How many owls can you find in the above photo?
Mama Owl in the Tangle Heart Tree.
Peter, Paul, and Mary together again in the bosque eleven days after Peter flew the coop.
Peter, Paul, and Mary
There was a 50% chance of rain, but any rain evaporated long before it reached the ground. The wind blew a lot of dust, however.
7:00 am (formerly known as 6:00 am) at the office. The sky was wild.
5:00 pm (formerly known as 4:00 pm) when I got home from work. The sky was wild.
6:20 pm (formerly known as 5:20 pm), the almost full March Moon, AKA Worm Moon, would have been rising over the mountains. No moon, but the sky was wild.
Tangle Heart Tree pinching March Clouds.
A wild sky over the Rio Grande and Sandias. The cranes are gone.
When I walked out to Fourth of July Point where I took the above photo, I didn’t see or hear D Wowl. On my way back I heard D Wowl hoot from one of his trees between the clearwater ditch and the irrigation ditch. I couldn’t see him in the darkness, so I called out “Where are you Daddy Owl?” He flew out of the tree and landed on a branch next to me. He didn’t say a word, simply posed. I told him that I had posted photos of him two nights in a row and that everyone was going to get tired of seeing him. I don’t think he believed me.
I continued walking north, and I made a side trip to Beaver Point. D Wowl flew to one of his favorite perches near Beaver Point as I walked by.
Dawn
I didn’t see Daddy Owl when I first went out tonight, and Mama Owl’s ear tufts just barely showed in her nest. I walked over to see the cranes. On the way back from the cranes I could hear Mama Owl hooting from her nest, but there was no answer from Daddy Owl. When I got up to our gate, I heard Daddy Owl answering with different hoots than the normal hoots when he answers Mama Owl. It was getting dark, but I walked down to see what was up with Daddy Owl. He had a gopher. He sat on a large branch and continued his hooting. When the dusk was almost darkness, I saw the silhouette of Mama Owl pop up out of the nest. The Bazooka could not focus on her in the darkness. She flew over to Daddy Owl, he gave her the gopher, and she flew back to her nest. I got a blurry shot right after Daddy Owl gave Mama Owl the gopher.
You can see how much bigger Mama Owl is than Daddy Owl.
Almost half-moon tonight
Dawn
Silver, Loki, and Marble were having a standoff over a dish of cheese this morning.
These photos taken at sunset into dusk are what 30% chance of snow looks like.
Skunk tracks
Rabbit tracks
The snow was mostly gone by late afternoon.
Mama Owl is in the nest! I’ve been checking every night since I photographed Mama and Daddy together on Friday evening to see if I could see Mama Owl in the nest. Last night I didn’t see her, but tonight I could see the top of her head. When I said, “Mama Owl, you are on the nest!” She popped her head up just enough to look over the edge at me and let her ear tuffs blow in the wind. The evening sky was celebrating mama owl with a display of beautiful colors after sundown.
Daddy Owl was deep in thought.
A kitty print. Which kitty remains a mystery.
Purple ice mimicking the pTerodactyl on the clearwater ditch.
pTerodactyl flying over the clearwater ditch
Sandias and cranes at dusk.
Purple Tangle Heart with crescent moon
Dusk
Dusk and crescent moon
Persistence of dusk with crescent moon
Crescent moon
Laurie picked catnip for the kitties while she was out for one of her hourly step goals. Gwendolyn was like a kitty demon eating her sprig of catnip.
The cranes were flying in and landing on the Rio Grande in bunches. Click on photos to enlarge them.
These are not technically Fire Rainbows (very rare) because we are below 55º north latitude, and the sun was much lower than 58º above the horizon as the sun was setting. However, the clouds were cirrus, and they obviously had ice crystals acting like prisms refracting sunlight and creating a firey rainbow effect. They are probably run-of-the-mill rainbow clouds.
Sunrise and a crescent moon peeking through the clouds.
Pink clouds make a halo around the Tangle Heart Tree.
Off Center & Not Even 