Nature, environment, and a little philosophy
Our annual Sierra Nevada backpacking trip might be the only predictable part of our lives, yet we're never proactive enough to score permits for the "good" trailheads. That's how we found ourselves hiking over Baxter Pass in the last week of June, elevation 12,300-feet (3,749 meters), practically alone on the trail, managing headaches and nose …
Our big birding day, that is. San Diego County has more species of birds than any other county in the United States: 520 species. On Global Big Day, Eric and I set out to see as many of them as we could. We have a lot of birds because we have a lot of geography; …
I was surveying the bone-dry San Luis Rey riverbed recently, performing autopsies on crunchy, senescing weeds, when I had a revelation in sound. I heard a newborn bird learning to sing. First, from a nearby willow, drifted the adult Vireo’s song: a well-formed, two-part warble. Then came baby’s: a squeaky, unfinished attempt tapering into hesitating …
Stars, like salt. 