Salado Creek Greenway, Lady Bird Johnson Park Trailhead, Northwest, Rain in the Midst of Drought

Friday, September 16, 2011

Today's photos:

I woke up this morning to the sound of heavy rain falling outside. I quickly realized I wasn't dreaming. The rain fell primarily in central Bexar County. Much of the eastern and western parts of the county didn't get any rain at all.

For most of this week, I have been planning on walking the section of the Salado Creek Greenway from the Lady Bird Johnson Park Trailhead towards Wetmore Rd today. This is the section of the greenway that goes through where the wildfire burned this past Sunday. I received conformation from the San Antonio Park Police Department this morning that the trail had reopened since the fire. I will have a post about the wildfire's aftermath next Tuesday or Thursday.

Most of the rain this morning fell in the Olmos Creek watershed, but enough fell along Salado Creek to leave pools in the wetland area through which the Morningstar Boardwalk section of the trail passes. This made for another remarkable set of photos, especially the clouds, the dragonflies and the ripple distorted reflections in the pools. The highlight for today was by far the family of deer that were moving downstream through the wide open area of the wetland.

A Couple of Caracaras

I think I have mentioned somewhere that on my walk through Bamberger Nature Park and the Leon Creek Greenway on Wednesday, August 24, it seemed like every creature and its cousin was showing up for my camera.

There is a dirt trail that goes north off the paved trail in the park just before it intersects the main greenway trail. As I was passing this dirt trail, I happened to look up to the tops of the trees. Sitting at the top of one of the tallest trees were two crested caracaras.

I had seen a caracara in the creek bed on my walk the Monday before. According to the literature, caracaras are falcons that spend most of their time on the ground. While caracaras generally build their nests at the tops of tall trees, from what I could see, these two were no where near a nest.

The two seemed to be surveying what was happening around them and, I would like to think, enjoying the view:

Leon Creek Greenway, O. P. Schnabel Park Trailhead, South

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Today's photos:

I began today's walk in O. P. Schnabel Park. I walked the natural surface trails to the paved trail that goes down to the Leon Creek Greenway trail. I stayed on the paved trail walking south to a point about a mile north of the Leon Vista Park Trailhead, then walked the dirt trail in the creek bed back north towards the O. P. Schnabel Park trail.

The deer were out in droves, but for the most part were too deep in the brush to get a good photo. As can be seen from the photos, I still managed to photograph a few of them. I was tempted to leave out the vulture photo because I have published so many photos of them already, but the one pictured above made the lowest pass over my head of any vulture to date. I figure it deserves publication.

The drought continues. There is a cool front approaching the area that may bring some scattered showers in the coming days. Any rain we get won't come soon enough. The Bexar County Fire Marshall issued a reminder today that the high fire danger will continue at least through the next week whether we get scattered showers or not.

More Dragons of Bexar County

I might have mentioned it in a previous post, but I am surprised how well dragonflies and damselflies appear to be doing in spite of the drought. As a matter of fact, I have so many photos of them, I will be doing several more posts that feature these fascinating creatures.

Almost all the photos I have of them are when they are perching. I'm getting better at photographing them in flight, but it isn't easy. I vaguely remember reading somewhere that their average flight speed is about 25 mph and can reach speeds up to 50 mph. Trying to follow, much less focus, a telephoto lens on an insect flying at those speeds is quite a feat. 

This series of photos of dragonflies (no damsels in this series) was taken on my walk on August 24 on the Leon Creek Greenway south from the Bamberger Nature Park Trailhead: