Our day trip yesterday took us to the Magdalena mountains south and east of Albuquerque. The drive was less than two hours, and the weather was fine. We found ourselves navigating up a steep road in Water Canyon. The riverbed was dry at the bottom, which was a bit disappointing, as Kelly hoped to do some collecting. A few miles up the canyon, however, we found a lovely little spring-fed pool next to the road. Both Kelly and Rango splashed around enthusiastically. Kelly found a wonderful variety of diving beetles of all sizes. Rango charged himself with ridding the pool of any and all water striders. While Kelly was collecting water creatures, he found quite a few dragonfly nymphs. I made a spot decision to take some home and try my luck at tending the nymphs until they morph into adults.
After we collected the pool, we made our way up the mountain. At the top, there is a national research station and observatory, but that was behind a gate, so we didn’t get to see the buildings close-up. There were a few hiking trails near the top, so we parked the truck and decided to try to summit the highest point in the area. I was discouraged when I got fooled by a false summit at one point. However, Kelly encouraged me to keep going, and after a bit, we were at the top, where we found a crew of researchers installing some equipment. Evidently, on the far side of the mountain, there is a road to the top. That was ok, though, because the hike was very good for us, and the view was glorious!! It was clouding up as we started back down toward the truck, but the rain held off until we were down out of the canyon.
On the way home, we drove by New Mexico Tech, a lovely little campus that reminded me very much of Colorado School of Mines.
Three of the six of my nymphs survived the trip home, and are happily swimming in a tank in our breakfast nook. I hope I can get the nymph husbandry down pat so that I can show my students the transformation in August.
Part 2: Back to the pool!!
Later in the same week, we headed out again to gather data for Kelly’s new project. Our first water target was south of Socorro, in the middle of some pretty remote country. We drove by a few residences that indicated a high degree of introversion and isolationist desires. Some of them were pretty creepy. At the end of the road, instead of finding a lovely spring, we found a locked gate that led to a big cattle ranch. I guess this is pretty common in New Mexico. Some families have been ranching an area of public land so long that they consider it theirs, even to the point of building an entry gate to their ranch on public roads. We honored their gate and their claim and turned back.
We next found ourselves back in the Magdalenas, but on the north edge, west of the original pool. The public road went right through the “yard” of an aging ranch that has fallen into great disrepair. The entropy was offset by some amazing graffiti. See the pictures! I especially loved the bobcat skeleton. Super cool. There were public roads all over the ranch, used recently for wood-cutting. We tried several roads before we found the spot where the spring was supposed to be. However, there was no spring to be found.
We were pretty close to the original spring site, so we headed over there. I was hoping to find some food for my new aquatic pets. Rango needed to clear the water of striders again, and Kelly did some more collecting. It is a wonderful spot, and we were all happy to be back.
Image gallery.
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