Of Sticks and Stones and Needles

When I am walking in the desert with my three dogs, I don't dare take my eyes off the ground directly in front of me except to allow myself a quick glimpse of what the terrain is doing a few feet ahead of me.  My vigilance is occasioned by the presence of things very dangerous to dogs-rattlesnakes, Colorado River toads, gila monsters, scorpions, jumping cholla and other assorted cactii, mesquite bushes with sharp needles, lifeless bodies of mice and birds and the detritus of humans- principally shards of glass.

This makes the desert sound like a joyless place and most of the time, I find myself regretting that I am not back in Colorado, with the "green, green grass of home."  But every so often, if I allow myself to relax my vigilance, I find amazing things that fill me with the wonder and joy that only nature can occasion.

There is a park several miles from where we live that offers the best of both worlds-lush green grass that the dogs can roll in, and miles and miles of the La Canada wash, a dry river bed that floods in huge downpours.  It hasn't rained that much in Tucson this year, so the wash has been relatively dry, its soft sands and dirt a pleasure for the sensitive paws of three dogs. It contains hidden treasures that the dogs and I enjoy every time we walk through it. 

There are tiny, tiny lizards that look just like little sticks, except they balance on legs the width of a human hair. McGuire, my Brittany, spots them first.  He stands stock still and stares and I stop and stare too.  The little lizards usually freeze; little eyes watching us carefully until they decide to make a run for it and then, before you know it, they have totally disappeared under a shrub or bush. 

Then there are the little brown pebbles, who sit among the other stones until approached, at which point they hop quickly away, little horny toads who have just had their sunbath interrupted.  Arthur, our little dog, is totally delighted when one of these little stones decides to jump.

Tiny ground squirrels dig little tunnels up and down the wash, popping up for an instant then disappearing before Summer, my lovely white Australian-Shepherd-Great Pyrenees mix, can even get her nose down to sniff into these mysterious holes.

The quail are lots of fun.  These birds, whose heads are topped off by rounded feathers that look like the hats ladies wore 60 years ago, bob up and down, making humming, cooing sounds as they scamper through the bushes.  If we disturb them, they flutter about a foot off the ground and land in a group of bushes just a few feet away.  These birds are principally ground-dwellers; they eat seeds and insects.  I guess they are the desert "streetsweepers."

Coming home a few weeks ago after one of our walks in the park, I spotted what I thought was a small, dead rattlesnake stretched out in the pebbles alongside the driveway.  I lobbed a little stone at it and it didn't move.  I got the dogs out of the car and into the house, put on my gardening gloves and prepared to grab the snake and dispose of it.  It would have gone well, except for one thing:  the snake had vanished.  So now, the vigilance I exercise on walks in the desert has been extended to stepping out of my door and into the front or backyard.