Field Season_2021_USGS_and then some….
Greetings once again…….
I haven’t been posting here for some time, but a new slide-show is up and running on Vimeo (at least I hope so). Spring and Summer have almost passed, but not without plenty to do and done. In late March, I saddled up the pony and headed back to San Diego for a 7th season working for USGS through KusLab, the bird research side of WERC (Western Ecological Research Center) in the San Diego. The main office is just a stones throw from San Diego airport – but, really it is an empty office these days due to COVID. For the entire season, once again I lived at SMER (Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve). The field season just ended last week on August 13th, 2021. The work routine was fairly much the same as many years with duties primarily focused on surveying for the Endangered Least Bell’s Vireo and Endangered Southwestern Willow Flycatchers. While the vireos are doing pretty well in terms of numbers, the SW Willow flycatchers are not doing so well at least in the main survey areas of the Lower San Luis River and in all the riparian areas of Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (MCBCP). With COVID-19 still an ongoing issue worldwide and for sure in California, we had to be mindful of the pandemic and take precautions like working in masks at times or keeping some distance when we did our MAPS (monitoring avian productivity and survivorship) work. MAPS work was conducted at 3 locations this season, and I worked at two of the locations/stations on MCBCP known as DeLuz and Santa Margarita. The diversity of species we worked with at MAPS seemed pretty promising as usual and some new banding codes made for some new challenges for me in the bird-banding realm. Thankfully, the MAPS crew has some well-informed banders in its ranks!! Despite a multi-year drought, many tough neotropical migrants and the local resident species (Towhees, Sparrows, Bushtits, Wrentits, some wrens…..) continued to make a go at breeding and carried on with their bird lives as we collected data about them in the field. This season I spent time on the Lower San Luis Rey River study area helping with some of the monitoring duties of vireos and of course I participated in the end-of-season “Veg” work which all the crew works on post-vireo-flycatcher season. It was a tiring season for sure this year for many reasons, but now with some rest – and, as I am looking back through these images and reflecting on the season, I can say we did our best to do good work and to have some fun at least some of the time while busting through what always is a tough field season. Working with the monitoring crew was a good way to get an intimate look at breeding vireos and special thanks goes to Ryan and Shannon for letting me help with their work and to protect them from any evil in the LSLR. The MAPS crew also managed to plow through many 100 bird days with some form of grace and the comaraderie was always welcome for this lone warrior. The field season wore many of us down but I am always amazed at the crew I work with for sticking it out and grinding through the final weeks of work even though many of us were exhausted from being in the field day in and day out for 4.5 months. We began our work March 29th in masks at the office and by August 13th, the Delta variant had us back in masks as a precaution as we checked out at the office August 13th….. At present, I am now back on the Mesa above Bishop, hunkering down now inside due to excessive smoke from multiple fires north – with plenty of house projects to contemplate and to start plowing away at!!!! Anyhow, I hope you get a chance to view this 12 minute life-of-a-migrant-bird-worker episode. The slideshow I set-up jumps around a little from field work (surveys, MAPS work, Monitoring site) to some images of (mostly bird) life that happens on the weekends away from work in the field. Due to some USGS/GOV online restrictions I am only keeping this “show” up for about a week — so if you see this link and the Vimeo feed is gone, well that means I have removed the video….I can share it via flash/CD/DVD for anyone interested in a home-viewing….and without further ado, on with the show…….thanks for watching….hope you enjoy it….(PS, forgot to put music credits in END….Live from Here – with Chris Thile and Friends – Can’t Find My Way Home, Orange Mandolin – Wildfire, Live from Here – Hyperballad with Thile and Aiofe)….
California_Coast_R/T
Hello All,
I have made it back home to Davis, CA once again, this time for a longer spell I think. After 5 months in San Diego I did return to Davis and began to settle back into life here. I jumped right back into the UCD Craft Center and some small and big wood projects like the workbench project I had started a while ago, but I had an ache to travel a little bit locally and to see a new place – The Channel Islands. I had never been, but people I know have been going there for a while. So, off I went down the coast to Ventura, CA – mostly on the scenic and slower route of the Pacific Coast Highway (once I was past Half Moon Bay). I do not love driving but the coast route is indeed a nice drive. First stop was Monterey, CA on Sept 20th as I had booked a trip with Shearwater Journeys a while back – (as this is there last year of pelagic birding). The day before going out on the boat though, I knew I wanted to chase sea-otters a bit around Moss Landing. That time was well-spent as the inner bay, tidal flats, and marina are all quite fun to pass an easy day around. Had luck seeing many otters, some probably being otter pups and their parents chilling out in the protected harbor. Shorebird migration is under way so plenty to see there too. After a day chasing otters I headed to Monterey. From the Fisherman’s Wharf docks we went out in a fairly large swell for the day and many of us including me got a little sick from the rolling sea. It was an okay trip overall, but not a huge amount of sightings. A few pods of humpback whales, a few Black-footed Albatross, a Buller’s Shearwater, and the usual cast of characters for that area gave us something to focus on periodically for the 8-hour trip. Not my best pelagic trip, but always interesting to be out on the bay. From Monterey I head right into Big Sur down the windy-hilly section of the PCH. When I was 17 yrs old, I flew out from NYC and biked from SF to Ventura on this road. It’s hard to imagine doing it now, but the amazing scenery and youthfulness for sure made it easier then. Elephant seal females and some young males have been hauling out at some spots along the coast, so I stopped to see them further south. In Santa Barbara I rested a day, got my Channel Island map, and stumbled upon the memorial for the Dive Boat Concepcion that went down in flames out in the Channel Islands this September. After sending a few photos of this to friends and family, I learned the next day from a good friend that someone she knew was on that boat with her husband and they both perished. A humbling experience to be at that memorial along the docks in the harbor. On South from Santa Barbara. Once in Ventura, I jumped on the Island Packers ferry to Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa. We stopped briefly at Santa Cruz and then went to Santa Rosa. I really loved the island. spent 5 nights there. Day-hiking from a base and backcountry camping with a heavy load (too heavy). My photos document the incredible vistas, wildlife, ocean views, huge scale of beaches, and some of the interesting history of Rosa. For anyone who hasn’t been to the islands, highly recommended. From the island, I dropped down to San Diego for a couple nights to see friends and then hauled quite fast up the 15/395 to Bishop where I met with a real-estate broker. Buying a piece of land or a house is on the radar right now and Bishop is high on the list as an affordable place to do that – maybe I will be a homeowner soon?……enough said for now though….hope you enjoy the slides…..have fallen into a spell of hip-hop club music so using that some as background music….as for that last video that was up, I pulled it down off Vimeo as it probably was breaking some USGS/federal copyright rules…but, I will send copies to anyone who wants them……give thanks and be thankful for as many things as you can every day!!!
USGS_2018_2019_take2
Greetings once again,
The second part of USGS field seasons 2018-2019 should be up and running now. Part2/take2 features some of the non-bird aspects of daily life in the field; one encounters all sorts of nature when you spend 6-8 hrs a day outdoors. For those that don’t believe that rattlesnakes are a common worry, I happily posted some of the snakes I have been up close in person to. During one survey called DeLuz/Roblar, I choose to change from boots to running shoes so I can swiftly go up a steep fire break and then descend to Roblar creek. Well, the place I chose to switch my footwear out happened to also be where a rattlesnake was resting (photo of boots, rock, snake). That is how close one may be to a rattler without realizing it. Thankfully, rattlesnakes usually don’t want trouble and neither do we, so we stay alert and do our best to avoid stepping on one and go around them with a good margin when we see them. Where I have live for many field seasons, Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve, we have snakes that live near the house and who sometimes search for and chase prey under the back porch. The Red-diamondback and Speckled-rattlesnake are two of the short videos shown. Due to the wet winter, it seemed like the frogs and toads were in abundance and were out and about breeding where there was water. The survey at Roblar creek was full of tree frogs both on the creek rocks and in the stream. I had also never seen so many toads; some being endangered Arroyo Toads which were breeding at our field site at DeLuz in the river/creek. I should have shown the 1000s of tadpoles in the pools, but it looks like I somehow skipped over loading those…there were 1000s and 1000s of tadpoles at the start of this season in March/April/May…..When we were checking the nets during MAPS banding at DeLuz creek it was pretty common to see dozens of froglets and toadlets on the ground or metamorphosing in pools. Hopefully this year’s wet conditions gave a boost to all the amphibians out there. At the end of each bird survey season, most of us go back out into the thick of it to do a series of habitat vegetation transects (50-60?) and circular vegetation plots on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton and at the San Luis Rey River site. We use vegetation poles that extend up to 7-8 meters (the yellow poles you see in photos), plant identification guides, and other implements to measure and characterize (lots of numbers and plant species codes) what the habitat looks like for the birds (LBVIs and SWFLs) that are using the areas we survey and monitor for breeding (and foraging…). If the going gets to thick with poison oak or say stinging nettle, we may throw on the Tyvek suits you see some of us wearing to help wield off the toxins and stings….all part of the fun of veg work which lasts about 3 full weeks. In the last weeks we also summarize all of our survey data which brings us up back to the wonderful USGS office right off the side of the SD Airport and San Diego Bay….a nice place to work from time to time. This video wraps it all up I with an image of the “Principal Investigator” of the USGS (San Diego office) bird studies, Dr. Barb, who received a big award from USFWS for her conservation efforts spanning 3 decades!, some shots of our annual end-of-season get togethers (hurrah!), and some bonus shots of Ocean Beach where many of us seek out fish-taco/burrito/foodie nourishment, perhaps a beer or mule, and companionable camaraderie after a day or week (or 4.5 months) in the field. Many good memories, experiences, challenges, insights, learning opportunities, stings, bites, tumbles, fish tacos, swims, long walks in the thick of the habitat, and more lead us on the path to enlightenment in the field out-and-about in nature as well as in the urban environs we inhabit in San Diego County!!! There will be more posts to come in the future…for now hope you enjoy the present ones……adios for now from DST studios in Davis, Cali….
