Thursday, January 28, 2010

Skywatch Friday: Snow and Flood

Snow on the Santa Ritas 1-23-10

(taken in Sycamore Canyon click to enlarge)

Snow in the mountains means floods in the valley...

...and churning brown water in the Santa Cruz river...


...at Ina Road flows peacefully away to the north.

All photos were taken last weekend on January 23 after the snow and rain of the night before. I went to Ina Road to hopefully spot some black-necked stilts but to no avail. This water was too swift and brown to attract them. However, I did discover that a new walkway has been installed here and I plan to go back and explore the trail. I only saw a few birds here this day and all were birds I had already seen elsewhere, so no additions to the Big January Count at this location. However, I did see a Lark Bunting in Sycamore Canyon yesterday, so that make species number 108 on my Big January Count!

Have a Happy Skywatch Friday everyone!

(I'm off to find some more birds!)

6 comments:

abb said...

Lovely! So hoping I get out to your neck of the woods again some day.

Max said...

Looks like El Nino is in full effect down there. Great news for the riparian vegetation!

Sylvia K said...

Marvelous captures, Kathie! The clouds are gorgeous! Love the cactus against the skies! Have a great weekend!

Sylvia

Dawn Fine said...

Congrats on your Jan Bird count! Hope you get a few more before the end of the month.
In Tucson now and getting rain today.
I can appreciate your water photos...
I sent you a facebook email about the BwBTC meet up...let me know what you think..

Anonymous said...

You've had some interesting weather this year, Kathie! I hope you find some interesting birds while you're out and about.

eileeninmd said...

The weather has been weird everywhere. Great skywatch photos, the mountain scenery is gorgeous!