Finding a parking spot for our Ford F-350 pickup, the 22-feet-long and six-wheeled towing unit of The Goddard, is sometimes a challenge. We usually just park on the outskirts of businesses’ parking lots because, unless the parking spots are oversized, we sometimes take up more than one space. When visiting Yellowstone National Park in September, we realized that we needed to get early starts in order to find spaces in the park’s parking lots: we arrived after Labor Day and park rangers assured us that visitation had noticeably dropped, but parking spaces were still at a premium beginning in the late morning hours, So it was when we visited Norris Geyser Basin, located in Yellowstone’s northwest quadrant: we arrived at about 8:30 AM on September 12 and happily found a parking space. It was already getting pretty chilly in mid-September: high temperatures in the basin that week were in the mid-60s Fahrenheit (about 18 degrees Celsius) and pre-dawn low temperatures were in the low to mid-30s Fahrenheit (about 0 degrees Celsius).
Those cold air temperatures combined with the hot steam rising from abundant geothermal features to create an otherworldly effect; it was extremely foggy, which made it difficult to discern any of the geysers, hot springs, and other features. The day soon warmed up, however, and the features revealed themselves. There are two different loop walks around Norris Geyser Basin: the longer and more forested Back Basin, which we visited later the same day (see that posting for an explanation of the different types of hydrothermal features, which I won’t repeat here), and Porcelain Basin. Here’s a look at some of what we saw in Porcelain Basin, once the air cleared a bit.
Those are some impressively large logs. This is the north-facing side of the Norris Geyser Basin Museum, designed by architect Herbert Maier (1893-1969) and built between 1929 and 1930. The museum, at 7,560 feet (2,304 meters) in elevation, was our first stop at Norris while we waited for the fog to dissipate. Maier also designed three other buildings in Yellowstone National Park: still-standing museums at Madison and Fishing Bridge, and the Old Faithful Museum of Geothermal Activity. Together, the four structures, built in an architectural style known as “National Park Service Rustic” that attempted to connect manmade buildings with the natural environments in which they were constructed, interpreted the geologic features on the Grand Loop road. Unfortunately, the museum at Old Faithful was demolished in 1971 to accommodate a new visitor center; that structure was itself demolished to make way for the current visitor center that opened in 2010. Maier also designed still-standing buildings in Yosemite National Park in California and Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, as well as a number of structures in state parks in Texas.This picture, I think, really captures the extraordinary beauty and kaleidoscopic color of Yellowstone National Park. (Not really: it captures the foggy conditions at Porcelain Basin for the first hour or so after our arrival.) This hillside is venting sulfuric acid, gas, and steam, and the colder temperatures on the morning of our visit made the venting look quite pronounced. Norris Geyser Basin is the hottest area in Yellowstone National Park, in which one only needs to dig four miles downward to find magma – rock that’s so hot that it has become liquified (one wouldn’t necessarily want to do that, though). The average surface temperature in the basin is 280.4 degrees F (138 degrees C), and a probe sent 1,086 feet (331 meters) under the ground’s surface registered a temperature of 464 degrees F (240 degrees C). A vent from which gases and steam escape is called a fumarole (from the French fumerolle, which is a domed vented structure built over a stove to allow steam and smoke to escape); a fumarole that vents sulfuric gases (like these in the photo) is called a solfatara, while a fumarole that vents carbon dioxide gases is called a mofetta. A muffuletta is a delicious Italian sandwich popularized in New Orleans, but that’s not important right now.These pools, collectively called Porcelain Springs, give their name to the basin. They’re supposedly very pretty when the sun is shining on them, but I guess we’ll never find out for sure. The white mineral surrounding the bodies of water is called siliceous sinter, also known as geyserite. The silica is brought to the ground surface by the hot water in the pools, and accumulates very slowly – about an inch per century. Relatively new sinter is white; as it ages it turns to a darker gray color. The hydrothermal features in the greater Norris Basin, including both Back Bay and Porcelain basins, contain the highest level of silica in Yellowstone National Park – it’s what contributes the white milkiness (some might say porcelain-like) attribute to these bodies of water. Other minerals, like iron, arsenic, and sulfur, are all abundant as well. The latter contributes a distinct aroma to walks around these basins.This photo, too, is indicative of what we saw while waiting for the fog to go away. As you can see, Porcelain Basin is not a terribly inviting place if the sun isn’t shining. These trees, interestingly, found the conditions in the soil conducive to germinate, grow, and mature into tall pines; the soil conditions later changed because of geothermal activity in Porcelain Basin and made the ground inhospitable to many lifeforms. Most of Norris Geyser Basin is walkable only on boardwalks like this one: the ground is too fragile (and, remember, it’s nearly 300 degrees) for visitors to walk on directly.I took this photo from about the same position as the previous one (the boardwalk is just to the right side of the image), but looking slightly to the left and about half an hour later. You can see the sun was starting to emerge but steam is still rising from Nuphar Lake, which is itself not a geothermally heated body of water – it’s just plain old steam evaporating as the air temperature rises. Nuphar Lake (nuphar is a genus of flowering aquatic plants) has an interesting recent story, however. In 2021 and 2022, the lake’s water level rose by several feet (about one meter). Apparently, a geothermal feature near the lake began sending silica-laden water into the lake rather than into Porcelain Basin, which turned the lake’s water cloudy-white. The water level rose so dramatically that Nuphar Lake threatened to overflow its banks and into Porcelain Basin (which would have been pretty bad, because there are a lot of really pretty features there). By the end of the summer of 2024, though, the water level receded to its previous level and the color of the water returned to its normal clear green. Geologists found that an earthquake that occurred in April 2024 near the lake created a 10-foot-wide (about 3 meters) crater and caused