USGS_2018_2019_take1
Greetings all,
It has been a year since I have posted into my blog, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy doing all sorts of interesting things!!! I meant to have a slideshow of the 3-months of wood school I was in OCT-JAN 2018 – @ The Center for Furniture Craftsmanship in Maine, but things have been busy. Eventually, my new blog “sliding dovetails” will begin to chronicle my wood work. Today’s post is a compilation of images (and some videos – more in take2/part2) from the past two years’ field seasons in San Diego working for USGS. As there are restrictions at USGS and federal GOV to posting social media where the USGS emblem appears, I am trying to limit this video as best I can to those who work with me and just followers (who are almost all family/friends). (I may have to send a private password for the Vimeo video server to limit who views these slide-shows, so be prepared.)
It was another good and tiring field season this year down in San Diego. Due to a very wet winter, the areas we survey for Least Bell’s Vireos (LBVIs) and Southwestern Willow Flycatchers (SWFLs) were a lot wetter than all previous seasons I have worked on this project (this was season 6 for me in last 7 years). You will see in the images that the Santa Margarita River was flowing most of the season and side tributaries as well were also wet (DeLuz and Roblar creeks). The vegetation, as a result of winter rains and wet soils, was happy – and as a result of that and perhaps because it seemed like a cooler year in SD County, the Vireos had a productive year. Up at Lake Henshaw, one of the survey areas for SWFLs, the reservoir had filled up quite a bit and that made for surveys by boat instead of just by foot. The flycatchers seemed to have a good year up there as well. The 5-month field season is for sure a tiring one with LBVI and SWFL surveys to be done almost every day of the week for most of the crew (others also monitor Coastal Cactus Wrens). Interspersed with the surveying for our birds, some of us work 3 MAPS stations on a weekly basis at the Tijuana Estuary and at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (MCBCP). MAPS used to be done at 5 sites in previous years, but that work has cut back little in past years. The images I put together run in a order of sorts. There are habitat photos taken during surveys at various locations, then some of our MAPS captures, and in part 2 there will be some more survey images, some bonus videos of wildlife encountered during the season (other than birds), and since the season always ends with vegetation work, there are a few photos of that….we end the season by compiling all of our survey data into data summaries which then is analyzed by the office after field-season ends…..we started work March 18th this year and ended August 16th. There are a few photos from 2018 field season mixed into the two parts I am posting to consolidate the two years…..I am now back in Davis, CA in the wonderful and typical 100 degree days of summer heat. Luckily the local pool I use is open 7 days a week and I can bike over there to keep from melting and to keep those field-work muscles preserved!!!
Panama_(trip 2)_Part II
Greetings all,
I added the “trip 2” to the heading as 3 years ago I also went to Canopy Tower in Panama (you can find a link to that by searching past blog posts) – but this Part II is of the recent 2018 trip just to clarify. I did not go to Canopy Lodge the first trip nor did I get down to the Panama Canal locks – so this trip was just as fun and added some new sights…and birds.
After a few days at Canopy Tower, myself, mum, and Sara got a ride to Canopy Lodge which lies about in the middle of Panama. The trip from the Tower to the lodge was fairly quick – only about 2 1/4 hrs. We crossed the canal to start which was via the picturesque Centennial bridge and then made our way up the PanAmerican highway through a variety of scenes such as new cookie-cutter subdivisions looking out of place in the somewhat rural surroundings, through more typical latin american towns and small cities, and eventually through some rolling hills and a very curvy road that was surrounded by a bit of deforested land (probably for agriculture and rural land-use). Eventually we dropped into the town of El Valle de Anton. The town is a nice simple town with just a few main streets, a core central area with the market, businesses, schools, and the surrounding hills (see photo in show: “Sleeping Indian Mountain”) and mountains offering a lush backdrop/forests to explore in. Canopy Lodge is a beautiful place which has been constructed along the main river of the area. The grounds around the main lodge area have plenty of wildlife and a fair amount of bird species can be seen by exploring the gardens, river area, and a feeder or two which fruit is left out on to attract some local species….We stayed a total of 4 nights at the lodge. The 4+ days we were there were filled with hours and hours of walking trails, roads, and birding along the roadsides. Along with birds, we also were searching of non-bird wildlife like sloths or even baby sloths (photo: baby on adult), butterflies, dragonflies, etc… We did not have to travel far at all to see tons of good birds. For many groups such as trogons, motmots, tanagers, woodcreepers, woodpeckers, kingfishers, antbirds, seedeaters, and hawks…..we easily saw 4-5+ species of each. Having local guides that know the areas we explored made finding various species of owls & baby owls (photos), elusive motmots, and somewhat rare woodcreepers (Scythebill – photo) and hummingbird species (Sicklebill – photo) look easy; the Canopy guides are invaluable resources for bird-finding and general bird-knowledge. Many species were quite spectacular to see close-up…such as Lance-tailed Manakins, Boat-billed flycatchers, Barred Antshrikes, and Blue-crowned Motmot (one of my personal favorites – photo). Mum and Sara became instant bird watcher and finders pretty much from day one (neither had done a lot of birding before this trip!). Also thanks to our guides who are incredibly savvy with spotting scopes, we managed to get good looks of birds high in trees, deep in the forest, and also close-up through their nice Leica scopes. Digiscoping was common and some photos you see in these slides are from iPhones held up to the scope eyepieces….I am looking forward to doing more of that. After covering a lot of the local areas by foot and combi, we then did an all-day trip towards the west coast of Panama – we did a lot of roadside birding and driving until the guides knew of good spots for specific species. Quick stops lead to good looks at some cuckoo species, parakeets, hawks, and small but beautiful Blue seedeaters (photo). We arrived at the coast in a light drizzle and found ourselves on an isolated beach with views of Blue-footed boobies sitting far out on a buoy, we had a good place to swim, had lunch and some coffee, a little rest…and then off we went for a little more searching for bird flocks…which we found and kept ticking off more bird species. Back at El Valle we hit the market for some of the nice hand-sewn “Molas” that local people and indigenous peoples make. Our final day, we finally had a little rain but not too hard or too steady – so we drove to some more of the local roadside forest and found some more birds, butterflies, and sights/sounds. We ended the day with a pair of Tropical Screech Owls found by Moyo the guide – which he gets photo credits for as I passed my camera over to him as he had a very close view of them on his side of the fence. Back at the lodge we checked out the gardens some more, went up to the treehouse, and I took a few fun swings into the natural swimming pool they have made by building a wall down into the grounds and then let the river run through it! So cool. A final dinner and good sleep in our nice rooms eventually lead to hopping back into the Canopy van for our ride back to Panama City and then a bit of a wait for our flights back to Peru and LAX. All in all, I find these lodges so simple to travel to and make for a great one week get-away. As schools opened in Davis in late August, the timing was perfect for the trip (USGS field season ended Aug 16th) so I arrived home from Panama and had work the following week in the elementary schools…..hope you enjoy the slides and go check out one of the Canopy family some time…next year I am aiming for Canopy Camp in the Darien region….stay tuned….
Panama_2018
Greetings from Davis, CA…..schools are open and I just finished my first week in 6th grade with a good group of Davisites…..
A new slideshow is uploading now into Vimeo, so it is time to write up what it is about. The first set of photos were all taken in the first days while myself, mom, and Sara were staying at the amazing Canopy Tower, one of four of the Canopy family destinations in Panama. This was my second time to the Tower and it was great to be back there once again. The trip began with the usual car rides and plane flights from Davis->Sac Airport->LAX->Panama City->met at airport and transferred so easily to the Tower thanks to Canopy….I met up with mum at LAX on the 23rd of August and after a long wait at LAX (10hrs) we flew to Panama. Sara was already on the ground when we arrived and we headed up to the tower – arriving there less than 1.5hrs after arrival at airport! That in itself is a big perk of going to the Tower. The first afternoon we went down to the Panama Canal and explored the Miraflores locks at the visitor center where you can learn about the history of the canal via museum style displays, a movie, and by going to the locks themselves (from a observation area). We watched a few large tankers/carriers going through both sets of locks while there – which is pretty cool. The new locks just opened in the past 2 years and they let some monster ships go through the canal – really really big super tankers with 1000s of cargo boxes…..After a good time at the canal, we went back to the tower for some rooftop birding, more great food, and some planning for days 2-3 at the tower. At the tower and around the grounds of the tower one can be immersed in rainforest and wildlife without getting out of bed essentially as the tower is in the middle of Soberania National Park. The howler monkey in these slides was about 20 feet from mum’s window. The tamarins, sloth, iguana, many bird species, hawks, vultures, kites, and butterflies as well can be all seen from the observation deck or along the road leading up to the tower. The following days we visited local bird sites such as the ammo ponds, pipeline road, the plantation trail, summit ponds, and of course we spent a lot of time on the observation deck. The highlights are in the photos (with a few videos). Motmots, Toucans, Trogons, Antbirds, Falcons, monkeys, frogs, butterflies and more (~214 bird species (which includes a few neotropical migrants) seen in 7 days) were all daily staples for the eyes and ears. Sleeping at the tower immerses the ears with the sounds of various frogs singing and peeping away the night along with the occasional howler monkey roaring in the distance. As a quick tip for anyone wanting to go to the tower, I can say that once again during the second visit we were basically the only people in the tower during our time there as I guess the ‘green season’ is a less busy time. The same ended up true for our following 5 days at the Canopy lodge which will be Part 2 of this series. It would be easy to write more, but for the most part I would summarize the time as this: wake up at 6am, go to deck, watch sunrise and fog streaming through the rainforest, have coffee on roof, eat breakfast, get in van/truck and go birding for 5 hrs, return for lunch, rest, bird from observation deck, take photos, leave for afternoon birding for another 2-3 hrs, rest, do bird list, visit observation deck, take photos, eat dinner, sleep, repeat. This is a very active vacation with birding and wildlife viewing on foot 7-8 hrs a day….which is quite fun. I can only upload one large file (free) a week to Vimeo, so stay tuned for those photos….the first 3 days were a great start to what was a great quick visit to Panama!!! Please click on link below for video…..
Iceland_final notes
Greetings good people,
The last short slideshow is up and loaded into Vimeo website. I am using Vimeo due to the very very slow upload times here at Word Press. I think I will alternate more now between posting just photos and also occasional slideshows. Also stay tuned for the opening of my woodwork/photography website which I really need to get online to help make more of a living….may need a few weeks to get that up….
