Arches National Park
A quick day in Arches National Park. A last minute reservation (required now, different from 10 years ago), a Park’s pass, an audioguide, and some of the most beautiful weather imaginable. The goal is to go back and do it all over again, bike around, camp overnight, and look up at the stars.
Fiery Furnace
Delicate Arch (the famous icon of Utah) from afar afield viewing area.
The Double Span
Le Sal Mountain Range
Bodega Bay
I went to Bodega Bay recently to collect some seawater off a pier for a long-term project with collaborators at UC San Diego. Somewhat of an ironic location, considering we’re studying marine algae, in the location of a famous Hitchcock movie, “The Birds,” inspired by a true story where seabirds were likely poisoned by a neurotoxin given off by a species of marine diatom. Though the actual event happened farther south, near Santa Cruz, Hitchcock chose the location of Bodega Bay because of its gloomy, foggy feel. The two days I was there were precisely that: windy, foggy, misty. I holed up for an evening at the Bodega Harbor Inn, reading from the Fall 2023 issue of “Wings,” the publication of the Xerces Society. Before, I had attempting read on the windy beach of Bodega Dunes, then found coffee (at The Birds Cafe) and tried for a walk at Bodega Head, the long peninsula that separates the Bay from the Ocean. Slow hiking-covering a short distance but taking time to stop and notice- is my bread and butter. What’s more, it was an opportunity to hike alone - without anyone there to hurry up the pace. Despite the wind, I was enthralled by the wildlife.
The above caterpillar, I’m fairly certain, is a species of tiger moth called “Ranchman’s tiger moth (Arctia virginalis).” Tiger moths are some of my favorites because they are beautiful as adults, and the ones I found were monching on a variety of plants: Italian thistle (Carduus pycnocephalus), Coastal Bush Lupine (Lupinus arboreus), and others unknown to me. https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/626880-Arctia-virginalis
Brewer’s blackbird
Pedal venation on wild radish
Click on each of the above images to enlarge: there are a lot of birds, yes, but don’t discount the (hundreds?) of sea lions on all of the surrounding rocks! Birds include cormorants, gulls, pelicans, and common murre’s (the ones that look like penguins)
Columbian black-tailed deer
White-lined Sphinx
Hyles lineata
A beautiful, long-tongued pollinator moth often mistaken for a small hummingbird. Here, it is seen sipping on nectar from Purple Mountain Heath (Phyllodoce brewerri).
Photographs taken on the shores of Upper Granite Lake, Yosemite.
