Out to the River early on a Sunday morning, Labor Day weekend, the world of humans is sleeping in. By the river I am greeted by a tent with snoozing occupant. I pass on by. The cool green water beckons, the deeper narrow channel just off the intermittent stream sand delta. I step in and open to the real world. Across the river, large sand flats are barely submerged.. water depth 2 inches or less and a thin coat of flocculent algae is blooming under the warm, nutrient-rich water. Corixid water boatmen are as thick as fleas scooting underwater and feeding on the rich algae. Minnows too, probably enjoying the algae and the corixids. A few killdeer with their white vests and black necklines watch me and then fly, zooming low over water and sand, crying as they go.
There is everywhere up the river life and and things happening. On the northeastern sandy jeep road I come across the largest red-eared slider turtle I've seen this year. Their track has flattened the sand with the dragging of the plastron. Looked like it was temporarily blocked on its return to the river by a steep sandy bank. I pick it up and give a small toss up on top of the levee under some cottonwoods.
I watch a Bembex sand wasp busy excavating like a dog digging sand, flying out behind it in sand that was too loose. After 3-4 attempts with no success and just moving sand around the little wasp flew off in search of a firmer sand bank. Out in the water a beaver cut stick floats past my ankle and I turn in time to see a small black snout just barely out of the water on the other side. It looks like a largish snake that does not see me. It begins to cross the main current towards me and I move towards it until it sees me and heads upstream. But the current is too strong and I come up to the 2 foot long snake swimming energetically under water. I lift it quickly with my stick and toss it a couple feet out of the water and glimpse the yellow brown belly and unmarked olive green brown back before it falls back to the water and swims swiftly away. There is so much here. numerous viceroys on the flowers along the sandy levee road, golden rod, white boneset, one pink Pluchea. I see one damaged viceroy, the front leading apex of its left wing has been pecked away, perhaps by the near miss of a passing bird. Its back left wing also is missing a section. I wonder how it can fly if its aerodynamics are so altered. I've seen quite a few damaged viceroys these few weeks and it makes me wonder if viceroys may be suffering because monarch numbers are down and the mimicry of a poisonous or distasteful model may not be providing viceroys the normal protection. I wonder how general a phenomenon this might be.. the linking of the success and problems of mimics with their model.
It is remarkable that so much is here.. by a busy western/ southern town/city of 119,000. So much wildlife leading wild lives undeterred by 85,000 fans who have come to town to cheer for the first football game of the year. I can't remember having ever seen so many frogs as there have been all along the shallow bank of the river. They hop away in a panic as I walk along the sand and mud silty edge of the river bar close by the bank.
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
Evening River
A Tuesday evening, tired from a full day, I decided to go to the river for renewal. 8 PM the sun going down on a good day. Stepping across the gate and walking down the old jeep road, the yellow flowers of the tall Grindelia gumweed are noticeably closed, at least petals stand erect, closing off the central disk flowers. The world's tallest giant r,agweed stand (not really, but it is 2-3 m high) is releasing bright golden yellow pollen. Woe to those afflicted with autumn hay fever. Stepping through the green tunnel and out onto the levee, the warm white sand is unusually soft this evening.
At the river's edge the water is cutting more and more into the bank I first come to, where once there was a 10- 15 foot 'beach'. Now the current flow has moved against the sandy cliff of the levee.
Across the water a great blue heron flies up complaining with a hoarse croak about my late visit to the river. I can imagine the complaint something like, 'What are you doing here now? This is the time for the natives, the ones who have always lived here for the last centuries or more, back to a time of nature. Now is their time. What are you doing here?'
The bare, dead trees up above the far bank are silhouetted against the silver sky and more interesting and beautiful in silhouette than their full-leafed neighbors. The river continues to drop, exposing more, more expansive sand bars in mid channel. The flow now winds principally in smaller deep channels to the side or still in the center.
Stepping in to the water the temperature is mildly warm, a result of the long string of low 90F days. But on of the river there are bands of cooler water, cooling with evening. I wade across the water and the sand bars to the far bank and the deeper channel. I walk my sometimes/ frequent morning route there but see no damselflies. I do see the snout of a water snake swimming upstream, I scare away.
There is one place by the old concrete rip rap where the water is still chin deep,. but after it shelves out to a broader shallow spread of water. I turn to return and see the silhouette of a large darner dragonfly above the water with a hunting night hawk in the sky above. Returning up the jeep road a dozen fireflies are doing their thing. I think about Phenology and Global warming.. and how the May/ June flood may a bit like a quick example of global warming. The river is only now beginning to develop soft beds of algae across much of the bottom. Before the scouring and churning water and sand prevented significant growth. Now there will be food for corixids and other algal feeders, and later for predators feeding on the corixids. This is all starting and happening about two months later than was the case the previous 4 years. Now autumn is not long in coming.. and the succession is in early stages. What will it be like when the first cold days arrive?
At the river's edge the water is cutting more and more into the bank I first come to, where once there was a 10- 15 foot 'beach'. Now the current flow has moved against the sandy cliff of the levee.
Across the water a great blue heron flies up complaining with a hoarse croak about my late visit to the river. I can imagine the complaint something like, 'What are you doing here now? This is the time for the natives, the ones who have always lived here for the last centuries or more, back to a time of nature. Now is their time. What are you doing here?'
The bare, dead trees up above the far bank are silhouetted against the silver sky and more interesting and beautiful in silhouette than their full-leafed neighbors. The river continues to drop, exposing more, more expansive sand bars in mid channel. The flow now winds principally in smaller deep channels to the side or still in the center.
Stepping in to the water the temperature is mildly warm, a result of the long string of low 90F days. But on of the river there are bands of cooler water, cooling with evening. I wade across the water and the sand bars to the far bank and the deeper channel. I walk my sometimes/ frequent morning route there but see no damselflies. I do see the snout of a water snake swimming upstream, I scare away.
There is one place by the old concrete rip rap where the water is still chin deep,. but after it shelves out to a broader shallow spread of water. I turn to return and see the silhouette of a large darner dragonfly above the water with a hunting night hawk in the sky above. Returning up the jeep road a dozen fireflies are doing their thing. I think about Phenology and Global warming.. and how the May/ June flood may a bit like a quick example of global warming. The river is only now beginning to develop soft beds of algae across much of the bottom. Before the scouring and churning water and sand prevented significant growth. Now there will be food for corixids and other algal feeders, and later for predators feeding on the corixids. This is all starting and happening about two months later than was the case the previous 4 years. Now autumn is not long in coming.. and the succession is in early stages. What will it be like when the first cold days arrive?
Mid Day Flora and Fauna
Nice Saturday morning. I went to the river at 11 to see the midday natural world.
The walk down the jeep road is lined now with yellow Grindelia gumweed flowers. Oddly, I rarely ever see any pollinators on these flowers. I'll have to ask Phil G. or Michael K. why this may be so. The orange Campsis trumpet vine is still bright and colorful laying on the ground. The Pogonomyrmex ants are busily foraging in a more-or-less straight line down one track of the road. Odd to think that their bite venom is ounce for ounce is more deadly than a rattlesnake.
The walk down the jeep road is lined now with yellow Grindelia gumweed flowers. Oddly, I rarely ever see any pollinators on these flowers. I'll have to ask Phil G. or Michael K. why this may be so. The orange Campsis trumpet vine is still bright and colorful laying on the ground. The Pogonomyrmex ants are busily foraging in a more-or-less straight line down one track of the road. Odd to think that their bite venom is ounce for ounce is more deadly than a rattlesnake.
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