The final slides here are from the trip Sara and I took in Iceland in early April. I wasn’t sure what Iceland might be like this time of year and it proved to be an interesting and sometimes chilly trip. There was plenty of snow in the mountains and even down in some of the lowlands up North and in the West where we started out. Down South, the weather was a little more mild, but the winds were impressive a few days….60mph winds kept my flight from leaving until a few hours after the scheduled departure. Whale watching up in Husavik proved to be quite an adventure on a snow covered boat and in chilly conditions. We saw some whales (maybe 2) briefly and checked that off the things to do list. Icy waterways and Common Eiders bobbing about in the waves were a delight to see. Icy waterfalls and snowy landscapes reminded me of many winters spent in the snowy mountains in the Northwest. Long-tailed ducks, Ptarmigan in snowy-white plumage, tube-nosed seabirds, seals, beautiful Icelandic horses in snowy landscapes, and an excess of fresh water everywhere it seemed (a dream for a Californian) made time up North well-spent. Hot tubbing at one guest house proved to be a good way to end days. Down towards the Southern side of the Iceland, we enjoyed hikes up small coastal highlands onto wide-spanning mesas in search of panoramic view and puffins. The final day in the south we finally spotted hundred of puffins circling over the off-shore rock pyramids – probably just returning to land after a winter at sea? (this helped prompt the July trip BTW). Eating the super-thick yogurt-like SKYR is worth going to Iceland for alone IMHO….top that off with fairly affordable wild smoked LAX (salmon), and you are ready to go! The geothermal areas of Iceland have bubbling mud puddles and rocket like steam vents showing off how volcanic/geothermal Iceland is. The picturesque Ice Caps off in the distance look like something to explore by backcountry skis some day. The final day to explore proved to be to one windy and rainy day. The end sections of the slideshow shows the amount of wind – look at how the waterfalls in background are blowing horizontally! And, from the more recent trip – a walk through any nesting area of Arctic Terns is not for the faint of heart. They are some tough and noisy little seabirds. Hope you enjoy set 3 of 3….the first link is for set 3 and below that is set 2.
And Part 2 of 3…..
take care
Iceland_Part One
Greeting woofers fans!
Long time no write for me. I am putting together 3 slideshows from two trips to Iceland now. The first visit was in mid-April 2017 and just recently returned from a second trip from July 9, 2017-July 18, 2017. It was interesting to see the change of seasons in the landscape and wildlife-scape between these two trips. The recent trip was full of wonderful cliff walks and hikes along gorgeous coastlines full of seabirds and a neat spotting of a pod of Killer Whales by my compañera, Sara – among many highlights (like wild smoked salmon). The allure of seeing lots of Atlantic Puffins was part of the stimulus for a return voyage this July as I have enjoyed working with and seeing seabirds in their sea-based environments for a while – especially true after 3 seasons spent in Galapagos on Española Island with the boobies and albatross……The Puffins of Iceland delivered plenty of close encounters and thousands of fly-bys as they were in nesting mode wherever we found them. This set of slides covers the middle leg of travels (April being the first leg) which started at KEF airport near the capital and then took us around the Snaefellsnes Peninsula for a couple days and then on to the southern part of the Westfjords for a visit to the Latrabjarg Bird Cliffs (the western-most point of Europe). The last days were spent on Heimaey Island in and around the crater of an old volcano. Within the first 40 minutes of driving out of the airport I had to stop and start photographing the Arctic Terns that were nesting along the roadside (this ended up being a common sight in most towns we passed through – terns nesting by the hundreds in little colonies). The first stop for day one was the area of Hellnar and Arnastapi where the 24-hour light gave nice views of a near full-moon rise over the southern mountains and fjord. The weather treated us really well I thought. We had little rain, except for one day which was a heavy enough drizzle to keep us tent-bound for an afternoon of rest….cool days were happily welcomed every day after having a 10-day heat spell of over 100F in Davis, CA before this trip. Many species of seabirds and shorebirds were a delight to see along the various cliffs and coastlines – Puffins, Guillemots, Razorbills, Kittiwakes, Fulmars, Arctic Terns, Eiders, various shorebirds, Harlequin Ducks, Oystercatchers, and more were common sightings – and almost all were nesting or post-breeding. I think the photos will suffice to describe more of what we saw and experienced….I will add some more facts and maps in the following posts in case anyone interested in Iceland travels wants to read on…..for now, enjoy the show and stay tuned for the next two episodes of Icelandia….best and love to all…
Dolphins and Whales et al, Oh My!
Greetings from woofers who has been hiding out for a while now!
I will keep in brief for this new post as I am using my iPhone as a ‘hotspot’ for internet use at home right now. As I have to move my new travel trailer in a week, haven’t bothered to have wifi installed.
During the last few weeks of work in San Diego, I went on two short nearshore whale-watching trips out of Dana Point. The Ocean Institute has such simple 2-hour trips to go on, they have become a staple of end-of-season things to do. No Blue Whales were sighted on either trip, but we did see what the captain said was a rare Bryde’s whale on the first trip. It looked like a Fin whale, I suppose, to me – having seen one last year. We mainly just saw its blow and back a few times. The common dolphins were also great fun to see. I am always trying to get interesting photos of them – such as underwater, just surfacing, pairs of mom’s and their calves, jumping dolphins, and behaviors like bow-riding or wake-surfing. Managed to get a little of each on the two trips off Dana Point. Season 4 at USGS ended August 5th, and I drove up eastern Sierra to enjoy the scenery and saw no need to rush up I-5 back to Davis. After a few days in the Davis heat – 90s and 100s F – I drove down to Carmel-by-the-sea and was fortunate to stay at the cousin’s cottage for 3 nights! Down in the Monterey area, things were cool, calm, and comfortable. I went on two trips out of Dana Point with Sanctuary Cruises, one solo and one with cousin’s….both trips were pretty fruitful. I think we ran into the same group of 5-6 Humpback whales each trip. Great fun to see the whales (last year supposedly was a super year for whales in the Bay….that’s what prompted me to check out Moss Landing Point trips this year – the sightings from last year’s trips looked amazing!). From the Moss Landing harbor, we began seeing California Sea-otters, California Sea-lions, and harbor seals right away. I love seeing the Sea-otters (a few of these photos here are also from Point Lobos – a great place to explore the coast – good place to spot seals and otters). Not too far off-shore from Moss Landing, we ran into groups of whales, some mola-mola (Ocean Sunfish), more sea-lions, and 1000s and 1000s of Sooty Shearwaters. The coolest sight for me was the Humpback surfacing and cruising through a raft of shearwaters. Neat. Had a few other pelagic birds such as – Rhinoceros Auklet, Common Murre groups/pairs, Pink-footed shearwaters….One of the bizarre sightings for me was seeing a Sea-otter eating a cormorant (see photo with pink flesh and visible head of cormorant). Never heard of that before and saw it in the harbor on the 2nd trip. The sea/bay was calm both days, with fog or overcast skies mostly – good cool weather and decent for photography. These trips were just as fun as the Dana Point trips as they are 2-4 hr long trips, easy to get to, and in the right places to usually see some sort of good marine/ocean activity. The almost guaranteed common dolphins of Dana Point are a small bonus to those trips. I give many thanks to the Glickman/Kasper-Glickman consortium for making my stay so nice in Carmel. Fortunate timing and fun to be with this family…looking forward to more adventures this Fall-Winter!!! Enjoy.
Season_4_USGS_et_al
Greetings SoCal and the rest of the world!
Amazing how time flies when you look at your blog post record and see that the most recent posts were from a couple of months back now (Galapagos). Since Galapagos, I haven’t ventured too far – although, once again I moved from Davis, CA back down to San Diego County for season 4 with USGS. I went through my usual routine of beginning to pack up in Davis about 3 weeks before I was to head south which made the move less rushed and it seems to have been an easier shift this year. The big change this year was not staying at SMER (Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve) for the ~6 months I spend down here in SoCal with my work @ USGS. Fortunately, I found a place to stay here in Leucadia/Encinitas with a friend who has been living here for about 6 months. Living on the coast has been a nice change of pace, weather, for new local explorations, local fish tacos, and more. The coastal lagoons are a blessing on this stretch of coast and I try to go to a few of them each week. The highlight of Batiquitos Lagoon (closet lagoon for me) was the discovery of an active Great-horned Owl nest about a month ago. Frequent visits to the nest have been rewarding as we see the owlets getting bigger each week. This past week the first of the owlets completely left the nest and the other two explored many feet out of the nest and onto the limbs surrounding the nest. I only am posting a few photos of the nest in this slideshow as I will have a video of the owls (and more) ready in a fews days hopefully. Working on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (BASE) daily keeps me immersed in nature 6-7 hrs a day. Surveys on BASE for the California Gnatcatcher(s) (CAGNs) prove a great way to get to know the various habitats, backroads, and training areas on the base. Our CAGN plots are scattered all over from near sea-level all the way up to about 1000 ft up in the coastal mountains. Unfortunately, I don’t think most of us detect a lot of CAGNs on BASE, but the past week I had fledgling CAGNs at one point, so that was fun and hopeful. Spring breeding/nesting for all birds is moving along for many species we encounter. Seeing various species’ active nests is always an encouraging site – especially the local owl and Osprey nests with growing nestlings. Trips to San Diego have been adding good wildlife sightings at seal beach, La Jolla Cove, underwater at the Cove (Horn Sharks), San Diego River, and up at Cabrillo NM. Seeing a drone scare most of the seabirds off the cliffs at La Jolla Cove wasn’t such a good experience – the cormorants are on eggs down there along the cliffs! Fish tacos have been keeping me semi-nourished once a week and Leucadia Donut Shoppe’s 5am donut visits round out the perfect SoCal diet. A recent trip to San Diego River near Mission Beach to watch the terns, skimmers, gulls, and egrets mill around in the tidal flats went well until a homeless man on a bike swerved over and kicked me in my knee (I wasn’t hurt at all, but seemed like it could have gone worse for sure) – that killed the buzz of enjoying what usually is a decent place to just walk and observe. A guy spinning donuts in the same area in his truck topped that off as he was about 100ft from a killdeer nest (with 4 eggs) I had just found on the edge of the parking lot. Ugh! Anyhow, most everything else is going smoothly in SoCal life here in Leucadia/Encinitas. Being close to the beach (200m) makes it easy to escape into sunsets and waves, and I have about 6 days of attempted surfing now (I don’t even know if I can call myself a beginner yet – standing some on the board). On the way home from San Diego River I had a most unusual encounter on I-5. I was driving in the lane second from the right and saw a dead animal in the road near Del Mar. I drove around it and got a glance of some white and dark features. Then, seconds later in my lane I saw what looked like two medium-sized songbirds (blackbird size?)…..right away I realized what it was – two ducklings! Holy Cow – what can you do on a packed highway to avoid hitting something like that. The ducklings somehow got to the dividing line between lanes and I passed them! Then, I kept my eyes on the right rear mirror as these little ones had one more lane to go across to “safety?”. Well, I watched those two little bodies make it to the shoulder – both kind of leaning into their stride the way ducks walk/run. Somehow, I feel like this moment/event altered my perspective on the fragility of life. Interestingly, I had just seen three ducklings in the San Diego River that were happily following their mum in the river. Such precious life! Well, I could go on with some more tall tales and deep philosophy about how profound it can be to spend every day outdoors immersed in natural environments focused on wildlife or at least in wild habitats, but mainly I am just here to post some pictures and show what is I see and do day-to-day. Enjoy the slideshow – complete with Rihanna music (song titled “work”) that I find somewhat fitting as most of what I do here is related to work and/or looking for neat wildlife or scenery to photograph that also takes a little work/effort….stay tuned for owl video…..
