Field Season

So it's been quite a while since I posted, thanks to the ramping up of the field season. We're having waves of migrants coming in and the resident birds already have fledglings flying around looking pretty grown up! Its a really different environment here and thank goodness its unusually mild this year (which I wasn't aware of until someone told me today that normally we'd be in the mid-90's everyday at this point- yikes!). I'm at the library, so for entertainment purposes in lieu of photos, here's a joke:

A chicken and an egg are lying in bed together.
The chicken rolls over, lights up a cigarette and says, "Well, I guess that answers that question..."

Thanks Bob!

Helicopter Expedition

Friday was our helicopter trip to scout out some sites that we had trouble getting to otherwise and a chance to see the river from a different angle to get a feel for the whole. It was so awesome!
It was a 7 hour flight from Boulder City, NV to Imperial Wildlife Refuge, just north of Yuma, AZ. We had smooth flying the whole way and no one got sick- yay!
Here's some photos:

Return to Fort Collins

Hi everybody! I have flown back to Fort Collins for my first 4-day break from work and it is C-O-L-D! Just checked weather underground and the temp is 33 degrees. Its snowing and starting to accumulate outside, quite the change from 95 degrees in Yuma last week! But it is wonderful to be back and hanging out with Craig again.
Big news- yesterday he accepted a job with Hayden-Wing Environmental Consultants, so he will be starting work on Tuesday. They are based out of Laramie, so it's pretty close by and he will be doing a variety of work in the region. This might provide a few challenges for coordinating our schedules, which is why I bought my plane ticket back at the last moment. It seemed wise to take advantage of both of us having the time off since we're not too sure yet how Craig's schedule will look over the summer.
We have just discovered a wonderful new coffee shop in Fort Collins- The Wild Boar. Very spacious and homey-feeling in a historic building (Craig says the men's bathroom has a newspaper clipping from the 1920s in it) with yummy paninis to boot! Will try to post some more photos soon.
I regret not having my camera at work the last couple days because I missed out on some cool photos/videos of Gina and I tunneling through some 2 meter high cattails. Felt like a vole! But there will probably be more of that to come!


Craig's new haircut!


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Before and after snow photos

Salt Lake City to Yuma, Arizona

Salt Lake City

Rest stop overlooking salt flats, Utah

Painted Desert Trail
Imperial Wildlife Refuge, Arizona

Painted Desert Trail

Painted Desert Trail

We've spent the last two days in Yuma and 3 days before that near the Imperial Wildlife Refuge just north of here, hacking our way through just 300 meters of vegetation in 16 hours. Fun! But now we have a better idea of what to expect out of our aerial photographs and the harder ranked plots in general. Lots of birds around, including a bold roadrunner, Gambel's quail, and Say's phoebes. They are still all winter residents, the migrants haven't made their way here yet.

The Great Salt Lake

Well, I've made it to Salt Lake City, but only just barely! Started out with beautiful weather on the Front Range in Colorado and it was nice driving through most of Wyoming, but a little before the Utah border I hit a lot of snow and it was sketchy driving with no hotels around to stop at. Just took it slow and tried to drive behind a semi (but not too close!) so I could keep my wheels in its tracks. Once I started to get radio stations from Salt Lake I could hear they were calling out names of mountain passes that were being closed, but I didn't know where they were so I just kept my fingers crossed and kept driving. Fortunately, however I came in didn't close and I was able to make my way slowly (~ 30 mph) into town. Once I got into town the snow had slowed down and turned into rain and then finally stopped (which was very nice b/c I-80 is under construction through most of Salt Lake and it was hard enough to drive in the dark, much less with rain/snow). I called it quits on the far side of the city. Woke this morning in my cozy Super 8 hotel room to blue skies, so its back on the road again!

Nervous!

Well, it's almost time! In just two days I'll be back on the road again, en route to Nevada. Sounds like for the first month and a half I'll be working on the Lower Colorado River Project, which entails going to Las Vegas and then on to Arizona to set up survey points and do some veg work. Then it'll be bird survey training and then actual bird surveying throughout Nevada.

Bendire's thrasher

On a random note, anyone looking for a good movie/tv show to watch should try Battlestar Galactica (the new one). It's more drama than sci-fi and really well done. But you would definitely have to see it from the beginning to understand the storyline, so it's one to Netflix.

Beware the cylons!

Our apartment

See how useful the table is?