I Feel Pretty

I've been told many times before that "I clean up well."  I am often surprised to hear those words because in my former life as a teacher I wore dress clothes and "fixed" myself up daily.  Well, that's not the case now that I am working towards becoming a Wildlife Biologist.  My recent work often has me out in the woods for the better part of a day looking for mountain lions, felling trees, netting fish from a boat or gutting rabbits for rehabilitating raptors.  Last year while I was in Costa Rica recording wildlife sounds, I actually was shit on by some Howler Monkeys. I have photographic proof but decided to spare you.

I feel most comfortable in my usual attire of boots, a hat, army green or tan pants and a weatherproof shirt.

But yesterday I was having brunch with some girlfriends to celebrate the upcoming birth of our friend Mariah's baby boy. I have to admit it was nice to put on a spring dress, some pearl's and a pair of Mary Jane's and head off to Denver for a wonderful afternoon with the girls. I felt pretty.

Flower Detail

Focus is on the standards, with soft focus on the beard and falls.

Focus is on the style crest and beard, soft focus is on the standards.

Click here  to learn more about Bearded Iris Anatomy.

Detour: Road Closed

Noise is all around us, no matter where you are on the planet. It's even difficult to escape it completely when you are miles in to a several day backpack. The airplane traffic alone is so noticeable. Noise has been pushing my limits for 2 weeks now. Months ago I received a letter from the City of Louisville that they would be working on the sewer in the alley one house away from us. They were inviting all the nearby residents to come attend meetings with the project managers and be in the know of what would be taking place.  I read the letter and immediately put it in the recycle. I really don't have time to attend additional meetings right now, and besides, how bad could some sewer work be?
Well, we are over two weeks into it. And admittedly I am the one in our house who is most affected by all this noise and house shaking.

From 7 am-7pm for over two weeks this is what we've been experiencing:

• A water pump runs for 12 hours straight just outside my front window.
• Beep...beep...beep of the backing up of tractors.
• Digging and scraping of large machinery. 
• Various tools opening the paved street.
• Sandblasting.
• Dump trucks moving dirt.
• Tractors and backhoe's running, sitting idle out the windows.
• The house shaking from the jackhammering.
• Men in bright, orange hard hats yelling to each other over all the noise.
• Exhaust coming in from the machines.
• The public bus, which has been rerouted so it passes by our house 4 times/half hour.
• Delivery trucks and all other traffic sitting at the stop sign on my corner.
• My parrot Mango screeching for hours on end. All this noise and activity is throwing her off terribly.

I guess its no surprise that my studies have me focusing on Sound Ecology and the affect anthropogenic  sound /noise has on wildlife.   I am also very curious why some animals are more affected than others...and how Alex can actually sleep through all of this. He attributes it to having shared a house in college with multiple musicians. That makes him an adaptable urban survivor like a Corvid, and me the unadaptable species. According to recent studies, my inability to adapt to all this noise could result in the demise of my species.

Walker Ranch

We spent a good part of the day at Walker Ranch on Sunday. There's a lot you can do here: hike with your dogs, run, fish, ride horses and enjoy the wild flowers.  The area is nice during the week when it's not so congested.  But the weather was perfect Sunday so everyone on the Front Range was out enjoying a day off before the work week starts again.

Trax and Griffith walk their bikes up the steep stairs.

Elevation Map from Trail Central

A classic trail with a lot of history. From the web: The historic Walker Ranch was one of the largest cattle ranches in this region of Colorado. Settler James Walker traveled from Missouri to Boulder in 1869.  Suffering from a life-threatening illness and carrying only $12 in his pocket, James came to Colorado on the advice of his physician. Walker’s health dramatically improved in Colorado’s high, dry climate.  In 1882, he and his wife Phoebe filed a homestead claim to 160 acres in an open meadow with a flowing year-round spring. After first building a large barn and blacksmith shop to care for his livestock, James moved his wife and young son William into the family’s new ranch house by 1883. Designed for a self-sufficient lifestyle, the homestead was completed with a rootcellar, granary, smokehouse, springhouse, chicken and turkey houses, a wagon barn, a corn storage and pig barn, and various corrals and fenced pastures. Through ingenious trades, contracts, and sales maneuvers the family expanded the ranch.  When the Walker family finally sold the property in 1959, it was over 6,000 acres.  It went through a succession of owners until the county began a leasepurchase in 1976.  Walker Ranch is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a cultural landscape due to the integrity of its preserved fields, forests, and historic structures.

