Round the Ranch

We are looking for curios, for certain small animals.
— John Steinbeck

S and D headed out to Boulder Valley Ranch, on a cloudy evening surrounded by rain. The usually inconspicuous dirt-colored fauna were much easier to spot against the green green green grass, ripe with chlorophyll after this month’s deluge of rain. So maybe all those prairie dogs were always there, but it sure looked like 100 times their usual population.

And for all those, one coyote, wandering along the fence line and feigning innocent disinterest. Or so it seemed.

Also along for the ride:

  • a pair of geese, honking as usual as they sailed across the lake before their inevitable flight westward;

  • more prairie dogs than we could count;

  • some cows;

  • here and there, a horse;

  • a few cyclists;

  • a jogger, then another, then another;

  • an airplane doing barrel rolls;

  • a rainbow;

  • a kingbird on a branch.

And there you have it.

Addendum

Along the way, D noted the secondary “peak” on the ridge of Haystack Mountain, which can be seen in this post’s cover photo, and the second image in the gallery above. S suggested this could be “Not-a-Stack,” analogous to the “Notaban” hill on Mt. Audubon. Later that week (Sunday morning) the term “Naystack” occurred to him.

Naystack it is. So it is written, so it shall be. Please note the time and date in the log.

BNOSRBV Ranch