water to stop flowing from the hydrothermal features. The dead trees in the previous photo, and those in the foreground of this photo, were killed by the silica-rich hydrothermal water that had been flowing into Nuphar Lake. That’s one big takeaway from our visit to Yellowstone National Park: nothing’s ever the same, and you can’t count on anything being there on a subsequent visit.Well, well, well … look what decided to finally show up: the sun. This is the same Porcelain Springs body of water that’s in the upper-left corner of the image three photos up. A sunny day does make all the difference – they are very pretty after all. Like porcelain, almost.The steam in Porcelain Basin, made more prominent because of the morning’s cold temperatures, was finally starting to dissipate so that we could see what else the basin had to offer. The sun was already pretty high up in the sky by that point, but it made for an interesting look. No retinas were damaged in the taking of this photo; the steam was a lot denser than it looks in the image.This is Hurricane Vent, which once was a fumarole but has increased in size to include more water action as well as a small waterfall on its side. It was pretty noisy, and interesting to watch.I took this photo just a few steps down the boardwalk from Hurricane Vent. This is looking to the southwest and at Ledge Geyser, which, while it rarely actually erupts, was certainly impressively active and loudly spouting steam from several of its vents during our time in Porcelain Basin. When Ledge does erupt, the geyser sends water more than 80 feet (24 meters) into the air. The Norris Geyser Basin Museum is on the other side of Ledge Geyser and up a hillside in this photo.Here we’re looking northeast from the Porcelain Basin boardwalk and at Constant Geyser. When it erupts, Constant’s spouts of water can reach 20-30 feet (6-9 m) into the air, but last only about 10 seconds. The geyser can go 20 minutes or several hours between eruptions.A few steps down the boardwalk, Whirligig Geyser (on the right) has eruptions that can be heard throughout Porcelain Basin. That green-hued stream on the left is the East Fork of Tantalus Creek.Here’s a closer look at the East Fork of Tantalus Creek. In Greek mythology, Tantalus was one of the (many, many, many) sons of Zeus who, for whichever transgression(s) you might choose to believe, was sentenced to stand in a pool of water under a fruit tree. The fruit was forever just outside his grasp, and, when he bent to get a drink, the water below him always receded. Anyhow, the beautiful green color of this creek comes from the thermophiles, or heat-loving microorganisms, that live in the water, in particular Cyanidioschyzon (I did not, despite how much I would have liked to, make that word up). It’s a genus of algae that thrives in water that’s 100-126 degrees F (38-52 degrees C). The steam from Whirligig Geyser is obscuring them in this photo, but there’s also a population of red-colored thermophiles that is thriving in hotter waters (122-160 degrees F, 50-60 degrees C) closer to Whirligig’s opening. The red coloration comes from the iron oxide that is in the geyser’s outflow. You’ll recall from high-school biology and chemistry classes that the pH scale is used to measure the concentration of hydrogen ions in a chemical. The scale goes from 1 (most acidic) to 14 (most alkaline), with 7 in the middle at neutral. Some of the water features in Norris Geyser Basin have a pH value below 2; they’re nearly as acidic as vinegar. It takes a tough little organism to live in that hot, acidic environment.This body of water, situated near the end of the Porcelain Basin loop, is Crackling Lake, named for the popping sounds made by geysers seen on its shoreline on the left.Here’s a last look at Ledge Geyser. This photo was taken from the other side of the plume of steam from where I took the previous photo of Ledge (note the other folks on the boardwalk looking at Constant, Whirligig, and other geysers to the left-center of the photo). Even though it never erupted, Ledge Geyser was a most impressive hydrothermal feature that made it hard to forget that molten rock was just four miles below our feet.
After a brief respite in the parking lot (and our prime parking spot) for lunch, Nancy and I enjoyed the features of Back Basin. We saw a lot of hydrothermal features that day – fortunately the fog over Porcelain Basin lifted about an hour after our arrival so that we could see them – and my guess is that the next time we visit, we’ll see a difference in a national park in which nothing is ever truly the same.
Works Consulted
Lynne, Bridget Y. “The Geothermal Guide to Yellowstone National Park.” 2017.
National Park Service. “Norris Geyser Basin Trail Guide.” March 2024.
National Park Service interpretive signage at Norris Geyser Basin Museum and at features throughout Porcelain Basin.
Wikipedia, accessed October 2025. If you use Wikipedia, please support it.
Nancy, Gunther, Rusty, and I are wintering in Las Vegas, Nevada. We arrived here at the beginning of November 2024, with plans to depart in early spring of this year. There are worse places to spend the winter than Las Vegas: the campground at which we’re staying is surprisingly inexpensive with friendly folks and lots of activities, there are a lot of good restaurants and entertainment options relatively nearby, and, as we found out last winter (we spent five months here), there are a unexpectedly large number of hiking and birding opportunities very close to the city.
Gunther, Nancy, and I took advantage of one of those birding opportunities during the waning days of 2024 with a visit to Clark County Wetlands Park, located just a few minutes’ drive from our campground. The Las Vegas Wash, which I described in last year’s posting about the Owl Canyon Hiking Trail at Lake Mead National Recreation Area, creates the wetlands aspect of the park. Those of you who have spent much time in the desert city of Las Vegas might be surprised to see that a decent-sized creek runs through the east side of the metropolitan area. Las Vegas Wash is bigger at times, especially after heavy rains, than others. For those used to even small-sized creeks and rivers, it’s probably not a very impressive waterway. However, the Las Vegas Wash is absolutely critical for the health and sustainability of this area; the water in it is collected wastewater and runoff from the city’s hotels, golf courses, and other businesses, as well as residential wastewater and stormwater runoff, on a 12-mile journey (including through wastewater treatment plants) to the Lake Mead impoundment east of Las Vegas. Ninety percent of the water used in the Las Vegas metropolitan area is drawn from Lake Mead (the rest is from groundwater sources), so it’s imperative that as much water that’s used in the city gets returned to the reservoir as possible.