Maximum Impact!

photo by Trax

This is Max. Alex's brother's French Bulldog. He is ornery but makes us laugh pretty much all the time. 

To Bee or Not to Bee

Honeybee's are a vital part of pollinating. They are not the only creatures that perform this necessary act but they are the most efficient.  One third of our agricultural crops rely on honeybee's.  It is certainly a concern that they seem to be literally disappearing. Not dying in or around their hives, but simply disappearing. This phenomenon has been named Colony Collapse Disorder, (CCD) and has been linked to certain pesticides, specifically Imidachloprid, which is produced by the company Bayer.

I admit I am naive, but if this is the culprit to the demise of these insects, why hasn't this product been banned in this country just as it has been in France and Germany? I'm sure, like so many things, it has to do with big corporations, greed and $$.
This is obviously another reason to support your local farmers and buy organic foods. 

To learn more about this ongoing issue I highly recommend watching the documentary 

Vanishing of the Bees. 

Mullein

Mullein (Verbascum thapsus) grows like a weed out here in Colorado. I guess that's why it is now classified as one. But it actually has many uses. It is native to Europe, Africa and Asia. It has been adapted and used medicinally for thousands of years as an expectorant for the lungs, as well as for its antibiotic and anti-inflammatory properties. In tincture form it can be used for migraine headaches. It has been used to dye hair and as make up.  Its tall, dried stalks have been used for torches. And, I can tell you from experience it makes great t.p. in the backcountry.

 Mullein is a biennial plant. Seeds typically germinate in spring or summer and produce the large soft, furry leaves, like the ones above. After it over winters it begins to produce a long, single unbranched stem typically 1-2 meters tall. The tall pole like stem produces dense yellow flowers.

 

After flowering and seed release, the stem and fruits persist in winter. This makes for a great diet for many birds. The dried, brown, stems may persist into the following spring or summer. 

Today He Is Three

photo by Alex M.

Today, this Mama's Boy is three! Yeah, he's stinky and pee's on himself and his beard is usually pretty disgusting, soaked with slobber and who knows what else. But this Brown Dog is an irreplaceable part of our pack.  He fits in perfectly and life has been more full and complete for all of us since he arrived.

Let Yourself Be Silently Drawn

Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.

~Rumi~

Osprey (Pandion haliaetus )

It was a delight for my eyes to witness the return of this pair of Osprey (Pandion haliaetus). Apparently they have been migrating from South America to Silverthorne, CO to nest each April for many years. From what I have learned, the female of this pair typically arrives to the nest first, to do some house keeping. She prepares the nest, which you can see in the picture above is enormous! She catches up on her calories, while she waits for her mate.  This year he was about 10 days behind her.  I have to wonder, especially now that my mate takes to the skies, if she ever worries he may not arrive. 

What a treat for us to watch as he dove into the pond, located across the busy road, catching fish after fish to replenish his calories after nearly 5,000 mile migration.

Size, shape, color: Ospreys are brown above and white below, and overall they are whiter than most raptors. From below, the wings are mostly white with a prominent dark patch at the wrists. The head is white with a broad brown stripe through the eye. Juveniles have white spots on the back and buffy shading on the breast.

Ospreys fly with a marked kink in their wings, making an M-shape when seen from below.

Behavior: Ospreys search for fish by flying on steady wingbeats and bowed wings or circling high in the sky over relatively shallow water. They often hover briefly before diving, feet first, to grab a fish. You can often clearly see an Osprey's catch in its talons as the bird carries it back to a nest or perch.

Habitat: Look for Ospreys around nearly any body of water: saltmarshes, rivers, ponds, reservoirs, estuaries, and even coral reefs. Their conspicuous stick nests are placed in the open on poles, channel markers, and dead trees, often over water.