Galapagos_the end
Hello once again from sunny Davis, CA –
The final part of the Galapagos Island trip I took from Dec 24th-Jan 9th, 2016 is here! This set of images covers Isla Santa Fe (which you can see from above – as I flew over/along Baltra, Santa Cruz, and Santa Fe on my last day – you can just make out the aqua-blue waters of the bay we landed in and where we also did our final snorkel), South Plaza Island, Floreana, and Isabela Island. I do have a couple extra photos from other islands that escaped the last two posts. One photo shows proof that a Red-footed Booby really did walk on my mom’s back! This WILD seabird was as bold and curious as they get, I suppose. At Santa Fe and South Plaza we encountered many land iguanas. These iguanas are a completely different species from the marine iguanas that have also been in these sets of images. The land iguanas we saw were busy eating leaves, displaying for/with mates, and lounging in the sun. They are only found on some of the islands, so seeing this species was a good addition to our list of animals seen. The giant opuntia cactus were impressive on Santa Fe and South Plaza – they basically look like a tree with branches of cactus above. From the cliffs of South Plaza someone sighted some Spotted-eagle-rays in the waves. I managed to snap a few photos of them and I think they were mating, but not sure. The larger eagle-ray was huge. Also from the cliffs, various seabirds were cruising along as usual. The Red-billed tropicbirds are always fun to watch and listen to. They make screaming sounds as they fly about the cliffs and sea. A super bright male Yellow Warbler appeared along the trail we followed (all islands tourists disembark on have regulated trail systems/paths which you follow to minimize impacts to the wildlife and environment). Yellow Warblers are a common songbird on most of the islands. The sight of the colorful plants, blue-green-aqua sea, and black volcanic rocks was quite panoramic – and the volcanic history of these islands was evident in the uplifted features along the cliffs of South Plaza. South Plaza was actually our last stop on the boat tour and the following day we disembarked early in the morning for our trip overland on Santa Cruz Island to Baltra (where the airport is). I saw my family off at Baltra airport and then stayed a second week traveling with a friend on Santa Cruz, Floreana, and Isabela Islands. Most of the marine iguanas you see here were on Floreana Island. They had such a wild variety of scale colors such as black, red, blues, and yellow that it would be silly not to take a lot of photos of them! These iguanas have a flattened tail which allows them to swim in and under water – fun to watch, especially while snorkeling. Floreana had a great place to stay for us right on the main beach- Hotel Wittmer. The Wittmer family history goes back a long ways in Galapagos. We met a few of the Wittmers and even got a group photo with the family on the pier! Seeing more Galapagos Penguins while snorkeling and from the pier was a highlight. A trip to the highlands of Floreana was well worth the trip. We saw the island’s water source, the ancient pirate caves (which also ended up being the homes for the original settlers), a huge rock face-carving, more tortoises, and tons of green vegetation. After Floreana, we had a relatively easy boat ride back to Santa Cruz, and then some really rough boat rides to/from Isabela. Isabela Island was fun to explore too. We found penguins to swim with, flamingos, simple and good food on the streets, more tortoises, more swimming, and a fairly laid-back town to while-away the time there. Back on Santa Cruz, we gathered the necessary tourist goods (t-shirts) for family and friends, ate great food, and prepared for long travel days back to home bases. It took 4 flights, one BART, and one AMTRAK to get me back to Davis. Nothing compares to how Darwin traveled on the Beagle, so I won’t boast about any intrepid travels I made as far as getting to and from Galapagos – relatively, a piece of cake…That brings me to the end of this tall tale. I am sure I will be back in Galapagos again sometime. It is a neat place to explore and if you know your way around it does not have to be a hugely expensive travel destination. Some day I plan to insert my previous Galapagos months into this blog, so no need to write more now. cya later and take care…..
Galapagos_2015_16_PT2
Hola Hola again!
Here is part 2 of 3 from Galapagos trip 2015-2016. I had a few photos that escaped being entered into the last slideshow – these are from our stop at Genovesa (we disembarked 2 times on this island). This set of images is mainly from Española Island (Gardner Bay and Punta Suåraz) and Floreana Island (Punta Cormorant and Post Office Bay). For me, the highlight was being back on Española again – having spent about 8 months on this Island between 2004-2007 (at Punta Cevallos). Seeing Waved Albatross flying overhead and even a “99%” Waved albatross chick (almost ready to fledge with just a couple downy feathers) was most excellent! Española Island is the only island in the world (minus a few rare pairs) where Waved Albatross breed/nest. There are some shots of a Swallow-tail gull pairs allopreening, mating, and flying – they are the only nocturnal gull in the world and such beautiful gulls to see up close. The Nazca Boobies were in full breeding mode with all age ranges of chicks including some adults with eggs. It may look precious to see two young Nazca chicks sleeping on the parent’s feet – but, the sad biological fact is this is a siblicidal species where chick A always pushes chick B out of the nest just a few days after (and if) egg B hatches! An amazing flick-flight was going on between rival Hood Mockingbird groups – they have fantastic territory fights (they were literally tumbling in the sand at times!). Lava lizards from various spots were easy macro photography subjects. The lizards, like the bird species, vary slightly island to island in such things as size and color. Galapagos flycatchers were seen at various sites – precious little birds. We had a Red-footed Booby land on a few different people in the pangas – after landing on one person, it hopped along the backs of a few people! That is how fearless/bold wildlife can be in Galapagos! We spent New Year’s Eve on board the Galaxy and were treated to a minor feeding frenzy of sharks and a few bold sea-lions chasing flying-fish alongside our boat. The faded brown image of a shark, blurry flying-fish, and remains of a flying-fish found on the back of our boat (a sea-lion slept there that night) document that neat event…The sea-lions actually seemed to out-compete the sharks for the few fish being caught! A few birds you may find anywhere in the western hemisphere such as Yellow-crowned Night Heron, Oystercatchers, sandpipers, and Ruddy Turnstones were rambling along the beaches and lava rock. Seeing young sea-lion pups on most beaches offered simple meditation on the preciousness of life. Whenever I was on board our boat (Galaxy) I usually was on the look out for wildlife from the top deck or stern of the boat. I snapped many photos of the amazing flying/diving of Blue-foots (one which caught a fish on a dive), a sea-lion surfacing at the stern, Wedge-rumped Storm Petrels (Sp? – White-rumped?) doing their hovering behavior on the sea surface, and of the panoramic scenery around us. It was obviously breeding season for sea-turtles (mostly green) as we were seeing mating pairs in the bays at many beaches, including tracks from the females who lay their eggs above the tideline. On a few beaches, sea-turtles were along the shoreline or surfing the waves in search of mates…..plenty of wildlife wonder to see every day……that’s enough said for this round of the story…a final short part 3 to follow…
Galapagos 2015-2016_part1
Hola Hola, Greetings, and Happy New Year from Davis, CA….
Finally, I have a new post after way too long with little news and zero photos uploaded in months! So, here it is – Galapagos trip #5 for me. On December 24th, 2015, I left SFO at 12:30am and flew down to Quito, Ecuador and met up with my mom, sister, brother-in-law, and nephews (after they had traveled/endured through some tough re-routing and changes in plans…as well as some lost luggage). X-mas was spent relaxing in Quito seeing Old-town and a dinner at the hotel. On the 26th, we flew through Guayaquil and on to Baltra Island in the Galapagos with 10 of the other folks who were onboard the boat The Galaxy with us for this journey in the eastern islands of the Galapagos. As I had done fieldwork on Española Island in three separate years (once for about 7 months and twice for about a month each visit), I felt like I was returning to somewhat familiar territory – and what an amazing place to be returning to! We arrived at Baltra Island’s airport fairly smoothly and we were on our boat the Galaxy by mid-day – unfortunately, 3 pieces of luggage did not make it to the airport with us!. I always pack as efficiently as possible and usually roll my main luggage onto the plane, but for this final leg in the air (it took 4 flights to get from SFO to Baltra), I opted to check my bag – and it was lost…oh well, lesson learned – and thankfully, all 3 bags that were lost arrived by boat about 24 hours later! Once onboard, our Galapagos naturalist Greg Estes (who I will write more about in later post) introduced us to the boat, the crew, and debriefed us on our first stop – Mosquera, a tiny islet between Baltra and North Seymour Island. After lunch and a quick motor around Baltra to our first anchoring, we loaded into the two pangas (dinghies) and jumped off to say hi to the sea-lions, gulls, lizards, iguanas, white coral sand beach, whale bones, and beautiful scenery around us. As the sun set in the west, Daphne Major with its famously studied Darwin’s Finches sat in the distance – its clearly volcanic origin sloping into the sea. Great first day in the Islands! Generally, on boat trips in Galapagos you motor at night between islands – which is what we did this night and then woke up anchored in Sullivan Bay. This day was full of a great walk through the lava fields on Santiago Island, a bit of snorkeling and penguin viewing, and hike up the steps to the viewpoint on Bartolomé. The views were fantastic in all directions and the volcanic landscape was awesome. We were treated to many Galapagos Penguin sightings (both in and out of water), some good warm water snorkeling (water temp was around 80 degrees F!), Blue-footed Boobies diving into the bay, and great food for every meal. There are plenty of photos in the slideshow of things I have touched on so far… From Sullivan Bay, we again motored at night and woke up in Darwin’s Bay at Genovesa Island. We did two walks here and snorkeled for a good while in two different areas in the bay. Genovesa was awesome! Tons of seabirds of quite a few species (Nazca, Red-footed, and Blue-footed Boobies, Frigatebirds, Galapagos Storm-petrels, Shearwaters, Red-billed Tropicbirds…). The Storm-petrels were flying in huge masses above the cliffs – 100s of 1000s of this species live and nest on the island. We spotted one of their predators, a short-eared owl on the edge of the colony. I snapped a couple photos of it flying and landing on the cliffs where the petrels were. It was neat to see an owl during the day! A few species of the boobies had nestlings, some being quite old but still with a lot of downy feathers. Seeing the Nazca Boobies was particularly fun for me as this is the main bird I was working with on Española – they are such amazing birds. The beautiful Galapagos Doves were casually mating and nesting along the trail we were on. These doves (and so many of the Galapagos birds!) are striking in their plumage and colors. The Red-footed Boobies are quite a sight too- their bills and feet covering a wide gamut of colors – wonderful. We saw some of our first Darwin’s Finch species here as well as some Yellow Warblers. Genovesa was a great island visit and from there we motored way south to San Cristobol. San Cristobol is one of the islands in the archipelago with a decent size human population and little city located mostly around the port. We visited a Galapagos tortoise hatchery and adult tortoise sanctuary here (I also visited tortoise sites at Santa Cruz, Isabella, and Floreana Islands). It was interesting and fun to see all phases of the tortoises growing up and older. In the afternoon, we did some more snorkeling and then headed off to Española Island (where part 2 of this series begins).