We’re currently close enough to the Golden State that I thought this might be a California quail as opposed to a Gambel’s quail (Callipepla gambelii), but it is indeed the latter. It, along with three or four more of its kind, was hunting on the ground just off the trail shortly after we started our walk. In addition to southern Nevada, this bird’s range includes regions of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, as well as little parts of western Colorado.
Whether it’s moving, still, salty, fresh, or freshly treated, water makes a huge difference in supporting wildlife populations; without the wash, many species of birds, lizards, and mammals simply wouldn’t be in this place. That fact was made clear to us on the day that we visited. Like most avid birders, I keep a record of each bird species we see during the year. Before we began the five-mile loop walk through the wetlands, we’d seen 50 different bird species in 2024; by the time the three of us climbed back into the Goddard’s six-wheeled towing unit to drive back to the campground, we’d seen 18 additional species, 12 of which were species not yet seen in 2024, and four of which we’d never seen before. In other words, nearly a quarter of the bird species we saw in 2024 were seen on the on the 363rd day of the year during this 2 1/2-hour hike just outside of Las Vegas.
Much of the 2,900-acre (4.5 square-mile) Wetlands Park is a nature preserve, into which Gunther (very understandably) can’t go. However, there’s a very fine concrete trail that skirts the outer perimeter of the preserve and also goes over a bridge that crosses the wash. It was from that bridge that we saw three of the four “lifers,” or bird species we hadn’t ever seen before.
This is a view from the Las Vegas Wash looking west toward Las Vegas Boulevard, or “The Strip.” It was an overcast and hazy day in the Las Vegas Valley, but you can just barely make out some of the structures on The Strip. Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, the southernmost casino on The Strip and indicated by the green arrow, is about nine miles directly west of this position. The Stratosphere Hotel, Casino and Tower (I think it’s just going by The STRAT now) is indicated by the blue arrow and is located about six miles to the north of Mandalay Bay. (Incidentally, at 1,149 feet the Stratosphere’s observation tower is the tallest in the United States and is second in the Western Hemisphere only to Toronto’s CN Tower at 1,815 feet – but that’s a conversion from metric so who knows what’s really going on?) Anyway, the Spring Mountain Range is on the horizon, and in between Las Vegas Boulevard and the mountains is Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, which we visited last winter. Those are American coots swimming in the Las Vegas Wash on the right.We’ve seen lots of little white-crowned sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys) since becoming full-time RVers, especially in New Mexico and Arizona, but it’s always a pleasure to see (and hear) them again. Of all the little brown birds (LBBs), they are one of the easiest o identify. Small but mighty, these birds are exceptional migrators and have been tracked flying as many as 300 miles in one night.
Prior to becoming full-time RVers and when we still lived in Denver, Nancy and I visited Las Vegas at least once a year. Like most visitors, we arrived via airplane at Harry Reid International Airport (née McCarran International Airport), and took a cab to our hotel, either on The Strip, or, later and more regularly, in downtown Las Vegas. We’d spend a few fun-filled days, some more profitable than others, and then take a cab back to the airport and return home. A lot of people don’t realize that when they fly into Harry Reid International Airport, spend a few days recreating on The Strip then return to the airport to go back home, they’re not ever actually in Las Vegas – unless they go to the Stratosphere (I don’t care what it’s going by now; I’ll still call it the Stratosphere because I just got used to not calling it Bob Stupak’s Vegas World) or to downtown Las Vegas. Otherwise, each of the roughly 40 hotels and casinos, including places like The Bellagio, Caesar’s Palace, New York New York, The Luxor, The Wynn Las Vegas, and dozens more) along Las Vegas Boulevard, with the exception of the Stratosphere, is in unincorporated Clark County (as is the airport). Those hotels have a total of nearly 89,000 rooms (The Wynn Las Vegas alone has almost 4,800 rooms); compare to, say, downtown Denver which has about 11,000 hotel rooms and the biggest one, the Sheraton Denver Downtown, has 1,231 rooms). The point is, there are a lot of hotel rooms in Las Vegas (and tens of thousands more in unincorporated Clark County), and all of them have bathrooms with showers and flushing toilets, and all of that water needs to go somewhere.
Where it needs to go is into Lake Mead, and how it gets there is via the Las Vegas Wash. Wastewater treatment plant facilities clean up the water as it makes its way to the reservoir; during our visit to the wetlands on December 28, I was reminded of walking and biking on the Cherry Creek Regional Trail in Denver because of the unmistakable (and not entirely unpleasant – certainly more pleasant than it had been before) smell of wastewater under the process of being treated.
Anyhow, and as someone once wrote, back to the birds.
