The Ranch is open to day visitors from 10 AM to 4 PM.   $5 per person.   Groups of more than four people must call in advance.

SEPTEMBER 2010 NEWS 

This part of Arizona is very green now, as the monsoon rains have been abundant.   We had 3.5 inches in July, and 7.71 in August, totalling 11.21 inches, compared to last year’s 1.98 in July and .57 in August, totalling 2.55 inches.   In all of last year we had 13 inches, while we’re already at 18.46 for 2010.  Perhaps the long drought is over.

We’re in the middle of hummingbird migration, but fewer birds are coming to the feeders here and elsewhere, perhaps because of abundant rains producing flowers and gnats for them to get nourishment almost everywhere.  With the dry year last year that may have impacted breeding then, so there would be fewer birds now, but no one really knows.  Last year’s migration had huge numbers of hummingbirds, so I’m hopeful that the former theory is right.   Other bird migration is late starting, just as this past spring many birds seemed to be late to arrive or pass through. 

Elf owls and trogons will be leaving soon, but people are still seeing trogons up the canyon.   Mammals are seen less with all the grass and cover for them, but the bobcat did trot by the office a couple of days ago with a long rock squirrel swinging from its mouth.  I was not sorry, as that species of squirrel tunnels under the buildings causing many problems.   The javelinas are only appearing every few days, as is a fairly mangy coatimundi which raids the feeders in the Pinyon Pine by the office door.

It’s cooling off, starting to be in the fifties at night.  Historically the September night time average low is 48, but it’s been a warmer summer than usual, and the lowest we’ve had so far is 57.  Fall is the most beautiful time here, I think, as it cools off, the colors change toward the end of October and early November, and many of the bugs disappear.  The deer should be dropping their fawns in the next week or two (it’s very late here compared to other parts of the country, perhaps because there’s no cover to hide the fawns until the monsoons produce the tall grass).

Maybe we’ll see you here soon!

Reed Peters

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