Later I saw a hawk but had no opportunity to get a photo of it because it soared past overhead and then was gone so quickly I couldn’t even get my lens cap off in time. And so it went for other birds, and butterflies, and deer and squirrels. Even though I was patient and sat still for long periods the wildlife was just too active to catch on my camera. One bird that I really wanted to get was one that I didn’t immediately recognize but was rather strikingly noticeable in its size and black/greyish-white coloration and rapid flight, not to mention its abundance. This bird was, to use a fifty-cent word, ubiquitous. Finally, finally, success (of sorts):
But what bird was it? I didn’t know. The long, sharply pointed bill suggested a woodpecker species at first but its behavior and coloration did not. It simply didn’t act or look like any woodpecker I had seen before, and I’ve seen a lot of them including the Northern Flicker, the Acorn Woodpecker, the Downy Woodpecker and the Pileated Woodpecker. This bird perched on the branches but never clung to the trunk and pecked around. Additionally, I never heard any pecking, and with these birds in as great abundance as they were I should have. So, I contented myself with the fact that I had managed to capture a clear (if not brightly contrasted) photo of it and had observed enough of it and its behavior with just my eyeballs that I was confident I could identify when I got back home.
Turns out it’s the Clark's Nutcracker.
High in the mountains of the West, gray-and-black Clark’s Nutcrackers swoop among wizened pine trees, flashing white in the tail and wing. They use their dagger-like bills to rip into pine cones and pull out large seeds, which they stash in a pouch under their tongue and then carry away to bury for the winter. Each birds buries tens of thousands of seeds each summer and remembers the locations of most of them. Seeds they don’t retrieve play a crucial role in growing new pine forests.
Now, for the (scary) Suprise! part of my tale.
I had checked the weather forecast before taking off because I was concerned about the chance of thunderstorms. The rain part of thunderstorms didn’t much bother me because I had my tent and rain gear right enough, but lightning is dangerous. Thunderstorms were forecast at 24% so I felt safe enough; I knew what to do in case severe lightning started happening around me. My camp was in open ground, away from tall trees, and there was little enough evidence of recent lightning strike.
My night was spent in comfort. A few drams of brandy (and a couple more) and a hot meal and a good sleeping system helped to ensure that. Tuesday morning dawned bright and beautiful.
The day promised to be hot, even at 8,200 ft. elevation, so I just hung out in the shade and read a book. Then around noon some clouds started developing but sure didn’t seem threatening and there was little enough wind. Shortly though, I did hear some booms as of thunder, but they were muffled and seemed distant and didn’t last long. No worries, mate, I thought to myself. Then about an hour later I started hearing a lot of relatively loud and repeated airplane noise. At first I thought it was just the Nevada Air National Guard C-130s out of Reno, which I hear all the time at home. But it kept coming too regularly, too cyclic to be that. Hmmm, I thought, maybe I’d better check. So I dragged myself out from under my shady pine to check. Hokey Smoke, Bullwinkle! Off to my north east I could see heavy brown and white smoke rising in a column with not only airplanes flying around it but helicopter also. Wildfire! And that, my friends, is a scary surprise when you’re a few miles in the back country and uphill of that fire. I then proceeded to set a “personal best” in breaking camp and boogie’n down off the mountain!
It was the Whites Fire. Turns out I was never in any real danger (but you never know), and it had a happy ending for me. On the way down, only about a half-mile down the trail from camp, I was startled by a voice behind me, shouting to “give way, on your left!” or words to that effect. I drew up to my right and here comes this fellow tearing past me, running, screaming “There’s a blazing fire on just the next ridge over!!” As he passed I said, “Yeahhup. That’s why I’m headed down. But we’re safe now.” He stopped. “You think so?” he querulously replied. “Oh, sure.” I said. “That fire can’t jump this far before we’re out of this place. We’ll be long gone before it could ever get here.” Well, that calmed him down (and maybe even saved him a nasty fall, which would have been the worse for him). So we continued down the hill together and within an hour we were at the trailhead parking lot. He gave me a ride back to Reno and my bus stop home even though it was slightly out of his way. He even refused to accept my offer of gas money. He said I probably saved him from a twisted ankle or worse.
I was grateful for the ride. And the opportunity to get this last shot of the trip:
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Now It's Your Turn
What have you noted happening in your area or travels? As usual post your observations as well as their general location in the comments.