Some cool facts about the Osprey:

• An Osprey may log more than 160,000 migration miles during its 15-to-20-year lifetime. Scientists track Ospreys by strapping lightweight satellite transmitters to the birds’ backs. The devices pinpoint an Osprey's location to within a few hundred yards and last for 2-3 years. During 13 days in 2008, one Osprey flew 2,700 miles—from Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, to French Guiana, South America.
• Osprey eggs do not hatch all at once. Rather, the first chick emerges up to five days before the last one. The older hatchling dominates its younger siblings, and can monopolize the food brought by the parents. If food is abundant, chicks share meals in relative harmony; in times of scarcity, younger ones may starve to death.
• The name "Osprey" made its first appearance around 1460, via the Medieval Latin phrase for "bird of prey" (avis prede). Some wordsmiths trace the name even further back, to the Latin for "bone-breaker"—ossifragus.
• The oldest known Osprey was 25 years, 2 months old.

Kessel Run GoPro

Some fun, fast, twisty, single track in Fruita, CO. Video by Alex. Enjoy!

Hatch Chili Egg Casserole

Ingredients

1 lb Hatch chile sausage

2 cups Hatch Monterey Jack cheese, grated

4-5 roasted Hatch chiles, peeled, seeded and diced

1 dozen Central Market flour tortillas (since I cannot eat gluten I used corn)

2 tbsp New Mexico chili powder or to taste

8 eggs

3 cups half and half

1/2 cup fresh corn

Salt and pepper, to taste

---

Cooking Instructions

Cook sausage and crumble. In a large bowl, lightly beat eggs. Whisk in half and half and season with salt and pepper.

Pass tortillas through egg mixture and line bottom of sprayed baking dish. Spread layers of crumbled sausage, chiles, cheese and corn. Dust with chili powder. Repeat layers, ending with tortillas.

Sprinkle some cheese on top and pour egg mixture over strata; it should fill the dish and cover tortillas. Cover and chill for four hours or overnight.

Cover with foil and bake in 400 degree oven for 35 to 45 minutes. Remove foil for last 10 or 15 minutes of cooking to brown the top. A toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean.

Spring Evening

Mindful

Every day I see or hear something that more or less kills me with delight,
that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light.
It was what I was born for,to look, to listen, to lose myself inside this soft world, to instruct myself over and over in joy, and acclamation.
Nor am I talking about the exceptional, the fearful, the dreadful, the very extravagant, but of the ordinary, the common, the very drab, the daily presentations.
Oh, good scholar, I say to myself, how can you help but grow wise with such teachings as these, the untrimmable light of the world, the ocean's shine, the prayers that are made out of grass?
~ Mary Oliver ~

Making Their Way

You know its spring when the Passerine's start showing up at your feeder. These birds were preparing for a quick snow storm that passed through Colorado Tuesday.

Desert Roses

Spending time in the desert is a surreal experience. It can be a harsh existence with intense winds, a brutal sun and extremes in heat and cold. Running around wearing as little as possible during the day, seeking any form of shade available then piling on the layers trying to absorb as much heat by the camp fire at night. But I am drawn to it. So drawn to it that I often wonder if I might someday settle there. I feel lost when I am there. The good kind of lost. Lost as though no one knows I'm there. Lost as though time doesn't exist. Lost like I am just a grain of sand being blown across the barren landscape or a raven catching the thermal currents high above, fully enjoying the ride.

This past weekend brought all of that, and more.  We journeyed to Fruita, CO with some friends we have recently reconnected with. Our boys met when they were on the same lacrosse team as middle schoolers and this past fall, many years later, found themselves on the same mountain bike team. We traveled to races and spent time camping, sharing meals, catching up and realizing there was more to this friendship than we knew.

The boys, now becoming young men insanely fast before our eyes, have a lot in common. And so do we Moms. Discovering this has become a multi-layered, surreal blessing to me. Kinda like sitting back while Trax and Griff make an amazing beef stew in the Dutch Oven. Very confidently, all by themselves. Is this really happening?

Or watching a rogue horse run past your camp in the middle of the desert.

Or being on a mountain bike ride above the Colorado River and hearing those ravens off in the distance.

Or being completely amazed every time you see these geological wonders time after time.

Or noticing a gecko sunning itself on a rock wall, while you are riding unbelievable, sandy single-track and there's not another soul in sight.

 Or realizing how truly blessed we are that our chosen family continues to grow. Even in the harshness and beauty of the desert.