Here’s the first of the never-before-seen-by-us species: the Crissal thrasher (Toxostoma crissale). It’s very similar to a curve-billed thrasher, but the Crissal’s beak is even longer (and more curved, I think). This particular species prefers to stay on the ground, foraging for food, rather than fly about to fill its belly. In the United States, this bird is found only in the southern parts of California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, and far western Texas. I usually avoid editing my pictures, other than cropping and re-sizing, but I decided to adjust the contrast on this one to bring out the bird better. The overcast conditions on the day we visited weren’t the best for photography, and many of the birds were far away (in the nature preserve, where, thanks to Gunther, we weren’t allowed. Thanks again, Gunther.)Happily, the sun happened to be out a bit more when we were on the bridge in Wetlands Park, and I got what I think are some pretty good photos. These ducks were far enough away that I didn’t know what species they were until we got back home and I could have a closer look at the images. This is another new-to-us species, the ring-necked duck (Aythya collaris). As is sometimes the case, the identification feature that’s in the name of this species isn’t really helpful in identifying it: the ring on the neck is very faint, and was probably more visible to early naturalists on captured birds. As a migrator, this species is found throughout North America in different parts of the year; during the fall, Minnesota lakes supporting beds of wild rice can sometimes have flocks of ring-necked ducks numbering in the hundreds of thousands. In this species, as with many other ducks, the male (right) and female (left) genders have remarkably different coloration most of the year (note the extreme difference even in their eye color). As was pointed out to me a few days ago by a full-time resident of this campground, the females of many bird species have to stay more camouflaged to protect the young hatchlings (in that case, we were talking about hummingbirds, but it’s true for many bird species). We’ve had the opportunity to see plenty of double-crested cormorants (Nannopterum auritum), especially at St. Vrain State Park in northern Colorado, but they were usually swimming. For some reason, there were a lot of cormorants on the wing this day at Wetlands Park. This one is showing off its wingspan, which can get to four feet long. Interestingly, despite being a water bird, cormorants do not have waterproof feathers – it’s why they’re often seen on shore with their wings spread. I recently listened to a very interesting audiobook about the Cretaceous-Paleogene Extinction Event, in which an asteroid struck the Earth 66 million years ago and brought the Age of Dinosaurs (mostly) to an end. The author consistently mentioned, though, that only non-avian dinosaurs, or those reptiles that couldn’t take to the air, were made extinct. I’ve mentioned it before, but double-crested cormorants (the white crests appear above the eyes of adult birds only during the breeding season) are one of the best reminders that, in an indirect way, avian dinosaurs still populate the earth.I’ve long been struck by how majestic and powerful most birds look when viewed from the side, or perhaps a three-quarter angle, and how they don’t look at all majestic and powerful when viewed face-on. This is a great blue heron (Ardea herodias), which spent a considerable amount of time among the reeds on the hunt for small fish.The angle makes all the difference: same exact bird. Great blue herons are a lot of fun to watch – they’re very patient while hunting and move almost imperceptibly, but then strike lightning-quick to pull fish from the water. If you look away for a moment, you may have missed all of the action. GBHs grow to a height of almost 4.5 feet and can weigh 5.5 pounds, with wingspans measuring more than 6.5 feet.I originally thought this was a snowy egret (and thus a lifer), but when editing the photo for this posting I realized that its beak is all yellow and its legs are all black (and it’s overall bigger than a snowy egret, which have black beaks and yellow legs). Thus, it’s a great egret (Ardea alba), which we’ve seen plenty of times elsewhere but are still very gratifying to watch. This bird is the symbol of the National Audubon Society, which was created to save this species and others from extinction. Because of their white brilliance, the feathers of great egrets were once valued as decorative accessories for people. This one was just taking off from creekside of the Las Vegas Wash, affording a good view of its feet just above the water. Again, this bird was far enough away while I was photographing it that I wasn’t really sure what species it was, but upon getting home and reviewing it on a bigger screen I discovered that it is an American bittern (Botaurus lentiginosus). This, the third of the “lifer” birds for this walk, was flying about the wash looking for a good place to land. They weigh between 13 and 17 ounces (just over a pound), with a three-foot wingspan. In true Vegas style, we were lucky to see this bittern while on the wing; this species is somewhat rare to observe in the wild because it takes advantage of that striping pattern on its neck and chest to hide motionless among reeds and other tall waterside plants while hunting. American bitterns, also migrators, are found from central and southern Canada down into Mexico at different parts of the year. During the winter months in North America, this species is found only in the extreme southern parts of the southern states and along the eastern and western seaboards. That’s an American coot on the right. We’ve seen American wigeons (Mareca americana) before as well, most memorably near Willcox, Arizona, but it was good to see another one near Las Vegas. We didn’t see any wigeon drakes; only this hen; drakes have a green head and a white crown. Wigeons’ bills are shorter and more goose-like than those of other dabbling ducks, and for that reason more of their diet is plant-based than those of other duck species. That’s an American coot on the right.Compare this egret to the great egret pictured above: notice the black beak and the yellow feet of this one? That’s right: it’s a snowy egret (Egretta thula), and thus the final lifer of the day! Another difference between the two species is their size: great egrets can grow to a height of just over 40 inches and a weight of 35 ounces, while snowy egrets only grow to about 26 inches and a weight of 13 ounces. Regrettably, and although I waited for what seemed like a reasonable time, no American coots made their way into the background of this photo.The “wetlands” aspect of Wetlands Park ends pretty abruptly; in fact, within just a few feet of the water’s edge, the landscape reverts back to extraordinary desolation. The Las Vegas area is in the extreme northeast corner of the Mojave Desert, 54,000 square miles of a dry and sparsely vegetated area that also includes Death Valley. The desert gets between 2 and 6 inches of rain each year, and