Wild Nevada (Part 2)

Birds have always been an interest of mine. Growing up in Northern Michigan with a house flanked on each side with bird feeders one but couldn’t help but to pick up a thing or two about our feathered friends. By age twelve I could tell you which birds liked thistle seed (Goldfinches), which liked sunflower seeds (House Sparrows and Cardinals), and which birds liked millet (practically no bird likes millet but they are forced to eat it since it’s the common birdseed found in every hardware store, supermarket, and pet store).

Anyways, after a weekend camping trip with the Wolshon’s in Sequoia Kings Canyon National Park, we found an Amazon gift box in the mail. I opened it up and let Zoe claw into the wrapping paper. It was a copy of Sibley’s Guide to Western Birds (Thanks Mark & Kelly!). During the trip Mark and Kelly had been able to identify a Western Tanager, and sensing my interest in birds, they hooked us up with a great field guide.

So tonight I’m thumbing through the book to read about a Yellow Headed Blackbird that I had seen a few days ago when Ting asked me if I knew what the large gray bird was currently hoping off the edge of our deck. We peered out the window waiting for the bird to strut further out into our back yard so we could see his complete plumage. Zoe wandered up to the window and began to tap on the glass to see if the bird would move away from the base of the deck.

No sooner had Zoe tapped then a hawk swooped into our back yard and pounced on our bird. Ting shrieked as the hawk spun around with his wings outstretched and dug his talons into our poor bird. We watched as the hawk shrouded his prey and we could see the poor bird open his bill for a help cry yet no noise came out.

Within less then a minute, the hawk circled our back yard and took off for a large Cottonwood across Evans Creek where he proceeded to devour his new kill. Ting was visibly shaken and I don’t believe Zoe knew what to make of this show of nature.

As for me I ran over to the Sibley guide and immediately flipped to the birds of prey section. Hmmm…. A toss up between a Coopers Hawk and a Sharp Shinned Hawk! Living in wild Nevada sure is interesting!

Bagel Commute

I wrote this up for the commuter forum on RBR but never got around to publishing it. Anyways those who know me can probably wade through this one...

Every Monday morning for the last month or so my commute has been filled with bagels. I’m not eating the bagels (it’s hard to find a good bagel in Reno) but I’m seeing them. They pop up every 100 yards or so. Onion bagels, raisin bagels, egg bagels, every Monday I’m surprised by the variety.

The bagels are always one at a time, lying on the shoulder of the road. Sometimes they’re under the sagebrush off the shoulder but usually their just lying in the gravel. Usually by Wednesday they start having a “nibbled” look as the local fauna works away on them. Old bagels are rock hard and cannot be eaten easily. There’s a lot of Marmots on my commute. They’ve grown big and fat off the grass from the wet winter we’ve had. The Marmots live in the rocks and rangeland around Reno. They greet me every day as I ride by on my bike. A bagel on the side of the road probably looks pretty appetizing to them. It’s too big an offering for mice and ground squirrels. They could never get them down the burrow.

I don’t know why the bagels appear. I’ve imagined a pit bull directeur sportif, ala Manolo Saiz, out driving along my daily commute. He’s yelling at his tightly grouped cycling team “Rapido! Allez!” in a mix of broken Spanish and Italian. A bagel is periodically chucked at the bone-thin riders as they drop off the back of the pack to spur them on.

There are some pretty fast cyclists living in Reno (Julich spends part of the off-season here) and in all reality, there’s no one whipping bagels at them. That’s just my overactive cycling imagination. It’s probably just some high school kid who works at a donut shop getting his kicks throwing day-old bake goods out the car window. Either way the bagels are out there every Monday.

And I’m out there pedaling by wondering why?

Wild Nevada

Wow... First blog in a while. My Dad and Stepmom where in town over the week and that gave us a chance to show them around Reno. It also gives me a chance to type a little and try out some new picture posting software.

Now I titled this Blog "Wild Nevada" and I think that's exactly what Dad and Wilma experienced. Friday night we were eating dinner and my Dad noticed a large cat pacing along the edge of our deck in the backyard. "A wildcat!" he exclaimed! The cat did look strange with a small bob tail and tufted ears and face. The cat was approximately double the size of a normal house cat and had a tawny brown coat. By the time I got to the window he had hopped off the deck and hid in the bushes in the creek behind our house. Not to be dismayed he returned about an hour later and walked the same path back across our deck heading the other direction!

I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of the cat BUT with a little Googling I learned that we had a Lynx rufus californicus living in the neighborhood. Anyways the cat is not a threat to small children but it certainly got us wondering about our new home.

The weekend continued with a day trip up to Donners Pass (see Summiting in Snow) and a tour around Lake Tahoe. While I won't bore you too much with the details, needless to say it was very good seeing them. I also think Dad and Wilma got a kick out of seeing Zoe!

Here's a few Zoe rockclimbing picts up around Donners Pass. She can climb pretty quick on the granite and soon got out of reach of most all of us!



Getting help from Mom


Freeclimbing


Topping out excited