Gambel's Quail

Gambel's Quail are ubiquitous desert neighbors in the deserts of Arizona and New Mexico. With their characteristic bobbing headdress, they scurry across roads and peck around in the chaparral. They're certainly some of the most amusing birds to watch. They resemble the California Quail but Gambels are a unique species and the two quails' habitats don't overlap. The female and young are more modestly dressed than the males. They spend a lot of their time on the ground foraging and even nest on the ground, but they can and do fly. When a hawk soars overhead, quail tribes explode in a whir of wings and scatter into the bushes. If you're hiking and you startle a group of quail, prepare to be startled yourself!

Erin took these photos of a particular group of quail that hang out on the wall in our yard. A few months ago, many quail in this group were just little chicks chasing their parents in  their signature single-file line across our driveway. 




The mourning doves and quail seem to enjoy a sort of truce. The doves' range vastly exceeds the quails' - it stretches across most of sub-arctic North America.

Foggy Morning

I woke up to another morning of dense fog. Fog offers uncommon lighting in the usually bright desert, so I grabbed my camera and shot a few pictures. A humid 39 degrees felt like an old friend to my New England bones.


I don't know if these little lacewings were taking shelter in the cholla fruit or eating it. Perhaps edible shelter?

Chickadees

One thing I miss about living in Massachusetts is chickadees. They're really fascinating birds to watch. If you've got a feeder, spend some time watching the chickadees.

Homesick Yankee Ramblings

A quick scan of this blog reveals that I love Arizona, but I'm from Massachusetts. Many of the photographs and items around our house came out west with us. Every so often I get to looking at one of these things and I get a strong urge to go to where the photograph was taken. Such is the case with these chickadee photos.

There's a spot near the Quabbin Reservoir in the western part of central Massachusetts where birds will eat out of your hand during winter months. I don't want to reveal the exact location, but I will say that it's in an abandoned orchard a short ways into the woods. People have hung bird feeders around and keep them stocked with seed. If you bring some seed, just place it in your hand and wait a moment. Pretty soon a chickadee or titmouse or nuthatch will come along, perch on your fingers, select a good looking seed, and fly off.

I'm not entirely sure that I think its a good idea to encourage wild animals to lose their natural wariness of people. In the same orchard, deer wander about at a distance. They won't come too close, but they don't run away even when you get pretty close. Still, I want to visit this spot so badly and I wish it wasn't over two-thousand miles away.

We shot this on 35mm and developed it in closet I had converted into a darkroom. I used an antique Durst enlarger. It was a lot of fun. Can't help but missing my darkroom and my Worcester apartment.

I noticed that when I Geotagged this photo on Flickr it says this was "Taken in Enfield, Massachusetts." Enfield is no longer a populated town; it was flooded in the 1940's in the creation of the Quabbin Reservoir. This picture was taken in a town that no longer exists. From this distance, its non-existence feels so true.