summertime temperatures regularly climb into the 120-degree-Fahrenheit range. Still, there’s plenty of opportunity for my favorite desert plant, creosote, to grow (although these are, by far, the lowest-growing creosote bushes I’ve ever seen). We’re facing away (east) from the Las Vegas metropolitan area in this view. Yonder, about 20 miles beyond those picnic shelters, lies Lake Mead.Nancy was the first to spot this Say’s phoebe (Sayornis saya) as it flitted about in the shrubbery to our left (well, if Gunther saw it first, he sure didn’t point it out to me). The bird seemed to want to follow us down the trail for a while, giving me plenty of opportunities to snap its picture. These birds are found only in the western United States and Canada, and most of Mexico. They’re actually fairly gregarious, as birds go, and will often roost in buildings. Their diet consists mostly of insects. It’s possible that their name will change sometime in the future: there’s a movement in the birding community to re-name all birds that are named after individuals because it turns out that some of the individuals for whom birds have been named after were not themselves very nice people. Dunno if that’s the case for American naturalist Thomas Say (1787-1834); I do think that individual names are on their way out just for consistency’s sake.The walk that Nancy and Gunther and I were on was a balloon loop, in which you start walking and sooner or later make a left or right turn, then keep walking until you get back to the point at which you made a turn (completing the loop) and then walk back to the start of the hike (completing the “string” of the balloon). This allowed us to make a repeat visit to the bridge under which the Las Vegas Wash ran, and gave us another opportunity to see birds attracted by what the water makes possible – basically, fish and bugs and waterplants. The overcast and hazy conditions of the day were already pretty bad, and the mid-afternoon sun was fading, too, but I did get a few pictures of this belted kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon) perched over the wash. This photo, too, has been edited to bring out the contrast and colors of the bird. This photo still isn’t that great; the white spot above the kingfisher’s bill is just that: a white spot, and its eyes are black and above and just behind those spots. We’ve seen exactly two belted kingfishers, which is a flying marvel of a waterbird, since we became full-time RVers a little over three years ago. Both of them were seen in Las Vegas, which averages about four inches of rain each year (we saw the other one last winter at another wildlife preserve in Las Vegas proper; I’ll get around to writing about that super-cool place someday). Water really is a crucial aspect of wildlife diversity. We were highly fortunate to see this one actually fishing; it’s an laccomplished flyer and is capable of quickly diving down to the water to catch fish and crawdads with that magnificent bill.We’re nearly to the other end of the bridge now, and running out of water in which to see waterbirds. The ducks to the left, of course, are mallards (Anas platyrhynchos), including the drake at far left and the hen in the middle. Mallards are found all over North America, Europe, and parts of Asia and even Africa. I read recently that domestic ducks (the familiar white ducks of many a barnyard) are domesticated from the mallard species, and the mallard genome is so prevalent in ducks that it’s prone to cross-breeding in wild populations that some species struggle to remain distinct. This lovely couple gives a good size perspective on the snowy egret at right – they’re really not very big, are they?Alright, alright … one more bird before we leave the waterway. This is the fabulous American coot (Fulica americana), which, although it floats like a duck is more closely related to sandhill cranes than anyone in the duck family. I wasn’t going to include this, but there were (obviously) about three kajillion coots on the Las Vegas Wash that day and it doesn’t seem right to exclude an exclusive photo. This is, incidentally, the best picture of a coot I’ve ever taken; their black color and tendency to hide amongst water plants makes them difficult to photograph well. This was probably the biggest bird we saw during our walk. It’s hard for me to resist taking pictures of aircraft flying overhead, even while enjoying the serenity of nature. This is a Boeing 737 Max 8, registration number N17341 and operating as United Airlines Flight 1981, shortly after its scheduled departure from LAS (Harry Reid International Airport) at 2:05 PM Pacific time, with scheduled arrival at EWR (Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey) at 9:59 PM Eastern time. N17341 saw a lot of the country on December 28: it left Charleston International Airport (CHS) in South Carolina at 6:00 AM Eastern, flying first to EWR, then flew cross-country to LAS, then had this flight back to EWR. More than 1,050 flights arrive at and depart from LAS every day; it’s the country’s eighth-busiest airport.
The next couple of photos aren’t from the Las Vegas Wetlands Park walk – they’re ones I took in our campground in which we’ve been staying the winter. There’s not necessarily a lot of variety of birds here, but they’re still fun to keep an eye out for.
I often see this little dude, a male Anna’s hummingbird (Calypte anna), when Gunther and I are visiting our campground’s dog park in the mornings. While Gunther is attending to his business, I look to this same little branch on this same little tree, and about half the time he’s there, just about 10 yards from the dog park’s fence. The legs of all hummingbirds are so small that the birds can neither walk nor hop on the ground or on a branch. They, like all hummingbirds, are tiny: Anna’s have all the volume of a ping-pong ball and the all the mass of a shiny U.S. nickel (between a tenth and two-tenths of an ounce). As small as they are, they’re powerful fliers: males can soar up to 130 feet in the air. This species of hummingbird, one of 360 in the world, is found year-round in the Las Vegas area, as well as the western halves of California, Oregon, and Washington. Say, that reminds me: I’ve recently learned the German word for “pineapple” is “Ananas,” so the imperativ (command) for “Anna, eat pineapple!” in German is “Anna, esse Ananas!”Here’s another reminder that we share this planet with dinosaurs’ descendants: imagine the slashing terror of these razor-sharp talons, the brute strength of these powerful claws, the raw crushing horror of …… a rock pigeon (Columba livia), which is found year-round all over North, Central, and South America, and the campground in which we are spending the winter.Gunther thanks you for joining him (and Nancy and me) on this Las Vegas Wash adventure, and hopes you have a healthy and happy 2025 filled with lots of fun walks!
Here’s a list of the birds (not all are pictured above) we saw at Wetlands Park; it was one of the more successful birding walks we’ve ever enjoyed, and just a fun way to spend an afternoon in The Entertainment Capital of the World.