Season #3_USGS
Greetings from Davis, CA!
The weather has changed here in NorCal and we’ve had some light rains and cool days here lately. It is nice to have some changes in the weather and signs that the seasons continue to revolve….
I pulled out about 100 photos from the 6-month period I spent in San Diego County from March 8th, 2015 – August 24th, 2015 while working on a 3rd season with USGS as a surveyor for three bird species there (Southwestern Willow Flycatcher, Least Bell’s Vireo, and California Gnatcatcher).
The season started a little earlier this year than last year. We began with some new vegetation protocol learning lead by our fearless leaders SL, BK, AH, and KF. I thought some of our crew looked a little suspicious in their face masks (sun protection) – border patrol must do a double take if they see these USGS characters way down south in SD County? After the major fires of 2014 on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (BASE) and elsewhere in San Diego County, a lot of habitat was lost for all of the birds we work with – the fires last year just kept erupting/popping up for a couple days in many areas it seemed. Some of the photos here show the extent of some of the burns – a lot of the areas were filled with invasive mustard (yellow flowered hillsides) as well as tons of burnt shrubs, cacti, and trees when we first got to BASE. The Gnatcatcher surveys were an addition to our surveys this year, and this gave us a good chance to see and explore a lot more of BASE via back roads, tank trails, and fire breaks. At times, I felt like I was preparing for a truck commercial while driving 4WD up steep hillsides and up to panoramic vistas on the BASE. Before too long, we were into out Bell’s Vireo surveys and shortly after those began, we started the Willow Flycatcher surveys. There was plenty to stay busy with this season, I felt. Added perks to the season were yet another CPR/First Aid class with our return instructor who always amuses us – and, we got to try out the new choking vests! (photo/video). Up at Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve (SMER) we had a new mix of people, some of the same local rattlesnakes, Red-Tails successfully nesting in the same tree just off the dirt road we use to get to SMER, and plenty of oranges and avocados for all! MAPS banding filled in some time once again with Warner Springs being one of my regular jaunts some Fridays. It was fun to see some birds in hand and keep in touch with the Pyle Guide. The Vireos seemed to have a decent year from my perspective (not sure what the esteemed science gurus in the OFFICE have found out from the DATA?) – there were plenty of nestlings and fledglings seen in many of my sites (photos/video). Surveys for Flycatchers even yielded a few nice highlights of color-banded birds, nests w/ eggs, and fledges (video). The Upper Margarita survey became a tactical/strategic adventure this year with truck leapfrog, escaping the survey via hillsides, and use of Fallbrook Naval Weapons Station for entrance and exits – fun. As usual, the end of season was filled with doing vegetation quads and transects – lots and lots of them! Finishing up the veg work in the area inundated with homeless camps added a little to the diversity and variety of the work – though, it really isn’t that fun to do a veg quad in the middle of an active homeless camp! Seeing a Vireo nest amongst a bunch of TP on the ground was a first for me – not the best sign of cooperation between Vireos and Homeless folks. Some transects through Typha/Scirpus proved to be a good excuse to sit or lie down on the job (photos). I don’t have any photos of the end of season SMER party – but I do have a few cool videos of long-boarders surfing Trestles (the end of one of my surveys) accompanied by Beyonce cuts (one of our featured musical guests at SMER party). Anyhow, I think the photos sum up much of the season. RD gets credit for foto of JG tactfully monitoring some Vireos in the SLR. I’m not sure who took the foto of Dr. Bowling with that cast of characters in the SLR – either way, I think we need to consider those dolls as possible SLR buddies next season?!?! Life in Davis is moving along with a few days a week spent working in Elementary and Middle Schools as a paraeducator III (working with students with ‘disabilities’) and wood work + a wood class I teach once a week @ UCD Craft Center. I’ll sign off for now – but, stay tuned…I’ll be posting more blogs soon!!!…warning, this is kind of a long slideshow (>16 mins?)…I figured 6 months is worth 16 minutes of photos, so be patient….
Fall_ once again_2015
Greetings from Davis, CA…
Keeping with the tradition of the past few years, I made a quick trip to the Eastern Sierra Nevada of California to see the Fall colors and to spend time in areas between roughly Bridgeport, CA and Bishop, CA. My first trip to the Eastern Sierra, I believe, was in 1986 while I was traveling solo in the SF area and I found my way out to Tuolumne Meadows via hitch-hiking into Yosemite from the Bay Area; that is a tale unto itself. After hiking around Tuolumne Meadows, learning some rock-climbing, and enjoying the vistas of Half Dome and other big granite features (none of which I take for granite…jejejeje) – I got a tip to check out Lee Vining and Mono Lake from some fellow hikers. So, I hitched up and down Tioga Pass and had my first experience in the Eastern Sierra and Mono Lake environs about 30 years ago!
For anyone who has never dropped down from the High Sierra (or the West side of the Sierra Nevada) into the Great Basin/High Desert areas of the Eastern Sierra, all I have to say is – go check it out if you like sagebrush, hot springs, huge lakes (i.e. Mono Lake) filled with birds, and wide panoramas of desert and mountains. When I arrived in Davis, CA in 1994, I was able to make a quite few trips into the Sierra and Eastern Sierra and I was fortunate to have a friend or two who helped me learn about and explore this special part of California.
Having grown up on the Northeast coast of the US where each season is full of changes in weather and especially things like Fall colors and deciduous trees dropping their leaves, I guess that is part of what leads me to get out and about in the Fall. Over the years, I have been to many places multiple times in this area such as; The Bristlecone Forest in the White Mountains, various trails and hikes all along/above route 395, many hot springs, Bridgeport, Bishop, Mammoth, a few of the massive sand dunes (i.e. Kelso…), the Alabama Hills, Owens Valley and River, and more!…. there is a lot to see/explore.
Seeing the gulls, shorebirds, grebes, and various raptors this trip around Mono Lake always inspires. One photo that stood out was of a falcon that came whizzing toward a pond near a hot spring – I was pretty sure it was a falcon so I started to shoot it as it approached…when it flew into a group of ducks flying over the pond, I didn’t realize it had struck one of them! When I looked back at the photos, I saw it had a duck in its talons, then dropped it mid-flight. Long-billed curlews, Avocets, Ibis, and Northern Harriers were also good sights to see.
Often, this time of year leads to some reflection and I think about the past year and experiences of the past. When I chose the James Taylor music to throw into this slide-show (I used JT last year as well for Fall_2014), I was reminded of the 9/11 tragedy in NYC and how JT sang ‘You can close your eyes’ as part of a memorial service at ground zero. Having grown up partly in NYC, I often reflect on the life in a big city and the vast difference of say being in wide-open spaces such as the Basin and Ranges of the Eastern Sierra vs. walking the city streets in the ‘concrete jungle’. I also consider the fact that two people from my high school (of a 300 student school) died that day (9/11/01) and the many other people family and friends knew who also died that day. Perhaps such thoughts are a reminder to me to make what I can of time and days and may help me keep perspective on daily life – not only for myself but for anyone else’s life/days in this world.
As I have finally landed in to my Fall-Winter sub-let, I am feeling more settled now after two weeks of having a more solid home-base! This post is a bit delayed in uploading, but better late than never? 19 seasons of field work has its ups and downs, and moving from place to place, State to State, and even country to country I think is beginning to tire me out a little more….I will be able post Season #3 @ USGS later today, I think. From Davis in the second rains of the Fall, I send a farewell for now….
Panama Trip – The Final Part – III
Hola Hola –
This is the last post for this set from Panama. I put in a few short cuts of the camera video I took this time to spice things up. Seeing the Three-toed sloths moving in the Cecropia trees was great fun – shared some of that in video. The Kinkajou, too, was awesome to watch – these nocturnal mammals move about in trees with a smooth grace and confidence that rivals most of the monkeys I have seen in the tropics. In this series, I also threw in a few more photos from Barro Colorado – Smithsonian’s Tropical Research Area. When we got off the boat, our guide introduced us to one person who had been working on the Island with Smithsonian practically since the site became a research center. He reminded me of a man, Don Ramos, we would meet each year at the Darwin Station on Santa Cruz Island before we went off to Española Island – Don Ramos, similarly had been with the Darwin Station since it began and must have been about 70 yrs old the last time I went to Galapagos (2007). Don Ramos would get us into the long-term gear storage areas and help us with every aspect of preparing to be on Española for as long as 7-8 months. Neat to see people like this who stick with something so long!
