There
was a hummingbird on the water fountain today! Craziest thing…the hummer was sticking
its bill right into the middle of the bubble of water and taking a big drink. Haven’t
seen that before and, darn, I wasn’t quick enough to get a picture.
Although the fledgling sparrows have been foraging seed on the ground for themselves, it seems they can’t resist bugging Momma Sparrow to feed them when she’s around. She hops away, she flies away, then she gives in. They go find a seed or two for themselves, then the behavior repeats.
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Left at
7:45 on our bike ride this morning, which is earlier than yesterday but not by
much. We rode around the Harmon Rd/Sunshine Blvd block…thirteen miles. Back in
camp about 9:30. We rode in the sun the whole time, at a leisurely pace. The
heat didn’t feel too oppressive until maybe the last mile. Stopped in the
shadow of a traffic sign to get a drink. We’ve been making sure to take water
breaks before we get thirsty….trying to stay ahead in the hydration game.
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Chalk up another new experience in Arizona: Everything
in the yard is getting coated with yellow pollen. I think it’s from the newly
appeared long flowers (catkins) on the mesquite tree. The truck, chairs, picnic table, bikes, hair…if
there’s a surface, there will be pollen visible on it. When I retracted the awning tonight, tree
feathers and pollen cascaded off it like a waterfall.
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I’ve been hoping to see a burrowing owl
chick before we leave but that’s not going to happen. The breeding season for burrowing owls typically
starts in February, with peak activity
occurring between April 15 and July 15. The incubation
period last from 28 -30 days and the chicks don’t appear outside the burrow for
about 2 weeks after hatching. So we’re not here at the right time of year to
see the chicks. Of course, other things in the natural world have been occurring
earlier due to the heat, but I don’t think that will apply to the owls.
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The heat has basically put a halt to any
outdoor activity after 10 a.m. The rising
cost of diesel fuel has put a damper on driving a couple of hours to some of
our favorite places: Madeira Canyon, Whitewater Draw, Salt River Canyon, etc. But we still find something to do every
afternoon because there’s only so much sitting outside in the heat or inside a camper
that a person can tolerate, even with air conditioning. Today we drove to Oracle
for lunch at DeMarco’s Pizzeria.
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Diesel is now in the $5.45 to $5.99/gallon
range, depending on the station. The truck plazas (Love’s, Pilot, and Flying J)
along the highway tend to be on the high end of that range. Price for regular
unleaded gas is over $4 a gallon. Those making the decisions that led to these
increases in fuel prices aren’t the ones feeling the squeeze. If this keeps up,
people won’t be able to afford to drive to work and then what?
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Today we didn’t do much…went for a bike
ride, sat around and got hot… went to Oracle, come back to sit around and get
hotter. Seemed like a good day to tackle some questions that my mom has asked:
Roosters: Mom thought roosters only crowed at daybreak and was caught off guard by the crowing habits of the neighborhood roosters. For six weeks, I’ve been listening to the roosters crow all day and thought that was normal. She grew up on a farm, I did not. She probably has more real world experience with roosters, I only know what the ones across the road do.
But it got me thinking and then searching
online. When I typed in “When are roosters supposed to crow?” and got this as a
reply “Roosters
typically start attempting to crow between 8 and 10 weeks of age…”, I knew I’d asked the wrong question. The correct question should
have been “What time of day are roosters supposed to crow?”.
In the article “Why do roosters crow? Ten riveting facts about Roosters”,
almanac.com has this to say about crowing,
which is Fact #6:
Do
Roosters Crow in the Morning or All Day?
Both!
Roosters crow all the time—morning, afternoon, and evening! They’ll crow to
greet the day, to lead their flocks to forage, to cue a boundary, and to sound
the alert about predators.
We’re not clear how roosters got to be
synonymous with the break of day and a symbol of the morning sun; however, they
do usually START crowing just before sunrise. So, perhaps it’s just
more noticeable.
How
loud is a rooster? The crow
is, on average, about 80 to 90 decibels (and 142 decibels right next to their
head). For perspective, a chainsaw produces about 120 decibels. It’s truly
a deafening level at prolonged exposure, but roosters have a special way to
protect their hearing to avoid going deaf: When a rooster opens its beak fully
to crow, its ear canals are partially closed off and protected from
the sound.
My favorite neighborhood rooster was crowing ‘Happy
Birthday’ today…loud and proud all morning long.
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Why do saguaro arms droop? Don Swann, a biologist at Saguaro National Park since 1993,
had this to say on the website thisistucson.com:
And if you
happen across a saguaro with sad, drooping arms instead of arms that grow up,
at some point in its life, it likely experienced a freeze event, which is when
temperatures are below freezing for more than 36 hours straight. When that happens you start to get damage to the
tissue in the saguaro and where the tissue in the arm meets the main steam is a
zone of weakness and the tissue actually starts to kind of break down and the
arm will actually rotate and turn down.
And secondary to droopy arms, is why do some have so
many arms and some have none? Since water is the primary limiting factor
for them in the desert, in areas where they're getting more moisture they tend
to grow more arms.
Something I hadn’t thought about: While Swann
doesn't know what causes arms to grow from different parts of the stem, he says
the arms are usually distributed to help a saguaro keep its balance. How clever!
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Why do I pee so little if I’m drinking so much? In Arizona’s extreme heat, you pee less despite high intake because your body prioritizes cooling, losing massive amounts of fluids through invisible sweat (perspiration) rather than urination. The kidneys conserve water by reducing urine production to combat dehydration. This is normal, but still requires consistent, proactive hydration. (Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona)
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Took an evening bike
ride again. Not as bad out when the sun is on its downward slide.
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Kim switched to his
larger telescope to image some galaxies. Took him a bit to get things going but
the first pictures of the Whirlpool Galaxy that he showed me looked good.
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