Back to Percha Dam State Park

We came the 1+ mile back to Percha Dam this morning. It really was a no brainer, about a one mile drive, what's to lose?  I'm happier with the park this time around for some reason. We don't have Fox or CBS on our antenna TV, which we got at Riverside/Cabello, but PBS comes through, and our Verizon phone and Internet are strong. 

We got a few drops of rain, and I think the weekend is supposed to be rainy, so I'm looking forward to that, and hope a little of it lands on the river. :)

A new bird sighting already!  This, I think, is a Summer Tanager.  I saw one the night we spent here before going to Caballo, but couldn't get a shot of it.  This morning I got tons of photos.  Here are two:

This morning we took a walk and there were some good clear animal prints along the path above the Rio Grande. The river is dry, but down a little way the water starts again.  It must be deeper there, so it hasn't dried up yet. The prints came up from the water and then along the path.  I think two of the prints are from a cat or canine type animal, one looks like a cloven hoof, and the other is a bird track.

Can you recognize the prints?  Any idea what animal made them?  Do I need to start taking my walking stick with us, just in case?  When I saw the cloven hoof type track, I was looking around for Javalinas - but I don't think they travel alone.  Are there coyotes here, bobcats?  I think I'll ask the camp host or ranger which animals are in the area.

This is also a new bird for me:

Orange-covered Jail Bird - male.  Three were spotted working in and around the restrooms.

Percha Dam looking up river.

Rio Grande looking downriver from the dam.

While in front of the dam looking through it, I wondered how I'd know if they released water. Then I saw this sign.

And this is the campground bird catcher:

 Pretty cat - I hope he's well fed at home.

Brown-headed Cowbird

Brown-headed Cowbird

From me and Katie, have a good Thursday evening, everyone!  :)

We are still at Riverside Campground

The weather has been so nice, we don't need anything, and our 14 days isn't up until tomorrow morning, so I decided to stay the full 14 days.

My generator started smoking Monday morning.  I brewed my coffee and turned it off.  The other day the red light was flashing in a three flash sequence, which means Service Required.  I have the name and phone number of an Onan repair/service shop in Albuquerque, which was going to be my next stop after Elephant Butte. One of the women came over and we were talking and the smoking generator came up.  Later her husband came over, asked me some questions, got his tools and oil, and changed my oil and cleaned up my oil filter.  I couldn't believe his generosity of time and supplies to do this for me. They were getting ready to leave and put off their departure until he finished and my generator was again good to go.  He said I won't need to go to Albuquerque for service on the generator.  It should be fine for a while, with a new filter the next time around. Having the generator taken care of took some pressure off me to leave this area.

I'm thinking I might go back to Percha Dam State Park, one of the premier birding sites in New Mexico, and stay for a bit.  I was standing above the river watching some birds at dusk last night, and two birders with binoculars were there and we started talking.  They were telling me about a great trail at Percha Dam, if you walk it at dusk there are some unusual birds to see, and I think I might do that.

Suddenly a huge flock of Ibis flew overhead.  I couldn't focus my zoom lens in time to get a photo, but it was something to see.  A huge, wide line in a kind of flat V shape.  The birders were so excited.  It was a beautiful evening - there were night hawks flying overhead, the killdeer was back in the river, as well as Spotted Sandpipers and another little flock of  birds swimming around and diving for food.

Here are the latest and greatest birds:

According to my field guide, the Black-necked Stilt may have the longest legs in the bird world in proportion to the body.  Such unusual looking birds, I enjoyed watching them wading in the water.

Yesterday Katie and I stalked a Great Blue Heron up the river.  It wouldn't let us get very close, but it was fun to watch him and see how close he would let us get.

Bullock's Oriole taking a bath in the river:

Coming out all wet - he was kept company by a little male House Finch on the right:

Here's a clearer shot of the Killdeer:

Northern Shoveler and Blue-winged Teal:

Red-winged Blackbird:

Spotted Sandpiper:

Tern - it was hard to get any closer - he just kept flying back and forth down the river and then back up.  He never stopped flying, just dove into the water a couple of times and kept going:

Here are a couple of birds I couldn't find in my guides, but I thought they were interesting looking:

House Sparrow (Thanks, Judy!)