I’ve been reading “Riders of the Purple Sage,” one of Zane Grey’s early books that helped shape the Western novel formula. Publishing the book in 1918, Grey (1872-1930) was inspired to write a Western story after reading Owen Wister’s “The Virginian” (1902). It would be the most popular of Grey’s 90 books (it’s estimated that he wrote 9 million words in his career). Later prolific western authors like Max Brand and Louis L’Amour were heavily influenced by Grey; L’Amour himself wrote 89 novels and 14 collections of short stories. “Riders of the Purple Sage” has been adapted for film five times: in 1918 and `1925 (both were silent movies), 1931, 1941, and a 1996 TV movie starring Ed Harris and Amy Madigan (who have been married to each other since 1983).
Although I’ve read “The Virginian” and lots of Louis L’Amour’s books, I’ve never read a Zane Grey novel (my only point of reference to Grey was knowing that Colonel Sherman Potter of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital was a big fan). I’ve been struck how, in “Riders of the Purple Sage,” Grey deftly describes the canyons, mesas, and flatlands of southern Utah, the setting of the book. The characterization and dialog in the book are definitely of their time, but the story itself is pretty exciting and Grey was quite skilled at painting, in words, how the incredible scenery of the region appears.
Reading “Riders of the Purple Sage” reminded me of when we were in southern Utah and northern Arizona for an extended visit in 2023. We’d planned to stay in Fredonia, Arizona, for four weeks so that we could visit a couple of national parks and monuments in the region. Mechanical issues with The Goddard, our fifth-wheel trailer, extended our stay for an additional week. We were unable to lower the front jacks of our trailer, which meant that it had to stay hitched to the six-wheeled towing unit. A very competent RV technician was able to help us manually lower the jacks and we were able to unhitch our F-350, and he later fixed the jack-lowering issue (turns out a rodent probably chewed through a wire while we were camping at the south rim of the Grand Canyon; lesson learned is to never go to the Grand Canyon again). At any rate, our extended stay while waiting for RV parts was a fortunate one as we were able to visit the north rim of the Grand Canyon, which, due to snow, didn’t open until early June that year.
This post, however, is not about either rim of the Grand Canyon but rather a manmade lake in Utah. Our campground was in Fredonia, Arizona, about four miles south of the Arizona/Utah border. We spent quite a bit of time in Kanab, Utah (itself about four miles north of the border), partly because we found a reservoir near Kanab that offered great hiking and birding opportunities. We visited the lake three times in late May and early June, and this post has pictures from all of those excursions. We saw lots of different species of birds, and we were fortunate to have timed our visit for some pretty impressive displays of blossoming plants.
The average depth of Jackson Flat Reservoir is only 28 feet. It’s primarily a holding reservoir for irrigation water, but the lake receives plenty of non-motorized boating, hiking, swimming, fishing, and stargazing enthusiasts. The sage in this photo isn’t purple like in the Zane Grey book, but maybe it’s due to the time of day that I took the picture.
Jackson Flat Reservoir, located between Kanab and the state line, had been in its planning stages for nearly two decades when construction began in 2010. The reservoir meets local agricultural irrigation needs, and is also a wonderful boating, swimming, and hiking destination for Kanab residents. Built to a capacity of 4,228 acre-feet, the reservoir attracts a large number of waterfowl and other birds to southeast Utah.
Birds with predominantly black coloration are frustratingly difficult to photograph unless the lighting is just right; I really like the pattern on this common loon (Chondestes grammacus) so I decided to include the picture in this posting. Nancy and I watched this bird for quite some time; it would disappear under the water for up to a minute at a time, and it was kind of fun to guess where he’d pop back up. Their diet consists mostly of crustaceans and small fish. Common loons are found all over the United States – it’s likely how they got their name.Writing of “common,” here’s a common raven (Corvus corax) behind a juniper bush, looking much like a Muppet. True to their name, these birds are the most common of corvids (a family of birds that also includes crows, magpies, and jays), and, weighing in at 3.2 pounds at maturity, they are the largest of the passerine order (basically birds that perch, about half of the species on the planet). On our walks around the lake, we saw several ravens being chased in the air by red-winged blackbirds that were presumably defending their nests.Writing of which, here’s a red-winged blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus) patrolling water’s edge. “But Ken,” you might think to yourself, “this bird is neither red-winged nor black.” I would agree with you, and likely add that it looks like one of the 70 million species of brown-colored sparrows. This is, however, a female red-winged blackbird, which do not have the black color and red wing markings of the males of the species. You can differentiate a female red-winged blackbird from a sparrow by looking at the beak: it’s much more pointed and angular than say, …… the beak of this brown-colored sparrow. This is a lark sparrow (Chondestes grammacus), a species we seemingly see sparingly, but is actually fairly common and distributed throughout most of the United States and Mexico. To remind us that we were in an arid desert environment, there were several varieties of cactus growing around the reservoir. This is tulip prickly pear (Opuntia phaeacantha) featuring riotously vibrant colors on its blossoms. Whenever I see bright colors like this on flowers, or a bird, or a tropical fish, I think, “There’s a color not found in nature.” But they are literally found in nature. This is the road over the dam of Jackson Flat Reservoir, with the cliffs of southern Utah in the distance. The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument’s western border is just to the right edge of this photograph. The reservoir’s dam contains 800,000 yards of dirt and rocks. One thing I like to do when seeing a reservoir’s dam is to cry out “Dam!” I wonder if Nancy ever gets tired of me doing that. I should probably ask her sometime. We see a lot of dams.Some of the waterfowl we saw were far away from the trail that goes around the reservoir. This was a new species to us, so I decided to include it even though it’s a terrible photo. This is a black-necked stilt (Chondestes grammacus). It’s found in the western United States and down into Mexico, and in quite a bit of South America as well. They are about 15 inches tall, with long pink legs and a wingspan of close to 30 inches. Like other shorebirds, black-necked stilts use their long bills and beaks to