March 11-13 -- The Portal St. Patrick's Day Parade, And A Day In The Life

I think I'll compress the events and photos of the past 3 days into one. Easier for me that way... One of the wonders of living in a remote part of a Basin and Range valley is the lack of lights during the nighttime. I can look out my kitchen window, and see blackness and 3 lights at most. It's one of the reasons why astronomers come to live at Sky Village here as there are few if any lights to disturb their night sky observations. (One of the first things I did when I bought Faranuf was to angle the motion sensor lights around the house, and there are quite a few, down to the ground as the house is only a few miles from Sky Village and can disrupt their viewing.) Here is said view from my kitchen window, taken just as the predawn light brightens the sky to the east --

The darkened mountain range are the Peloncillos in New Mexico, which form the east edge of the San Simon Valley. After seeing this photo, a Facebook friend said it was too dark for her, but she lives in or near New York City. She finds it oppressive, I find it clean and liberating, no sign of so-called "civilization" to be seen. Well, except for that power pole, but it serves a dual purpose in that it's a good perch for ravens and raptors.  And here is looking in the same direction from the front porch -- 

I've always been a lover of Basin and Range topography, where you can gaze for perhaps a hundred miles and there are mountain ranges as far as the eye can see, with valleys in between.  It's probably why I was considering moving to the Owens Valley in the eastern Sierra, which is the western edge of the Great Basin and the Basin and Range and extends all the way to the Wasatch Mountains in Utah. Then I realized I could come and live in the Chiricahuas...

The backyard birds have been dogged by a juvenile Cooper's Hawk these past few days. I've either looked out the back, seen that there are no birds, then seen an intense-looking Cooper's hoping to snag a meal, or seen one flying in pursuit of a bird. The only thing I can do about it is provide the birds with more ground cover to hide in, which is why I planted the Desert Willow ad artemisia, but it will be a long time before they are large enough to provide shelter. But I haven't seen one bird snagged yet. Though I did have an odd and sad encounter with a Pine Siskin. They're numerous and ubiquitous right now, and will be until they head for their breeding grounds in about a months' time. One evening I was out near the north side of Faranuf and saw a Siskin huddled in a corner against the heat pump. I thought it was injured (they can get pretty vicious with each other at the nyger sock feeder) so I picked it up while wearing a pair of gloves -- and it took off, but then went back on the ground. Something was wrong with it; it looked as if it was trying to get a perch off the ground, possibly to find a place to sleep where it wouldn't be attacked and eaten by animals -- but it always ended back on the ground. It huddled against the house in different spots, and finally ended up near the concrete walkway leading to the garage. It looked like it was going to spend the night there, so I put a little box lined with Kleenex and some nyger seed next to it with the hope that it would still be there in the morning. When I checked around 6:30am the next day, all that was left were feathers; something had gotten to it during the night, poor thing. But it probably wouldn't have survived anyway. But it's one thing to come upon a bird that's already dead, and quite another to see it alive one day, try to help it, then know something had killed and plucked it after you'd vainly tried to help it. It was just one little Pine Siskin -- but it still got to me. Nature Red In Tooth And Claw... So the male Northern Cardinal, or A male Cardinal, returned to my back yard. Good!  I was determined to entice him to stay and become a Faranuf Resident. I finally got a good photo of him with my 500mm lens, even though he was at a feeder -- 

Things were looking quite promising -- then the javelina herd moved in, vacuumed all the seed up that was on or near the ground, and scared off the Cardinal, who never returned -- 

Dang javelina, they're worse than a Mongol horde....But I can't keep them out of my property, because that would keep other critters out, too, and I want to set up my "critter cam" near the far water feature to see what comes in at night. And the deer come and drink from it during the day. too. So I'll just have to put up with the Hoovering Javelina -- though I'm buying a few more seed trays on posts to keep as much seed out of their reach as possible. 

Saturday was the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade here in "downtown" Portal. It's another example of the fun and sociability that goes on in our little community. Here are some scenes from this important event on Portal' social calendar -- 

The parade starts with Portal Rescue fire truck, manned by volunteers (we have no county services, so we do it all ourselves) 

The fire truck is followed by the Portal Rescue "ambulance" -- 

The "Arizona Banjo Blasters" are a local musical group that, as this is the Age of the Internet, has their own website -- 

The Border Patrol have their representatives here, kitted in what looks like combat gear and driving really cool-looking ATVs -- 

Here's our new honorary mayor, Reed Peters, who owns the Cave Creek Ranch and is instrumental in many Portal activities. He's a man of many hats -- and he's wearing two of them here ;o) --

The parade goes to the end of Rock House Road, turns around, and heads right back down the parade route; this is our local kazoo band -- 

And a reminder of cookies and refreshments at the Portal Library, where there's also a sing-along of Irish music, and a presentation of the key to the community to Honorary Mayor Reed Peters. 

I attend the parade with friends Mark and Lori Conrad, who also retired from the South Bay of Los Angeles and moved to Portal. They're birders extraordinaire, and I take care of their house (Casa de Conrad) while they're gallivanting around the world, searching for birds and butterflies. I'm wearing a green hat and beads, too, though fortunately I'm behind the camera. 

My new spot for taking photos of the sunset is on Discovery II's roof; that way I'm above the surrounding trees, mesquite, etc. I can get some pretty good panoramic views from up there -- 

That's looking to the southwest with Faranuf's back yard in the foreground. (I can also check on there condition of the roof while I'm up there; I notice a few nails have pulled up on the back deck roof.) The clouds look promising, so I wait it out, and the colors pan out both to the east and west -- 

Looking northeast towards Granite Gap, through which Hwy 80 heads north to Interstate 10

The sunset pans out to the southwest 

And three more days have past -- just like that. Today, the 14th, is another Grocery Run To Douglas...