Cactus - Buzzards - Hummingbirds

This is a collection of some interesting things we have seen mostly here in South East Arizona. This is great country albeit a tad warm in the depth of summer, though not terribly hot. Keep in mind we are in Sierra Vista at about 4,500 feet in elevation. Typically we are anywhere from 12-20 degrees cooler than Phoenix, there is much more to Arizona than Phoenix.

We were out looking around the other day and came across a freshly mowed alfalfa field. At least it looked like alfalfa to us. In the field there were probably 43 turkey vultures and several Swainson’s Hawks. Our guess is the mowing did a lot of damage to the rodent population and they were now available for an afternoon snack for the buzzards.

Here is one of the Turkey Vultures that held closer to the road for his picture. It was neat to see all the vultures in the field; many were soaring around as well.

We may have shown this rock stack in a blog post sometime back. It is a neat stack of rocks and takes a steady hand to do this. We have seen lots of different rock stacks in various areas as we have traveled around.

Here, where we are, the rock stacking takes on a simpler method. It results in a fun character face and does not require as much time nor as steady a hand.

We see a lot of this plant here. It is called a Mexican Bird of Paradise or a Red Bird of Paradise or a Desert bird of Paradise or a Peacock Flower. The leaf structure looks more fern like and when we first saw the plant it did not appear to belong in this desert environment. They, whatever you wish to call them, bloom for a long time.

This is a close up of one of the Mexican Bird of Paradise Flowers. The colors are quite vibrant and in stark contrast to much of the desert flora.

This is a Cholla Cactus (pronounced Choy-ah). There are over 20 species of Cholla in Arizona. One called the Jumping Cholla only really seems to jump onto you and stick, it actually cannot jump. This specimen appears to be a Cane Cholla, very common around here.

Though you often see the spike and spine and sticky things at certain times of year they can produce beautifully colored flowers.

Not only flowers but they can provide home for some bird species. In about the center of the image you can see a nest. It was a Curve-billed Thrasher nest. They used it for two separate broods this year. It was amazing to watch the adults just fly into the center of the Cholla as if the spines weren’t even there. Certainly seems like a decent defensive perimeter for a home.

On the south end here at Vista View Resort there are two dog parks, one for large dogs and one for small. A fellow lets his German Shepard into one of the parks early in the morning and stands outside the fence to throw the ball. The shepherd fetches the ball, brings it back to the fence, and then kicks it back to his owner through the metal slats in the fence. It is fun to watch this well trained dog.

There are small tidbits of color scattered about as we walk around. This is an Ivy Morning Glory. We seldom see this flower and if there were farmers around they would probably dig this up or spray it. Morning Glory is the scourge of farmers as they will spread and take over everywhere.

This odd looking plant is a Mexican Tree Grass. The lady who owned this house stated she has had the three plants you can see in the picture for the 14 years she has been here and this was the first and only plant to send up a shoot such as this. The bees absolutely loved the flower on the large stalk and were alll over it for a long time. It was fascinating to see.

The Ocotillo is a very common shrub here in the desert and can be seen in profusion where the soil conditions are favorable. It is often called a cactus but is technically a shrub though it does prosper in the desert and has lots of thorns. When it blooms, which is normally following a rain as we see here, it attracts the hummingbird. If you look real close at the upper right in the picture you can see a hummingbird feeding on the brightly colored flowers.

This is a Prickly Pear cactus. Note the long spines and beautiful flower. They can be difficult to identify as to species as they will readily cross pollinate with one another.

We chatted with a couple out walking along one of the trails. They had their two cats out in the buggy for a walk. There are lots of dogs being walked on the trails and the dogs and the cats might cause some problems. Hence they walk them in the buggy and the cats get out for a look around.

In chatting with the cat owners we found out they live in Yuma, Z during the winter and come over here for the summer as it is much cooler than Yuma which is a lower elevation on the west side of the state. Oddly enough we also talked with another couple who summer here from Gilbert, AZ because Sierra Vista is typically 12-22 degrees cooler than Gilbert which is near Phoenix.

This image is titled “When you hot, You hot”. There are a lot of cottontail bunny rabbits here. When it gets hot, it was about 98 degrees on the day of this image; some of the rabbits will scoop out a shallow depression in the shade of a tree and rest there. This rabbit was not the least bit concerned with us walking by not 5 feet away. “When you hot, You Hot”.

We, as many of you, hang hummingbird feeder for the little aerial acrobats to get some nourishment. This is a Male Anna’s Hummingbird, but he looks to be in molt or at the least needs to work on feather management.

With the hummingbird feeder we will also get Hooded Orioles. This female Hooded Oriol can really take down the sugar water. They drink a lot.

I borrowed this image; our camera system would not work to get images of these visitors. In the later part of August we get Nectar bats here in Arizona. The lesser long-nosed bat and the Mexican long-tongued bat come in at night to visit the feeders. They are very sloppy eaters and will drain any hummingbird feeder they can find. They leave sugar water all over the feeder and drip a lot onto the hedges below which the bees really like. We have taken to getting our feeders down at night to avoid these messy problems.

We left the feeder up and watched the bats a couple of nights. They are incredibly fast and extremely quiet. About all you see is a ghost of the bat appearing out of nowhere and then disappearing.

We save dessert for the last image. Some say you should eat desert first but we saved this for last. There is a restaurant along highway 181 going from Wilcox to Douglas near Pearce Arizona called Sandy’s Restaurant. They are not fancy, have wonderful food in copious amounts, and fabulous deserts. This is homemade blue berry pie and huckleberry ice cream. Maybe those who say eat desert first are right. As an aside this dish is only $2.99 total. It is so cheap you can always afford seconds.