feed on freshwater shrimp, as well as crayfish and small fish. Species like these have no business being in the arid desert of southern Utah, except for the existence of Jackson Flat Reservoir – it’s a great benefit to area residents to be able to see birds like this.Indian paintbrush has long been one of my favorite wildflowers. There are more than 200 species of this plant; I’m pretty sure this is Wyoming Indian paintbrush (Castilleja linariifolia), which is the state flower of … Wyoming.THIS IS A TALES OF THE GODDARD LIZARD ALERT. Movement at the side of the trail around the reservoir attracted our attention to this western fence lizard, a very common reptile in the western United States. Note the blue patch on his throat; that blue shading also extends to his stomach (I’m guessing; I didn’t pick this rascal up to check) and leads to another name for the lizard: the bluebelly. There are five subspecies of western fence lizards; they have a SVL (snout-vent length) of 2.25 to 3.5 inches.As I wrote earlier, we happened to time our visits to Jackson Flat Reservoir when many flowering plants were blossoming. The flowering of this plant, desert globemallow (Sphaeralcea ambigua), lasted throughout our entire stay in the region: it was everywhere. It generally grows to a height of three feet, and is host to the caterpillar stage of a number of butterfly and moth species.Writing of which, here’s a butterfly species called the mourning cloak (Nymphalis antiopa). This butterfly is found in both North America and Europe. Because it feeds on sap from trees and shrubs, it’s not a significant pollinator.Back to birds: here is a couple of double-crested cormorants (Nannopterum auritum), contemplating a cooling dip in the waters of Jackson Flat Reservoir. Although they are definitely water birds, their feathers are not waterproof and they are often seen standing on the shore with their wings spread out in order to dry off. Their diet is exclusively fish-based.One of the facets of birding that I really like is the opportunity to see pairs of a particular species. The males and females of many species are often seen close together, and you get the opportunity to see how the two genders differ in appearance. This is a pair of ruddy ducks (Oxyura jamaicensis), easily identified by the male’s bright blue bill which only appears that way during the summer months (it’s gray the rest of the year).There are a number of really distinctive-looking birds of which I’d only seen pictures or video footage of, but never in real life until Nancy and I started full-time RVing. I’ll never forget seeing a wood duck in real life for the first time (at a state park in Albuquerque, New Mexico), or a scarlet tanager (at a campground in Tucson, Arizona), a common loon (on a lake in western Michigan), a northern cardinal (at a campground in Oklahoma) or a greater roadrunner (at a campground in Albuquerque). I’ve now seen all of those species several times in the last three years, but it’s always a thrill to see them again. The Gambel’s quail (Callipepla gambelii) is another of those birds: I first saw them at a regional park outside of Phoenix, Arizona, and I’ve seen them many times since then, but it’s still really fun to encounter them because of their distinctive appearance. This species is native to the American Southwest, and is also found in parts of Colorado and Texas.Gunther found this lovely stand of desert mallow on a walk near our campground in Fredonia. During our stay in northern Arizona, we saw about 50 kajillion of these flowers; at times, the landscape looked like a sea of pink-orange coral. But “Riders of the Pink-Orange Desert Mallow” doesn’t really have the right zing, and Zane Grey was probably right to title his novel the way he did.
The Goddard spent a few weeks in far eastern Idaho – about 30 miles from the Wyoming border – during the waning days of summer 2023. Ririe Reservoir, built in 1970 by the U.S. Army’s Corps of Engineers (CoE), impounds Willow Creek as it flows toward its entry into the Snake River near Idaho Falls. The reservoir has a surface area of 6.1 square kilometers (1,500 acres), about the size of Colorado’s Chatfield Reservoir at normal pool.
We camped at Ririe Reservoir long enough to see some of the cottonwood leaves change to their autumnal colors. This pavement is what I came to call “Raptor Road” because of the frequent sightings of hawks and falcons atop the utility poles (there were, unfortunately, no raptors atop the poles when I took this photo on the morning of September 8). That’s a potato field on the horizon.
Juniper Campground serves the reservoir, and, as is usually the case with CoE-built facilities, it’s outstanding. We spent most of our time at the reservoir camped in a site that had a great view of the reservoir through the Goddard’s back and side windows. We were there for Labor Day weekend and, although the Saturday and Sunday of the weekend proved to be pretty chilly and wet, we think the families who filled up the campground still had a great time.
The campground’s stands of native juniper trees, along with planted aspen, cottonwood, and chokecherries, support an outstanding wildlife habitat. The shrubs and trees provide food and shelter for birds, squirrels, and rabbits. I managed to take a few (hundred) photos of birds in the weeks that we were at Ririe Reservoir, and a lot of the pictures featured birds of prey perched atop utility poles (thus the title of this posting).
I was really happy to get some photos of this American kestrel (Falco sparverius) – it’s a species I’ve been wanting to photograph for many years. Their plumage, especially on their heads, is just so pretty. Kestrels are the smallest raptor in North America, weighing only about 5.5 ounces and measuring up to a foot in length, with a two-foot wingspan. Size- and weight-wise, they’re roughly the size of an American robin although their wingspan is much longer. They are found all over the United States, Canada, and Mexico, as well as much of South America. Like other raptors, they can see in ultraviolet light – which allows them to see a urine trail from a rodent. Kestrels also eat a lot of airborne insects, and will commonly patrol a well-lit football or baseball field in search of bugs attracted by the lights. They are fierce little birds, to be sure, but because of their size they’re also prey for other, larger raptors. We saw plenty of these magnificent red-tailed hawks (Buteo jamaicensis), both on power line poles and in the air, which makes a lot of sense because they are the most common hawk in North America. They’re found all over the United States and most of Canada. Red-tailed hawks grow to a length of 22 inches, with a weight of about 3 pounds and a wingspan measuring more than 4 feet. They have a very distinctive call, so commanding that Hollywood productions use the call whenever any bird of prey, whether it’s a bald eagle or an actual red-tailed hawk, is shown on screen (soundfile below). Red-tailed hawks are remarkably long-lived: one banded individual lived for at least 30 years in the wild.
