Category: Middle San Pedro Valley

A HOPEFUL NEW YEAR, WINTER IN THE SAN PEDRO VALLEY, AND AN ARTIST’S VIVID EXPRESSION OF THE RIVER

The promise of coming  vaccinations, a new president, and the start of a new year have me full of hope… a state of mind that had faded considerably during 2020, a year marked by tragedy, social division, societal unrest, and a steadily worsening global pandemic. 

Here in the Middle San Pedro Valley, the season of winter is at hand, although the use of a term like “winter” in a place like this is a stretch of the word. The coldest temperature I have ever experienced here was only 8°F., and snow rarely falls in the valley floor. The image above was taken on a winter morning when a rare  blanket of fog had smothered the riverbottom forest with its cool, moist embrace. Fog is almost as rare as snow here. When fog does occur, it is a very transient affair, for desert fog most often dissipates into invisibility very quickly as the day warms.

A full moon casts its light on a stand of winter saguaros.

A few years ago, five inches of fresh snow fell overnight, gracing our bosque with a mantle of gleaming, sparkling white. I could not resist taking an early morning walk in order to read the very best of nature’s newspapers, for the goings on of every bird and mammal were written plainly in the snow. I encountered fresh tracks of various songbirds, quail, coyotes, a raccoon, mule deer, javelina, mice, cottontails, jackrabbits, and more. Following a set of roadrunner tracks (they are quite distinctive) I came across a sight I had never seen before: a roadrunner perched in a snow-covered mesquite tree.

I met with this well-chilled roadrunner perched in a velvet mesquite tree on a snow-graced morning.

Nature has forever been a source of inspiration for artists. There are scenes along the San Pedro River that could captivate any artist’s mind. Last month, an unforgettable gift arrived in our mail, an original painting crafted by none other than my brother, Rick. He and I had spent some time hiking in the riverbottom woodlands one fine spring day, when the river was alive with color and light. We stopped for a break at one of my favorite spots, a place that left its mark in my brother’s memory. Rick captured the essence of that place beautifully in this painting. What a gift!

“San Pedro Reverie,” by Rick Waldt.

Rain Graces a Thirsty Desert and Four-footed Winter Company

For the past three months, hardly a drop of rain has fallen here in the Middle San Pedro Valley. This is, after all, a desert region, or nearly so – deserts are defined as areas that receive less than ten inches of precipitation per year. Here, we get a tad more than that. 

A typical rural driveway in the Middle San Pedro Valley; no street lights, no signs, and most of all NO PAVEMENT.

When the skies turned darker and darker shades of gray a few days ago, I was overjoyed. The land – and its life – has been under duress in southeastern Arizona. The past summer “monsoon” season yielded very little rain. So, when it finally began to rain earnestly on, of all days, my birthday, it felt like an exceptionally wonderful gift. As I stepped outside at dawn that morning, the air bore the rich, humid smell of rain and earth and wet leaves. I drew in big lungfuls, savoring the feel, the coolness, the dampness. For most Americans, rain is no big deal, a common part of life. Here, it is always something to be reverently grateful for.

After the rain, the floor of the mesquite bosque (Spanish for the word “forest” or “woodland”) was covered with millions of tiny velvet mesquite leaves.

The ground had changed color in two ways; it had turned darker  from the thorough soaking, and had also turned green, carpeted with millions of minuscule velvet mesquite leaves that had been unleashed from the trees by the pelting raindrops. The cyclic path of nutrients from soil to trees and back to the soil lay exposed at my feet, exemplified and accelerated by the rain.

The leaves of velvet mesquite are very small, but they grow in multitudes on the trees, providing a crucially important component of this hot, dry desert ecosystem: shade.

A few hours after dawn, a group of mule deer appeared. They are part of a small herd that has taken up residence in the surrounding mesquite bosque for the past several years. We always welcome their company and never consider them as our “guests,” for they and their kind have been here long before us or our forebears. If anything, we are honored to be guests in their home.

A group of mule deer appeared not long after the rain, foraging on mesquite pods and pigweed (Amaranthus palmeri).