We hope you enjoyed our little look around at a potpourri of subjects. We enjoy getting out and seeing the sights and places here in South Eastern Arizona.

Please let us know if you have any questions or comments. All the best – George & Deanna

Birds and Bugs and Critters

Here is collection of images showing some of the birds – bugs – and critters we have encountered here in south east Arizona. They are all quite fascinating. We are not very good entomologists but we tried to be as accurate as we could with all of the information. Out good friend Rodger Shoemake helped us with many of the identifications and associated information – thanks Rodger

This Western Kingbird with a lunch snack seems appropriate to start the blog. We were out looking for birds one afternoon and in a 4 ½ mile stretch of farm roads we counted 115 Kingbirds. There are a couple of different species but they were predominantly Western Kingbirds. We will show the type of bug that the Kingbird has in a later image. Shortly after taking this photo he swallowed the bug whole.

Here are two lizards on a large rock that we saw out in Las Cienegas, a grassland area where we like to go birding and just exploring around. It was neat to see the two lizards running around on the rock. Not sure what kind of lizards these might be, there are lots of lizards around.

This is a small lizard maybe only an inch and a half long. There are a bunch of these little guys all around. It must be a great hatch year for lizards.

Around here there are lots and lots of doves. This group of doves posed quite nicely. The one with the white border on the wing is called a White-winged Dove, appropriately named. They are very common here. We mostly see White-winged and Mourning Doves and occasionally a Eurasian-collared Dove. We have also seen Common Ground Doves so there is quite a variety of species around here.

Here is a Horned Lizard also known as horny toad or horn toads that we see around here quite frequently. When you look at them close up they appear rather fierce. When a horned lizard feels threatened by a predator, its final defense response is to shoot blood from these flooded sinuses and out its eye sockets. As a result, the predator is often frightened and flees. We certainly would seeing that display.

Here is another horned lizard. It is actually quite small as seen in the next picture. The previous full sized horned lizard is about 5 inches long.

I kept placing my pocket knife close to the lizard to get a size perspective and the lizard would scurry off a short distance. The knife is about 3 ¼ inches in length so you can see the lizard is quite small, a very young one.

We ate lunch out in Sulphur Springs Valley one day in Elfrida at a restaurant called Kountry Kafe. Because of covid-19 they have set up a tent and have outside seating only. This small brown praying mantis joined us for lunch. He was not so much interested in our lunch as he was in several flies that were nearby. At various times he got close to one and you could tell by his movements he got excited. Unfortunately we never did see him catch one. He was very entertaining to watch.

This is a Mesquite Leaf-footed Bug. They are often quite large and fly around kind of slow and clumsily. They are not dangerous to humans they just look menacing. This is the bug that the Western Kingbird had in his beak in the first image.

Here is a link to a brief You Tube video of one of these bugs that we made showing one walking across a hedge. It is fascinating to watch them move. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=On_EdVgr9Ys

You can tell this is a millipede because it has two pairs of legs for each segmented section. It must take a lot of practice to keep all those legs under control and going the right direction at the right time. After a rain early in the year there we saw more than 45 millipedes on a walk around.

There are some numbers of tarantulas around here. They don’t bother anything much. The people who live here talk about who saw the biggest and did you see that one last night etc.

Here is a walking stick which is a neat little critter. It is maybe 3 inches long. It was in the middle of a walking trail and we stopped to watch it and make sure it got across before someone stepped on it.

This is a red velvet mite. It is really small maybe the size of a pencil eraser. We were surprised at how red it was, certainly did not have any camouflage for this environment.

This red, spiny covered caterpillar we found while on a walk. It was munching on some dead leaves. It is the caterpillar form of the Pipevine Swallowtail butterfly. They are a very common butterfly around here.

This image shows the Pipevine Swallowtail. This particular specimen is much worn and the markings are not very bright and colorful. It certainly does not hold any resemblance to the caterpillar form.

Just to interject a bird. This is a Roadrunner. We see them quite often and have shown images of them in previous blogs. Here it is hiding under a bush. It was about 100 degrees and the roadrunner is panting. There is quite remarkable coloration on the head.

This caterpillar we found along the side walk. He was moving somewhere and seemed to be in a hurry. After doing some research we determined it was the caterpillar form of the Western Tiger Swallowtail.

This is the Western tiger Swallowtail that will be the result from the caterpillar in the previous slide. Butterflies sure go through a quite a transformation. We borrowed this image to show the butterfly. Though we have seen the caterpillar we have not yet seen the butterfly here.

This is a Cooper’s hawk with an afternoon snack. It landed on the roof top across the way and consumed part of its snack before heading off. There was a Cooper’s nest in the south end of the area and we have seen both the adults and juveniles.

Here is the last image. It is a mystery bird and if anyone knows what it is we would appreciate the identification. We saw in August in Las Cienegas, an open grassland area. We had seen lots of different sparrows here over the summer but cannot pinpoint this juvenile. Perhaps it is a Cassin’s Sparrow. Some have thought it might be a Vesper Sparrow but they really are not here in the summer, they are winter sparrows here but then who knows.

We hope you enjoyed this brief look at some bugs – birds – and critters. There are lots of all three types around here and it is fun getting out and looking for them.

Please let us know if you have any questions or comments. All the best – George & Deanna