Road Trip 5

One of the things I like about Five Springs (apart from the lack of people!) is the variety of landscapes in the area, from the Big Horn mountains (rising to over 13,000 ft) to the desert and canyons below.

We stopped for lunch one day beside the Big Horn river. After lunch I wandered around with my camera. The first thing I found was that there was a lot of prickly pear cactus, and it was all blooming. I'm used to seeing occasional prickly pear cactus flowers but I don't think I've seen a whole area blooming at once like this.

The flowers are quite pretty up close.

There were a few other flowers around. I think this is Locoweed.

The bank beside the river showed interesting layers of sedimentary rock.

At the bottom of the bank I came across this lizard which took off at an amazingly high speed. I froze and watched where it stopped. I then approached very slowly and it stayed where it was. I think it's a Common Sagebrush Lizard.

A bit later Shelley spotted another lizard. It also made an initial run for it and then froze in place. It turned out to be a Short-horned Lizard (aka a horned or horny toad, even though it's not a toad at all). They are also found in southern Saskatchewan (endangered) although I don't think I ever spotted one there.

Driving by, I noticed a trail head sign on an unmarked gravel side road. We went to investigate and found it was a new trail to Rainbow Canyon. From the Five Springs campground you can see there are some badlands down below but we didn't know how to get to them. The first thing I spotted along the trail were Sego Lilies. (the state flower of Utah) I love the details of the flowers.

The colors and patterns of Rainbow Canyon itself were quite impressive.

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Belize Birding

We had planned to go to the Crooked Tree nature reserve but it was flooded from recent storms so we booked a day of birding around Belize city with Birdwatching Belize. It ended up raining all day and we cut the outing short but we're not serious birders and we were happy to see the birds we did. Some of them were familiar and some were new to us.

With all the rain, there was water everywhere and more shore birds than there would have been normally. Like these Jacanas

I didn't realize at first that this was a juvenile Jacana - the coloring is very different.

This Willet was one of the first birds we saw.

Wood Storks are funny looking creatures.

Herons and ibis were keeping the stork company

I've seen whistling ducks in zoos, but not in the wild before.

Stilts are related to avocets and like them, seem like elgent birds.

We were looking at some other birds and didn't realize at first that this Tiger Heron was sitting on a branch right close to us. Lovely markings.

We saw several kinds of vultures, including this yellow-headed.

There weren't many hawks around in the rain. This Common Black Hawk was sitting on a power pole looking soggy.

Golden-fronted Woodpeckers seem quite common here but I was still happy to get a good look and photos of this one. They are colorful birds.

There were lots of little birds flitting about. It was a question of which ones would sit still long enough to photograph.

I remember seeing Vermillion Flycatchers in Big Bend National Park in Texas.

From a distance, it was hard to tell the Groove-billed Ani apart from the grackles. This one also looks a little damp.

Several times when we were looking for birds we spotted iguanas in the trees. At a restaurant two large iguanas crawled over the hedge beside us.

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Belize - More Photos

Miscellaneous photos from Turneffe and St George's.

We didn't see any big iguanas on Turneffe but there were some small Black Spiny-tailed Iguanas. The young ones tend to have more green color.

St George's had some bigger ones.

They are good climbers (as well as digging burrows).

There were lots of little lizards. I think they are Brown Anoles.

We saw the most Caribbean Land Hermit Crabs on Halfmoon Caye but there were some on the other islands.

We saw lots of holes that I assume were made by fiddler crabs but this was one of the few that I actually found out in the open and cornered for a photograph. Only the males have the large "major" claw.

I also found a few crabs on the side of the dock. They tended to stay half in the water, making them hard to photograph.

I think this is a Nimble Spray Crab, known for hiding in sea urchins.

At first I wasn't sure what these were - some kind of algae or anemone? I realized they are Upsidedown Mangrove Jellies. Occasionally one would be off the bottom and pulsing its bell like other sea jellies.

There were lots of little fish in the shallow water close to shore.

And small barracudas, presumably hunting the other little fish. I found this foot-long one stranded on the shore. There was no one around so I'm not sure how it got there. Maybe a larger fish chased it right out of the water? I put it back in the water and it slowly recovered and swam away.

There were also a few Red Cushion Sea Stars in the shallows.

At St George's we were lucky to see a pair of dolphins go by. We didn't get very good photos unfortunately.

Everywhere we went in Belize there were numerous dragonflies patrolling the air. I'm not sure what kind they were since they never perched. Luckily there were also a few other kinds that did perch so I could photograph them.

There weren't a lot of butterflies but I found a few.

I didn't see a lot of other insects (although something was biting us) other than a few interesting beetles.

There were lots of big hibiscus bushes that make my struggling little house plant seem rather feeble. But surprisingly, there wasn't much Bougainvillea.

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