This month marked the end of my field season at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. It was sad to see it end, but great that I was able to take Jay with me to help with the pollinator and genetic sampling. Knowing that we were in for very long days in the field and many miles of hiking, I treated him to a nice dinner at the Copper Queen in Bisbee, Arizona on our first night. Here he is outside the mining museum:
The next morning we went up into Garden Canyon bright and early. We were surprised to see so much water flowing in the stream. We even came across this waterfall:
Our first mission was to collect genetic samples from the two species of agave on base. Here is Jay snipping agave leaf tips off the canyon species, Parry's agave:
In search of more Parry's, we went into Huachuca Canyon, but we had to go way off trail to find them:
On Sunday we taught Jay how to collect pollinators with the infamous bug vacs:
There were lots of butterflies out and about:
And quite a few Sphinx Moths during the day:
Jay found this couple in one of the Palmer's agaves we were sampling:
And just like last month, the grasshoppers were EVERYWHERE!
We went to Scheelite Canyon to collect genetic samples from a cliff-dwelling Erigeron species. Jay was agile on the cliff face, but it still made me nervous. Don't worry, I didn't let him climb too high!
We didn't see the Spotted Owls in Scheelite (either day that we hiked up there), but we did come across the dreaded Vinegaroon in the middle of the trail (that's the tip of Jay's shoe for a size comparison):
On the way to the airport on our last morning we stopped by Saguaro National Park. They didn't open until 7am, so Jay didn't get to see the sea of Saguaros, but we did have fun exploring the park boundary. He got some amazing photos of a very friendly Cactus Wren. This is one that I took through my binoculars (his are much better, of course):
And finally, we couldn't visit the park without getting our picture taken in front of some Saguaros:
Adios Arizona, I'll miss you!
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