Wilson's Phalarope (Thanks again, Judy!)

These birds were always in a group, swimming around and bobbing constantly for food under the water.

If you know what they are, please let me know. (And Judy left a message with both names, thank you!  I'd bet the House Sparrow is pretty common, but I've sure never seen the Wilson's Phalarope before.  They are very different looking, I wasn't sure if they are a duck or some other type of bird.)

I've had a visitor peeking in my windows - he scared the heck out of me, and Katie, too. I have a ladder covered with a large plastic bag attached to my motor home ladder.  He climbed up and perched on top of the plastic bag.  Katie started barking, looking at the kitchen, so I got up and went back.  I didn't see anything, then looked out the window at the same time the squirrel saw me and we both scared each other to high heaven.  He jumped down and I went outside and chased him away.  Yesterday he tried it again, but I heard him climbing up and went outside and around the back.  We again scared each other half to death.  He ran and I screamed.  Jeez, he and I have to stop meeting like this:

And finally - one last sunset from Riverside Campground - this shot is the southern sky, the sunset itself was gorgeous, but I don't have a clear view of it from my area.

And that's it from this campground.  I know I'm posting a lot of photos, but I probably have thousands that are in the "didn't post" file.  There are so many birds here to take pictures of, but I'm kind of into birds right now, so I wanted to post the best of the shots I've taken.

A big Welcome to our latest Follower, One Texans Travels!   Chris has a new blog, and says he doesn't get to travel much for pleasure, so the blog will only be updated occasionally, but it looks like it will be interesting when he does!  Thanks for following along with me and Katie, Chris, we are happy to have you aboard!  

From me and Katie - have a great Thursday tomorrow.  Next post will be from a different campground.  :)

Squirrels at play, new bird sightings and skunk update

The other morning I was in the kitchen making coffee when running squirrels caught my eye and I shot some photos out the kitchen window. They were playing, fighting, climbing, chasing and sitting atop the wooden poles that separate all the sites and are along the roads.These little critters are all over the place - hopefully I won't be taking one with me when I leave.

Squirrel fight.

Time out after the squirrel fight

They love to chase each other up and down these poles.

These guys were racing around.  There's always a squirrel running across the street and dashing up a tree.

I saw some new birds, some of the photos aren't very clear, but they were the best I could get. It was getting dark - again - and they were a little distance away. I didn't want to disturb them.  Lots of birds come to the river at dusk.

Northern Mockingbird.  There are lots of these guys in the park.

Yellow Warbler - male

Yellow Warbler - male

Duck and bird - sorry, I'm too tired to do any more research on these guys. I couldn't find them when I looked them up.

Killdeer from the front.

Killdeer from the side

Good old Robin - I didn't know they had white around their eyes. I've never seen one up close before.

Skunk update:  I asked my neighbor this afternoon if he had an update on the skunk.  He said it had a bit of a recovery.  It is still not strong on one side, but today it went through his site, across the street, through the very large RV Rally Site and off into the trees far away.  It was moving slowly, resting often, and then moving on again.

Maybe the rattler's poison wasn't enough to kill him and he is recovering.  My friend Pete said only 2 of 3 rattler strikes produce poison, so maybe he wasn't poisoned, just hurt by the bite.  I don't know, but I was happy to hear he seems to be doing okay and is GONE.  My neighbor said, though, that last night another skunk was in the campground, across the street from me, eating pizza with the neighbors.  He sounded serious.

Skunk drinking at the river below my neighbor's site.

Yesterday the skunk spent the day sleeping under my neighbor's car, and woke up shortly before I went over.  He took a long time to get to the river, right below the campsite, resting after each few feet, and he finally made it.  Good by, Skunk, and good luck!

I'm thinking about leaving tomorrow.  Our 14 days isn't up until Thursday morning, but I'm starting to think about moving on, I'll decide tomorrow.  You'll be the first to know.

Our sunset last night.

From me and Katie, have a great Sunday night, everyone!  :)

The unusual, beautiful, and scarey and sad

First, I want to show you the view out my dinette window:

Isn't this a great campsite?  So it's easy for me and Katie to walk down the gently sloping hill to the water, and then look right and left to see if anything interesting is feeding or walking along the edge of the Rio Grande.  (I still can't believe I'm living on the bank of the "Rio Grande.")