If you listen to the section of video with the Orb spider wrapping up some prey, you’ll hear the typical Howler Monkey calls of the tropics. Howlers are fairly common in Central American rainforest areas – I love their sounds. I tried to put more species of birds we saw into this set as well. It was great to wake up in the morning, go to the roof, and just sit there and see what birds might show up – the Cecropia had fruits/seed pods that tons of wildlife were eager to eat. This set of photos shows birds like the female honeycreeper, the palm tanager, the Flatbill (a flycatcher), a Rufous-tailled Hummingbird, a Green Kingfisher, a couple of the Antwrens (one with a huge grasshopper it had caught), a Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan (brownish-purple lower mandible stripe), a Jacana with its young, and more Keel-billed Toucans (one is preening with its huge bill). The sleeping sloth is a Two-toed sloth – a good role model for anyone who is overworked/ing. The views and panoramas were extensive and nearly unbroken rainforest (most is secondary forest actually, but it is in good shape and much of it is preserved as part of the national park). Seeing the wet sloths day after day curled up in the branches touched me – they were tough and patient creatures. They would just curl up into a ball and sit there for hours if not a day until the rain would let up – quite a sight. Sloths have a poor diet and mainly eat leaves – this is why they move so slowly – they don’t have good energy from food, and perhaps this is just part of who they are? The iridescent morpho butterflies have always evaded open wing flying shots by me – not sure I will ever get one – but, one did land and you can see the bluish tint of its inner wings. Neat sights when they fly through the rainforest!!! If you watch the egg mass of a Red-eyed Tree Frog, you can see the tadpoles beginning to move about. That is life and development; just awesome!!! Also in here is a family of Capybara – the largest rodents in the world!!! They are rainforest mammals that are hunted by some for food. Neat to see the adult and young. You can see in the first slide that the United States Military first built this tower and it belonged to USA for a good time. Eventually the radar tower was shut down (not that long ago really) – and Panama became the owner of it (from what I understand). The vision of turning it into a eco-lodge with a focus on birds was a great idea and the idea became a reality. Such a neat idea and a cool place to spend some down time – just spending time on the roof is wonderful. That’s it for now…adios.
Panama’s Canopy Tower – Part II
Hello Hello and Hola Hola –
Welcome back to Panama Trip – Canopy Tower – Sept 3-11th, 2015. Here is the next set of slides for you all. As I watched/edited the iMovie, it was easy to see how amazing life is just by looking at the images of things I saw in a short 8-day period!! Just to give you some perspective of an average day for me at Canopy Tower, I will just describe the routine:
Wake up at 5-530am or so (wow, pretty early for a “vacation”), get up to the roof by sunrise – or better yet – before sunrise, begin listening to the morning chorus of insects, birds, howler monkeys, start taking photos of birds feeding in the eye-level tops of the Cecropia trees that nearly touch the tower, grab a cup of coffee from the table on roof that has just been set up with coffee and tea, descend from roof for a delicious breakfast, take a few more pictures of any birds or perhaps the sloths visible from the dining room/living room/kitchen level 3 of tower, get ready for excursion, drive to morning site, walking, birding, wildlife viewing, taking photos, back to tower for delicious lunch, but – before lunch spot green iguanas and lizards in Canopy vegetation = take more photos, then eat, break time, up to roof for photos and wildlife watching, rest, rehydrate, get ready for afternoon trip, off to Pipeline Rd, birding, looking for wildlife, taking photos, looking at birds through scope/binoculars, back to Canopy, rest, delicious dinner, sunset on roof perhaps, resting, 7-9pm looking for night mammals with swiss-germans who have awesome spot-flashlight, photos of Kinkajou/night-monkeys, download images to iPad to see how they are turning out, share some photos through WiFi of Canopy Tower, sleep. Repeat daily.
Well, this set of photos shows more of the neat things we encountered around the Canopy, on the way to and on Barro Colorado Island, and at various local sites. I particularly enjoyed seeing the iguanas feeding in the local Cecropia trees, various colorful lizards prowling the vegetation along the fence, the night mammals like the the Kinkajous and Night Monkeys, perched and flying raptors – such as the Black Hawk-Eagle (photos), Short-tailed Hawk, and the Semiplumbeous Hawk (photo), the leaf frogs (some smaller than my fingernail (photo), and the common aquatic and wading birds one sees in the tropics like Jacana, Common Moorhen (photo), and Tiger Herons (photo). Birds like Black-Breasted Puffbird (photo), various kingbirds (tropical, photo), and flycatchers (Flatbill, photo) appeared in the local trees around the Canopy and on walks. Thanks to the few birds and wildlife that posed nicely for photos! If birds weren’t abundant or appearing at all, other wildlife often drew our attention in. Butterflies, leaf-cutter ants, howler monkeys, red-eyed tree frog larvae (tadpoles, photo), leaf bugs (photo), and various small to medium size lizards were fun to observe and take photos of. Seeing the night mammals ended up being fairly common as a few people were keeping and eye out for moving branches or shining a light into trees at night to look for movement. One Kinkajou spent nearly an hour wandering around the trees next to the Tower searching for ripe Cecropia fruits/seeds to eat. I will post some video of that in Part III. I think the images here show how diverse, beautiful, and amazing the tropical wildlife is – and this is just an hour from downtown Panama City!!! Really cool stuff. Looking forward already to another trip south before too long!!!!
Año Nuevo Elephant Seal colony
Greetings woofers fans!!
Here’s another post to keep the ball rolling. Last year (January 2014) at Año Nuevo State Park just south of the town Pescadero on the California coast, they opened the Elephant Seal viewing areas for an extended time as part of a special coastal conservation event. Each year during breeding season, guided tours are offered for a limited time of 2 hours or so to view the Elephant seals. The day I went we had 4 hours to go in and see the seals as well as to photograph as much as we liked. There were plenty of baby seals and hundreds of adults all over the beaches. A few of the bull seals were engaged in small fights, but I still haven’t seen the really rough fighting that leaves the bulls scarred and bloody. You can see some of this scarring in a photo or two, I think. Two seals were wearing GPS/time depth loggers on their heads; these sorts of devices have revealed amazing things about the ecology of these amazing marine mammals. Two major things such units have uncovered is the huge travel distances and depth of dives these seals make. The seals may appear fairly sedentary and lazy in the pictures, but in reality some of these huge seals travel distances in the 1000s of miles at sea each year while away from the breeding rookery. The seal pups hardly looked small – they were already getting fat and growing fast from some of the highest fat content milk any mammal gets as a newborn. Some of the large bull seals had a big funny looking (and elephant like) proboscis making them look quite cartoonish to me. For the most part, the breeding season is a lazy time spent on the beach for these seals – except for the battling the males engage in for control of a harem. It also a tough time for the seals for females especially, as they are not eating much of the breeding and pupping season. As the morning was warming up, many seals were flinging sand onto themselves to help stay cool or perhaps to also shoo away flies. It was fairly easy to get good photos of the seals as the viewing areas have platforms or trails that get you within a few meters of some of the resting seals. Out in the bay there were a couple of sea-otters floating in the waves and kicking back on their backs – which seems to be one of their pastimes. On the way home North, I stopped by Pescadero beach – as the waves were really breaking nicely. This was a Mavericks surf competition year and in fact, which means wave action was big. The sun, wind, and waves were aligned well – and as a result there were spectacular shows of refracting light from the wave mist and sun. I threw in a few photos of the light show here as well. Really amazing. It was a day well spent with the Elephant Seals, the coastal area, and it’s always fun to go see some of the fine woodwork in the town of Pescadero at one of their galleries. No major bells and whistles or country music in this slide-show, just some photos in an area I enjoy visiting from time to time.
Take care, and stay tuned….
USGS Season #2 – Finale
Greetings and welcome back to woofersthedog blog!!!
I have no excuses for not posting for a long-long time. I do have plenty of content I could/should be posting, but I haven’t been sitting down at the computer a whole lot in the past 5 months. This post is quite similar to my mid-field season post I put up a while back while in San Diego – and, even some of the photos are duplicates. But, this post fills in some of the missing links of the work I did in San Diego from late March – August, 2014. Most bird photos here showing birds-in-hand are from the 5 MAPS (Monitoring Avian Productivity and Survivorship) stations that USGS runs during the field season (all in San Diego County). The MAPS project is one of many avian studies being worked on during the migration and breeding season for the neotropical migrant and resident birds we encounter/work with. The core project from March-August is the surveying and monitoring of Least Bell’s Vireos (LBVIs) and Southwestern Willow Flycatchers (SWWFLs) found in the various study areas (Cactus Wrens and California Gnatcatchers are also worked on by some). AnyWHO, you’ll see a little of everything from field season #2 (for me) in this short 10 minute musically enhanced slideshow/video. I wanted to give an idea of how amazing and light many small songbirds are by comparing the mass of various coins to the mass of many of the birds we work with. You can see birds like a Bushtit (the bird in photo with a sort of devilish look and white in its iris) or the Warblers (many of the smaller/colorful birds shown here) weigh in at only 5-10 grams!!! How amazing is it that such a small and light bird can migrate thousands of miles each year during Spring and Fall migration to/from their North American breeding grounds on the wing using just a few grams of stored fat! Many of these small birds head south & over-winter in places like Central America and South America – it’s sort of too bad they don’t earn frequent flier miles, imagine how many miles they could have earned!
This season was the year of big fires in San Diego County – a few of which were on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton. MCBCP is one of the main study sites for the LBVI and SWFL studies as well as where 2 MAPS stations are. The fires were intense and wiped out huge areas of habitat. In fact, we were running a MAPS station when some of the first fires were detected on MCBCP and began to run wild – thankfully, we were evacuated from our site within hours of this and we were safe. Sadly, due to the fires, many of the active bird territories/pairs disappeared at many field sites. During the 2015 field season (approaching fast) it will be interesting to see how the burn areas have rebounded.
Overall, it was a tough year for the birds with the long-term California draught and the big fires ;-(
I’ve added a few pop-up comments here and there in photo-stream as usual and the rest speaks for itself. Music by Sarah Jarosz and Casey Chambers chosen as I saw Sarah open for Casey last year in Santa Cruz, CA – both great bands to see. And, since I think we all have a little country in our roots/spirits – I added a little OMG!….play it again….play it again…..play it again!
