Sunday, March 19, 2017

Desert Blooms

This winter has been the wettest winter in several years and it's showing. Last week we were driving the kids to the park and I could see Daisy Mountain turning orange from the poppies from over 3 miles away. So the next day I decided to take a hike up Daisy Mountain. There were flowers everywhere. It almost doesn't look like a desert here. 

Coming down the mountain I came across a Western Diamondback. It happened to be less than 100 yards down the hill from where I saw my first rattlesnake in this state. It seemed a little strange because the trail was pretty busy that morning. I had just passed a girl coming up the trail not even two minutes prior to this what means she walked right past it. I was putting my phone in my back pocket, heard the snake rattle, and stopped. I started looking around and there it was less than 5 feet in front of me slithering across the trail. 

So I stopped for a few minutes and took some pictures then waited for the snake to get off the trail. I saw quite a few people coming up and didn't want someone to find it and kill it. Right before I left a guy came up jogging and stopped to check out the snake.  He told me just a week ago he had a "turtle" (desert tortoise) hiss at him on the trail. I asked him where and it was the same tortoise I had stepped on the week before. 










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