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| no partners | | Mission: Operation Sheepskin
Location: Anza Borrego Desert State Park near Palm Canyon
Weather: Sunny, mid-80s
Goals: 1) to get my bighorn sheep fix for the year, 2) find a new species to add the fauna list, 3) find my first sidewinder of the year, 4) to discover a new species, 5) to explore new terrain to get to learn the park better.
Results: 1) found some bighorns, 2) Added verdin, black widow spider, etc. to the fauna list for Anza Borrego 3) No sidewinders  , 4) Saw a new species: Baja California Treefrog (27th new species for me of this year!), 5) Explore the mountain tops south of Palm Canyon.
Mood: content
Song: I Got Beers by Kenneth Keith Kallenbach (https://youtube.com ... AFV4)
Highlights: Seeing the bighorns up close, seeing the speckled rattler, and seeing the baja california treefrog
Lowlights: Losing my lens cap and cracking my lens, higher gas prices, forgetting my sleeping bag.
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I went to Anza Borrego Desert State Park to mainly get my bighorn sheep fix in for the year. Also, I'm taking my friend there next week for Spring Break and decided to scope out the area on the 2-days that I have off work, thus calling this my Pre-Spring Break Trip. The weather was great, but the first night, I camped near Joshua Tree and forgot my sleeping bag and was cold. Temps dropped to 51 degrees there. I also got a sore throat.
Monday morning, I looked for sidewinders hard by combing the flats and flipping everything in sight. I only saw a scorpion. I then started flipping trash near the agricultural areas and found, what appeared to be, a dead desert iguana. It was stiff, but when I took it out of the water, it started to show some life and opened its eyes, thus making it my first caught desert iguana of the year. I later returned to where I placed it and it was gone, so hopefully it was doing well.
I flipped a few more lizards and found a very skinny iguana that did not run from me at all. I don't think this one was going to make it. I assume that it did not eat well prior to hibernation.
I hit Anza Borrego and combed the desert looking for more sidewinders and found nothing and ended up cracking my camera lens. I went to the mountain tops to look for boas and rattlers and later ran into my bighorn sheep near Palm Canyon. These bighorn looked younger than the ones that I saw last year.
On Day 2: I combed the terrain and found a speckled rattler. I was pressed for time and had to hit the road soon. I did a little birding as well and took many wildflower pics, but only because I was not finding any snakes or lizards at the time. I normally don't care about photographing flowers, but they are cool to see in person.
Anyway, I'll return to Anza Borrego with my friend next week and will hopefully see some sidewinders and other stuff. Hopefully, more snakes will be moving about. So far, it's bee a slow year for me looking for snakes, but a great year for me finding other animals. The wildflower show, if you into that, was fantastic at Anza Borrego. I'm sure it'll be at its peak soon. |
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Wildflowers Observation Substantial
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Route Editor
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