I promise to have a second post in the next few days, but it’ll just be a mass of Elephant Seal photos from Ano Nuevo, CA circa 2014
Fall in California_2014
Greetings and happy Fall to all from the scenic Marin Headlands,
This hostel has just tripled in residents and added ten times its human energy recently – as 24 eighth graders from The Dunn School of Santa Barbara area have inundated the place!! The Marin Headlands Hostel and Headlands have been a good home-away-from-homelessness lately – and I am approaching my second year in a row of maxing out the 14 days/year limit of stay in the hostel. Hawk Hill is a short walk up the hills, Rodeo beach is about a 15 minute walk away, and exploratory cliff hikes and coastal trails abound in all directions (as well as a few free campgrounds many people do not know about). It’s hard to believe this hostel and the Marin Headlands are only a few miles from the huge population of the greater SF Bay Area. It is a gem of a spot. (Please don’t tell too many people about the free campsites!)
This post covers last week’s trip to the Eastern Sierra and has a few added photos from Hawk Hill. I have been going over and up to the Eastern Sierra/Sierra on and off for about 20 years. I first went there after hitch-hiking from San Francisco to Yosemite when I was ~17. After a week in Tuolumne Meadows, I ventured over Tioga Pass to see the Mono Lake area and Lee Vining – a nice experience. After a dozen or so trips out to this area, I am always glad to return there!
I was hoping to see some Fall colors this recent trip, and I was not let down. Having grown up in the Northeast, I think I have an ingrained desire to experience Fall – to feel cool/cold air, see leaves changing colors, and to feel the weather moving towards winter. Back East, these changes all came locally and at greater extremes (I just had to go to the front or back yard). In California, the changes are less dramatic I find – so, I make such voyages to the Sierra/Eastern Sierra to get closer to extremes. AnyWHO, Here’s the low down of this recent trip:
Mono Lake had a fair amount of Eared Grebes paddling about the shorelines and the yearly census was being done by plane while I was camped nearby (over 250,000 eared grebes use the lake each year during migration). I found one grebe flopping across the road about 6 miles from Mono Lake; this bird was nearly hit by a car in front of me. I was able to pick the bird up without a chase and transported it to the lake where it happily paddled away from me! Colorful sunsets were the norm at Mono – awesome. I have a simple spot I camp where I can see most of the lake while also being hidden away and protected in some pines. After two nights at Mono, I dropped down into the Mammoth and Bishop areas to find a new hot spring I had never been to and to explore some forests near Mammoth. The hot spring was the best I have been too and camping was simple nearby amongst the sage. A morning soak in this spring preceded the drive up to a nearby forest. It was obvious the birds at one campground/forest had habituated to humans (i.e. free food) – one Red-breasted Nuthatch landed on me and let me hold it! Cool, but not a good sign. Nuthatches, Mountain chickadees, and a Williamson’s Sapsucker (thought it was a Yellow-bellied until I looked at Sibley book today!!) decided to pose for me nicely. Many Red-shafted Flickers were not as cooperative for photography. After a few hours up in the Ponderosa and White Fir forests I headed back up towards Lee Vining.
I explored Lundy Canyon and the Parker Lake trail to see what Fall had to offer there. The Aspens in both areas were really on fire. I think the polarizing-filter I usually have on my lens brightened the greens, blues, yellows, oranges, and reds a little – but, the colors were naturally vibrant and contrasted nicely. Up at Parker Lake, male and female Bufflehead were paddling about in the reflected yellows of the Aspen leaves. Eared Grebes were also up on that lake paddling about. Since the trail wanders along the creek, I was able to see some trout and an American Dipper enjoying their time in the shadows/shallows. After a fairly eventful hike up to Parker Lake, I went back to my private camp near Mono Lake. A colorful sunset finished the day. The night was a little crazy as a mouse decided to spend the night running about my truck bed (where I often sleep) scrounging for food (which is usually very animal-safe in my Ammo Boxes!). The following morning, I found the mouse sitting among my supplies content to have found an apple I hadn’t stashed. Later, before revving up to drive back to Davis, I checked my engine compartment and there was the mouse again (or another one?) looking up at me. Hopefully, the mouse did not jump off the car at 60 mph somewhere mid-highway!
All-in-all it was a good, quick, and typical trip to one of my favorite spots of California. I hope you enjoy the show/fotos…music by brother James (Taylor)…James, I find/feel does a good job of embodying the feelings of Fall, freedom, and joie-de-vivre in his music (East Coaster) – all things that trips to the Eastern Sierra can bring if you enjoy your time there.
California_offshore_2014
Greetings from the flatlands of Davis, CA!!!
I thought it would be good to post a compilation slideshow of a few recent pelagic trips I went on. Two trips were taken this past week out of Half Moon Bay, CA and then out of Monterey, CA. A few other photos in this show are from a trip I took with my mom out of Dana Point, CA in August.
The Dana Point trip was with Ocean Institute – a blue whale trip that they run this time of year when the Blue Whales are feeding fairly near-shore. We saw a few Blue Whales surfacing and had one “fluke-up”. We also passed by a decent size pod of Common Dolphins on this 2.5 hr trip. Dolphins have been regular sightings on most pelagic trips I have been on recently…awesome to see every time – especially when they bow ride the boat!!
The Half Moon Bay and Monterey Bay trips were with Shearwater Journeys. In total for the past two trips, we spent about 18 hours at sea. The highlights of the trips are in the slideshow here. Learning to photograph birds in flight is something I am trying to get a hang of. Being on a rolling boat/ocean and trying to track whirling seabirds is a challenge, but I am managing at least to get a few birds in focus or at least somewhat decently framed or silhouetted (I hope). For me, some of the good sightings on these two trips included: A few Black-footed Albatross, Rhinoceros Auklets, Cassin’s Auklets, Sabine’s Gulls, Red-necked Phalaropes, 1000’s of Black-vented Shearwaters, Sooty Shearwaters, Pomarine and Parasitic Yaegars, a dead South Polar Skua (brought on board), many Common Murre – some with chicks, Stellar Sea-lions, Northern Fur Seals, many groups of feeding California Sea-lions, California (Bull) Sea-lion feeding on an Ocean Sunfish, dozens of Ocean Sunfish (Mola Mola), a pod of Risso’s Dolphins off Monterey, a breaching Humpback whale, and many California Sea-otters mostly near-shore. In-between wildlife sightings, there was lots of open water without a lot of activity. It was interesting during quiet spells to look over the side of the boat, especially in Monterey Bay, and see a variety of jellyfish, salps, and many mola mola – some of which we were able to pull up in a small dip-net and look at up close. All-in-all, the trips were a good way to get to know the California near and off-shore environment.
Without the many sets of eyes on these boats, some things would pass many of us by. The leaders on the trip as well as many experienced birders helped those of us (like me) who are not that familiar with all the seabirds to get on birds and get better looks at them before they wheeled off away from the boat. The true experts on the boats would identify birds 1/4 to 1/2 mile out at times – which was always amazing to me. On one trip we had Jon Dunn, Peter Pyle, and Steve NG Howell as just 3 of the 5-6 leaders. These people are all known in the bird world (and beyond) as some of the most knowledgeable folks out there in terms of bird identification/ecology as well as great all-around naturalists from all the time they must spend in the field. Check out Steve NG Howell’s new book about Flyingfish – the photos alone are incredible!!! Pretty cool to see the actual people who wrote the bird books many of us use in the field (i.e. Pyle Guide, Birds of Mexico, Bird-finding Guide to Mexico….).
I will admit that I found the days at sea pretty tiring. Ten hours is a long time to be at sea – and, when you also add three hours of driving to the day – it does add up. Thankfully, the weather and sea cooperated pretty well and our captains did a great job of maneuvering us around all day so we could all get good looks at all there was to see!! It’s pretty amazing to me that we actually get to see some birds like the Rhinoceros Auklets and Cassin’s Auklets – they are fairly small seabirds sometimes hidden in rolling swells, fog, and wide areas of view. Again, thanks to the experienced birders on the boat, we were able to see many of these birds.
That’s it for now. I am definitely grateful to live here in California and am always amazed at the natural world this state has to offer…..enjoy the slideshow….music by Black Eyed Peas – “Where is the Love?”
Apu_Ausangate_et_al_2
Greeting and Hola, Hola from Davis, CA – bicycling capital of the world…
I’ll wrap up this two-part series now for you. So, after two relatively easy/short days of hiking around Ausangate, two long/hard days followed. But, like I said, the effort was worth it as the views were incredible in all directions. The Apu (Ausangate) became a massive snowy-white and glacier covered mountain on The North Face (where the sun hits mountains less usually). Some of the glacial moraines extended great distances from the existing glaciers and glacial lakes – signs that this mountain and its glaciers were quite a bit bigger a long time ago. After our third day of two high passes, our fourth day had only one high pass – the highest of the route. According to Sophie’s GPS it wasn’t quite 5,200 meters as maps showed it to be, but it was quite close (over 5,100 meters). A few new mountain peaks appeared as we rounded the North Face (back) of Ausangate – one of these mountains is called “Mariposa” (The Butterfly). This was a massive mountain with a long series of summits. Later that day, we ran into three mountaineers who had just climbed the mountain! Wow! Although the climbing season is actually later in the year, some people still climb during the dry season.
In the photos here you can see the type of dwellings we stayed in. The adobe house that seems to blend right into the hillside was my favorite. The thatched roof matched the opposing hillside and the adobe was like an extension of the brown earth the house was built on – that is how many of the alpaca herder homes look. The alpacas were in herds on many hillsides. They meander around eating grasses and occasionally were being moved around by herders and their scruffy dogs. Most alpaca could be approached to within a few meters as they don’t seem too scared of humans. Mixed in with some alpaca there were a few llamas and Vicuna were sighted up high on our final pass. Although the passes were tough, the excitement of making it to the final saddles overcame some of the exhaustion and a sense of euphoria developed in me (typical of making to the “top”). I loved being up at those high saddles knowing we’d made it – and, the views were pretty great from up high. The final pass was filled with light sleet and snow for the final stretch – making the hike feel quite adventurous as we ducked our heads to avoid being pummeled with falling snow and hail. The last pass (photo) was filled with hundreds of cairns (rock pyramids). Here, our guide made a few small offerings with coca leaves to the Apu. Ausangate, being a sacred mountain in the region, receives a lot of blessings, offerings, and sacred praise by those who visit. A few small crystal clear spring fed lakes on the final day were also sites where Ausangate receives blessings and where rituals are carried out (by shamans, locals, …).