WARNING! The next photo shows a bird eating a fish; if you get squicked out by the sight of mildly bloody things, you may want to consider scrolling past the picture with some haste.
I saw this osprey (Pandion haliaetus) atop a power pole with its sushi breakfast mid-morning while I was driving to the town of Ririe on some errand that I’m sure was important. I was happy I’d thought to bring along my digital camera, because although we’d seen plenty of these birds during our stay I hadn’t gotten a picture. Ospreys weight about three pounds, with an impressive wingspan of 5 1/2 feet. Ririe Reservoir contains rainbow and cutthroat trout, kokanee salmon, smallmouth bass, and yellow perch. It’s difficult to tell what this unfortunate fellow was.
Ospreys are supremely adapted to support their diet of 99% fish (I don’t know what the 1% is; maybe like all of us, they break down about once a year and get a Big Mac): uniquely among raptors, two of their rear toes are reversible to allow them to carry fish with two toes in front and two toes in back. Their feet also have barbed lobes to aid in the grasping of fish, and they fly with their catch facing head-on to decrease wind resistance. Over the course of several studies, researchers found that ospreys are successful in catching a fish about 25% of the time. They are found all over the world, with the exception of Antarctica. Osprey were seriously endangered until DDT was banned, and their numbers have since strongly rebounded. These birds typically have a lifespan of about 20 years.
Of course, there were birds perched on things other than power poles at Ririe Reservoir (and apologies for anyone expecting more utility pole content; the title of this posting is probably misleading). Here’s a chipping sparrow (Spizella passerina) enjoying a quiet morning while perched on a cottonwood limb. The easiest way to tell a chipping sparrow apart from the other several billion brown-and-white sparrow species is the presence of a dark horizontal line through their eye. Male chipping sparrows have a handsome ruddy-brown cap atop their heads. This species is found throughout the United States, although they’re found in the center of the country only during their migration.This pretty bird sitting atop a juniper tree is a female American goldfinch (Spinus tristis). In the waning days of summer, the plumage of these birds is starting to molt into its winter colors. Goldfinches are unusual among most birds in that they molt twice each year: once in late winter and again in late summer.When birdwatching, I usually have my eyes trained at the tops of trees. Nancy spotted these male American goldfinches from a window in the Goddard, and I stuck my camera out the front door and snapped a couple of photos. We’d just had a brief rainshower in the campground, and these guys were looking for seeds on the ground. Goldfinches are purely vegetarian birds; they eat predominantly grass and flower seeds, and insects only inadvertently. There’s a species of bird called the brown-headed cowbird that lays its eggs in other species’ nests and lets the new parents raise their young (and the cowbird hatchings often crowd or starve out the real hatchlings because cowbirds are much bigger). In the case of goldfinches, cowbird hatchlings usually die a few days after hatching because they can’t survive on the all-seed diet that the goldfinch parents bring to the nest. Note that, like the female goldfinch above, these two fellows also appear to be in the process of molting for the winter.More birds on the ground: while on a morning walk with Gunther down Raptor Road, I saw this mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) on the roadside and bundled up against the chill of the early day. I feared it was sick or injured, but it flew off shortly after I took this picture. You may have heard a whistling sound when a dove flies off; that’s not coming from their beak, but from the beating of their wings. Doves spend a lot of time on the ground gathering seeds, and can eat 20 percent of the body weight (the birds can weigh up to 6 ounces) in seeds every day. This is the most frequently hunted gamebird in North America, but the current population is estimated to number 3.5 million birds (more than one mourning dove for every person in the country). I really like the pale blue ring around mourning doves’ eyes.Mourning dove, elevated (and a shout-out to all the barbed-wire aficionados).Lots o’ ladies in this particular blog posting. This is a female Brewer’s blackbird (Euphagus cyanocephalus) hunting for breakfast in the grass near a campsite. These birds (the males are definitely black, with a startlingly bright yellow eye) are fairly sociable and help reduce insect populations near human habitations. Blackbirds also eat a lot of seeds. They can gather in flocks numbering up to 100; we didn’t see any gatherings that big, but we did see lots of these birds.
We also saw black-billed magpies and an eastern kingbird during our time at Ririe Reservoir. The new species that we saw at the reservoir brought our total species count for the year, through early September, to 87 – the number with which we ended the calendar year 2022. We also saw a lot of utility poles, but I haven’t been keeping track of those. Will we reach 100 species of birds seen in 2023, with more than 3 months left to go? No one can say. However, we’ll be spending quite a few weeks in parts of the country in which we haven’t yet stayed, so it’s very possible.
I should probably include a picture of Ririe Reservoir in this posting, so here’s one with a friendly dog (it’s Gunther, on one of his security patrols around Juniper Campground; everything checked out on this walk). We’ve stayed at more than 60 public and private campgrounds in the nearly two years since we began full-time RVing, and Ririe Reservoir’s Juniper Campground is definitely in our top 5 favorites. Between the opportunities for wildlife watching, enjoying the quiet environment (the dark skies at night allowed for some incredible stargazing), and easy access to a number of attractions in the area, this campground really impressed us.Alright, one more utility pole photo, at sunset, with a center-pivot irrigation system on a potato field, some beautiful Idaho mountains, and an osprey.
Tales of The Goddard 