Winter roses, at Sahauro Ranch, Glendale, Arizona.
Tag: Glendale
Resident rooster.
Some of you may have noticed that the fatchance dateline has changed. A few months ago I made a cross-town move, from Tempe to Glendale, Arizona. If you have visited the Phoenix area you know that its vast sprawl has created countless pocket communities. The surrounding older agricultural towns like Glendale have been absorbed into the urban mass, but there are neighborhoods, sometimes whole blocks, where a more rural vibe persists. On the first morning after we moved into the house in Glendale we were enthusiastically greeted (four a.m.!) by the neighborhood rooster, and he has continued to do so every day since. This is no hipster rooster, but an authentic barrio rooster, whose proud ancestors first crowed here in the early 1930′s when a WPA project laid out the community’s first paved streets and sidewalks and the first homes were built.
The rooster in the photograph above is not my neighbor bird, but a denizen of the Glendale library. The library is built on a remnant parcel of the old Sahauro Ranch – the first large-scale farm established here during the territorial era, after irrigation made citrus cultivation practicable. The descendants of Sahuaro Ranch chickens and peacocks and guineafowl now freely roam the library grounds.
Resident rooster.
Some of you may have noticed that the fatchance dateline has changed. A few months ago I made a cross-town move, from Tempe to Glendale, Arizona. If you have visited the Phoenix area you know that its vast sprawl has created countless pocket communities. The surrounding older agricultural towns like Glendale have been absorbed into the urban mass, but there are neighborhoods, sometimes whole blocks, where a more rural vibe persists. On the first morning after we moved into the house in Glendale we were enthusiastically greeted (four a.m.!) by the neighborhood rooster, and he has continued to do so every day since. This is no hipster rooster, but an authentic barrio rooster, whose proud ancestors first crowed here in the early 1930′s when a WPA project laid out the community’s first paved streets and sidewalks and the first homes were built.
The rooster in the photograph above is not my neighbor bird, but a denizen of the Glendale library. The library is built on a remnant parcel of the old Sahauro Ranch – the first large-scale farm established here during the territorial era, after irrigation made citrus cultivation practicable. The descendants of Sahuaro Ranch chickens and peacocks and guineafowl now freely roam the library grounds.
Desert milkweed seed pod (Asclepias subulata), at the Xeriscape Demonstration Garden, Glendale Main Library, Glendale, Arizona.
Desert milkweed seed pod (Asclepias subulata), at the Xeriscape Demonstration Garden, Glendale Main Library, Glendale, Arizona.
Little hurtful things.
At the Xeriscape Demonstration Garden, Glendale Main Library, Glendale, Arizona.
Little hurtful things.
At the Xeriscape Demonstration Garden, Glendale Main Library, Glendale, Arizona.
Found this little fellow drawn to the kitchen light. A plume moth, possibly Himmelman’s (Geina tenuidactyla). In Glendale, Arizona.
Found this little fellow drawn to the kitchen light. A plume moth, possibly Himmelman’s (Geina tenuidactyla). In Glendale, Arizona.
Urban Birding: I stepped onto the patio the other day to watch a hot air balloon descending into a nearby field when this kestrel landed on the power line in the alley. It is normally the roost for the backyard doves, often as many as twenty birds at once, as the effusive streaks of droppings attest. When the kestrel lit, there was a minor explosion of doves, flying off in panic in all directions. Feathers were ruffled, and a few were lost in their haste, but no doves were taken.
Dithyramb 