After the high pass, we began our long one-and-a-half day descent back to Tinque. There were plenty of alpaca to be seen on the descent including a few rare long-haired alpaca. These long-haired alpaca supposedly have quite valuable wool. At the end of the fourth day, we arrived at the ‘termales’ (thermal hot springs) – a small town where two large spring-fed hot tubs have been made. Soaking in a hot-spring was a great way to end a long day hiking! Later, once gain, our meal was cooked for us and we settled in for the night. Finally, after a few days of not feeling like eating a lot, I was eating everything I was served (altitude often lowers the appetites of people high up in mountains – I think feeling sick and this effect definitely had me eating less than usual). Before going to sleep, one of the local weavers came in with all sorts of hand-made woven alpaca textiles – we each bought a few things to take home and to support the local community. The hand-made alpaca textiles (hats, blankets, scarves, etc)….are all quite a treat to see especially when you know the person who made them probably raised the alpaca, spun the wool into yarn, dyed the yarn, and then did the knitting or weaving to turn it into something warm and beautiful.
The final day, we hiked downhill for three hours to the town of Tinque. Don Basilio and his wife lead the way. Seeing Don Basilio’s wife spinning her bag of alpaca wool into yarn fascinated me. She was spinning from the moment she came to meet us the night before and continued all the way down the hill – twisting the wool, spinning it, and then collecting it on her spindle. As we approached the more civilized town, we gave away the last of our snacks to kids who appeared on the road. Some say this is a bad habit, but I don’t think it was wrong to give out some left-over tamales, bread, fruit, candies, power bars, and such to the kids. It is a tough life some people live high up in the Andes – as was easy to see in one of the youngest boys in one troop that met us on the road – his feet were fairly dried up, cut, and cracked from regular bare-foot or basic-sandle life stomping around the highlands. The bright sun and dry air have their effects on the body for sure.
In Tinque, we ran across a bunch of men skinning freshly killed alpaca. Alpaca meat is a staple and makes for a good steak. One skin was just being finished as we approached. You can see how small the carcass actually is and how much wool is on one of the high mountain camelids. The final hours on the road also showed how important adobe is in Latin America in general – everywhere adobe bricks were being formed and dried in the sun. This is the building block of life here for sure. Once in Tinque, we said our fair-well to Don Basilio and rode a bus down to Cusco – about three hours down the mountains.
In Cusco, the final day was filled with a parade in the making which we caught some of. This also coincided with the very ceremonial raising of the Peruvian and Inca flags (rainbow colors). The parade just started rolling as we grabbed a taxi to the airport for the flight back to Lima. I snapped a few photos of the drummer boys and tambourine girls before jumping in the taxi. For the most part, I think I have covered “all the news, that’s fit to print”. I could write A LOT more for sure….For now, signing off and preparing to go out to sea two times this week out of Half Moon Bay and Monterey – so, stay tuned for that tall-tale later….thanks for reading/viewing….dst
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- Peruvian and Inca flags in main square
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- Parade in main square of Cusco
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- The little drummer boys!!
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- Apu Ausangate from the Northeast
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- Apu and alpaca – morning, day 4
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- East face of Ausangate
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- Awesome trekkers hut – night three of trek
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- Our hut for the night – naturally, adobe
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- Alpaca and young
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- Multi-colored alpaca- smile!
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- Glowing summit
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- The path up to the pass
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- The North Face of Ausangate
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- Emerald colored lake
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- Distant views – high mountains
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- High Andes alpaca “ranchito”
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- Adobe “ranchito” high in Andes
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- Early morning ice
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- Mariposa in afternoon light
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- “Mariposa” (The butterfly) – neighbor of Ausangate
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- Ausangate and glacier lake
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- North Face glacier lake – huge glacial walls
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- Alpaca starting their day
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- The highest pass – relief and joy
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- Herd of alpaca near pass
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- Sacred fresh-water spring
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- Long-haired alpaca
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- Horse train returning to Tinque
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- Alpacas and typical Andean home
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- Still spinning away!!
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- Tinque kids and puppy
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- Child size road block in formation
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- Four on motorcycle, no problem!!
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- High Andes sparrow
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- Drying adobe bricks
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- Colorful new adobe house, Tinque
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- Traditional dress of Tinque woman
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- More freshly made adobe
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- Final stretch into Tinque
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- Alpaca carcass and skin
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- Freshly cut alpaca skins
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- Skinning an alpaca
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- Spinning alpaca thread/yarn
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- Turning wool into thread/yard
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- Spinning, spinning, and spinning
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- Don Basilio and his wife leading the way
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- Tinque woman and child
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- Unloading the horses, day 4.
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- Our faithful horses
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- High Andes bird
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- Hot springs at end of trek!!
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- View from hot springs, night 4.
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- The trekking route around Ausangate
Peru_Apu_Ausangate_et_al_1
Hola, Hola! Greetings from the foggy mountain Marin Headlands – Golden Gate paradise….
I have just returned from a quick trip (Sept 3rd-16th) to Peru that began with my traditional public transit route of Davis, CA Amtrak to Richmond BART to SFO airport – which was then followed with fights from SFO to Lima, Peru and from Lima –> Cusco, Peru and back. Oh yes, there was also a 5-day trek out of Tinque, Peru around the highest mountain in the region, Apu Ausangate. This first of two posts starts in Cusco and ends part-way around the Apu (Sacred Mountain) – Apu Ausangate.
As I have reported on Lima in past posts, I will skip right to Cusco – a new place on the map for me. Cusco is a huge city high up there in the low Andes. The city of Cusco is located at about 3,400 meters (11,200 ft) – which means lowlanders like me coming from sea-level need to take it easy the first few days to acclimatize to the relatively high altitude and thin air. The city of Cusco sprawls in all directions, up the hillsides surrounding the main center, and feels like a busy Latin American city. This is a tourist-minded town and foreigners are about as common as locals it seemed. Never-the-less, trips to the local market and into outskirts of the city take one out of the tourist mindset and into the regular day-to-day life of Cuscenos. The main market just out of the center is a fascinating place – my favorite part of it being the fresh juice aisle where dozens of ladies manning their juice stalls try to lure you in for a fresh drink. Pick any combination of tropical fruits and they’ll make you one tasty treat! For the first two days, I mainly ate delicious food at local restaurants, looked at tons of amazing alpaca goods, and rested. After a couple of days of resting in Cusco, we took a trip out-of-town to see some local Inca ruins.
Not far from Cusco is the Sacred Valley – where we visited the ancient Inca ruins of Pisac and Ollantaytambo. Both show the intricate and precise stone-work the Incas somehow were able to accomplish a long time ago without modern tools. The ruins were fun to explore and walk up, down, and around. Unfortunately, somehow during this day I picked up a bit of a cold (perhaps from change in altitude, cooler weather, some rain, or ??) – this for sure haunted me for the week to follow. Ugh!
Because I felt so sick after a long day in the Sacred Valley, I postponed my start date of the Ausangate trek by 24 hrs. After 24 hrs rest, I decided to go for it – even though I was a little uncertain how I would deal with the high altitudes with a bit of a respiratory infection running through me! In the end, it all worked out as you can see from the photos here. There were three of us on the trek. Myself, Sophie (a German tour-guide by profession), and Don Basilio our horseman and guide. We also had two horses to help haul our gear for the entire trek – thank-you horses!
Ausangate is a big and high mountain. At 6,384 meters (20,945 feet), it is the highest mountain in the region. Our trek topped out at third and final pass somewhere close to 5,200 meters, which for me was the highest I have been above sea-level. The hiking was fairly easy the first two days as we only walked for about 2-3 hrs those days to get acclimated. On the third and fourth days, we earned the spectacular views all around us by hiking nearly 10 hours both days. Hiking over two passes on the third day definitely took some effort – as after the first pass, we descended into the valley and then went right back up again to about 5,000 meters for our second pass. The only other sightings of humans on the second half of the hike were a couple of groups of trekkers/mountaineers and the alpaca herders with their alpacas. Alpaca were almost everywhere on most hillsides – they are obviously a key part of the livelihood for this region. The views of each side of Ausangate changed with each face. The East and South Faces were less snow-covered than the North Face which you’ll see in part II. Up high on all its faces, Ausangate is all snow-covered and an incredible mountain to see. For most of the route, there was usually an established trail/route on solid rock or dirt/scree. For some sections, we did a bit of cross-country walking – but it was never difficult terrain. The hardest parts were the long inclines that went up and up to the passes – during these sections it seemed like I would take a step maybe every second, but not much faster. At night, we stayed in great adobe houses that belong to the locals or are part of the trekking circuit.
For now, I think I’ll just put this post up with the following photos and I will finish up with the next post with some more tall-tales of the trip and another set of photos as well.
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- Cusco city panorama
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- Looking down into Cusco center
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- Cusco center
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- Cusco – ladies and lamb
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- VW goes Burgers & Pizza
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- Cusco – flowers in market
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- Pig heads in Cusco market
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- Who needs refrigeration?
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- Contrasts in life
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- Kid in a blanket
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- Cusco kids
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- Typical child on back
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- Flowers at museum
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- Giant hummingbird
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- Hummingbird heaven
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- Animals in grass – ruins
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- Night sky with Inca figures
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- Radiating points from center (Inca)
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- The natural shades of alpaca
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- View into the Sacred Valley
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- Looking up at Pisac ruins
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- Inca ruins of Pisac
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- Typical colorful indigenous woman
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- Fresh orange juice!!
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- The Inca ruins of Ollantaytambo
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- Inca stonework
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- Incredible stonework
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- Registration point for trek
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- First day leaving Tinque
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- Ausangate behind the town
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- Loading up our horses – second day
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- Staring contest with alpacas
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- View at our guide’s home
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- Can you see me?
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- home construction and big skies
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- Trekking up our first hills
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- South face of Apu Ausangate
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- Glacier fed lake
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- Flowering cactus in highlands
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- The view from my bed
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- High Andes birds
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- A break before our next pass
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- Sophie resting her bones
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- our faithful horses
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- big rocks in remote hills
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- heading up to the pass
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- looking down the wet valley
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- Alpacas are everywhere!
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- More alpaca
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- mountain, alpacas, and clouds
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- Sophie checking altitude on GPS
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- Big lake below Ausangate
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- Cloudy day in Andes
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- High mountains view
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- Ausangate panorama
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- Big green lake – north side
This blog revolves around just about anything I happen to be doing, it documents places I travel to, and it is a place to share my interests with others online.
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