First the "unusual."

The other evening, we were standing at the top of the hill and I saw the weirdest looking ducks. I've never seen ducks this color before, so I took lots of photos.  I was losing the light, but still got some pretty good ones.

When I got back to The Palms, I got out my field guides and looked them up, but they weren't shown in the Birds of Arizona Field Guide, which has most of the birds I see.  Then I checked the Sibley Guide to Birds of Western North America, and there they were - Cinnamon Teal.  Aren't they an unusual color?  I took lots of photos and couldn't see their eyes in any of them. Looking at the drawing in the guide, their eyes are the same color as their feathers, with a thin black ring around them.

There were two Cinnamon Teals floating around with two Blue-winged Teals.  According to Sibley's these two types of Teals are often seen together.

I'm sorry I didn't get the top of this bird's head - he stood up too fast and I lost him.   But I wanted to keep the photo of the white feathers under his wings.

Next is the "beautiful."

The Snowy Egrets come around from time to time fishing along the edge of the water.

They slowly work their way down the river, eyes on the water, just like some fishermen I've known.

Yesterday afternoon there were two of them, right at the edge of the river and I saw their yellow feet.  You can see this water isn't very deep.

And last, the scary and sad.

Late yesterday afternoon a few people were standing around at the edge of my campsite, and a Ranger drove up.  I went outside to see what was going on, and the camp host came over and told me there was a skunk in the area. It was either sick or dying, and was seen nearby.  She said one of the campers saw it being bitten by a rattlesnake, and they killed the snake.  So when another camper reported a skunk that was acting strange, it was presumed this was the one that was bit.

A while later Katie, who was sitting in her car seat, started barking and looking out her window. I looked over, and there was the skunk in our campsite.

I went outside to snap a photo; it wasn't moving and appeared to be dead. I went over to the camp hosts' site and told them where the skunk was.  The wife said the Ranger told them if it died overnight, leave it alone and an animal would probably take care of it.

At 4:45 am, Katie started barking and woke me up.  There was a weird barking near us that lasted for about 20 minutes, ending with a keening sound that went on for a while.  I got out my flashlight and looked through the window, but couldn't see anything. It didn't sound like a dog or coyote (a neighbor said it might have been a fox).

This morning I looked outside and the skunk was gone.  The camp host came over and we checked the area, but there was no fur or blood, nothing in the loose dirt showing it had been eaten or dragged away.  I thought a larger animal might have grabbed the skunk in it's mouth and carried it off, leaving no trace.

Later in the morning, I looked out my window and saw Phyllis, a camper from across the street, stopped at the river's edge taking a bunch of photos up toward the trees.  When she walked by The Palms, she stopped and said the skunk was there at the base of the tree, sleeping.  I was really surprised, apparently last night it wasn't dead.  Good thing I didn't get too close.

I went down with her to see it, and got some pictures.

The man camped next to me was walking along the river - he was the first one to report the skunk - and as we were talking the skunk woke up.  (Obviously these were taken with my zoom lens).  It turned around and looked at us, then down at the man, then back at us.

Poor thing. It obviously wanted to be alone and we were disturbing it, so I went back to The Palms.  When I went back after a while, and it was gone.

I went back a little while ago, and there it was stretched out by the tree.  I must have missed it the last time I looked.

 
A couple of people came by and we started talking, and it slowly moved to a hole at the base of the tree and settled there. As it was turning around very slowly, making it's way to the hole, it raised it's huge tail at us. It didn't spray, but I definitely heard what it was saying and went home to The Palms.

I guess Fish and Game will come by and take care of the skunk, but they have such large areas to cover, who knows when they will get here.  I think the skunk is dying and has no energy to move much, but of course, just in case it's dangerous, it is still a little scary.  It's too close to where people are taking their kids down to the river this weekend. 

I'm definitely going to keep Katie (and myself) away from bushes and piles of leaves, because of the skunk and any other rattlers that might be around.  I always do anyway, but I'll be especially vigilant during the rest of our stay.

From me and Katie, have  a good weekend, everyone.  :)