The wait goes on - Sunday, July 6, 2008

Any month now …

Alpha with Steeldust, Luna, Butch and Ember

Hey, check it out - automatic captions now below the pix. Cool.

So there’s the big girl, looking like she could hold out until August (hopefully not!).

As the Fourth of July approached, I was hoping, hoping, hoping Alpha would do us all the honor of foaling on or near Independence Day. I’ve already - just recently - named her foal … though if it turns out she’s really just monstrously fat, the joke will be on me. I’m going to keep you waiting on that name.

When I first got out to the band Saturday, three things hit me in quick succession, in the space of about three seconds: Where are the bachelors? Where’s Sundance? Where’s Hollywood?

But before I could panic unnecessarily, Hollywood strolled up out of a nearby draw, which contained, you guessed it, Sundance hanging out with the bachelors - minus Mouse, who followed hot on Hollywood’s heels, and minus Chrome and Hook, who were still hanging out close to Wildcat Spring, off to the east. I wondered if Sundance had been kicked out of the band or if he had wandered over to the boy band of his own accord … but there will be plenty of time to speculate about the young man because when I saw the band later - after I had gone partially around the loop, he was back and secure with the family band.

Let me go off on a partially related tangent: Butch was hanging out close to Luna, but he and Sundance hang out - at various times - close to all the other horses. I’ve tried to pay attention and see if I noticed them hanging out more with Luna or Mahogany, but they’re family. Even Pinon and Ember don’t stick right to their mothers’ sides anymore. In the past, I’ve wondered if Luna and Mahogany were the mothers of Butch and/or Sundance. It seemed weird that two mares would produce such twin-type colts in one year. But how about this for a new working theory: What if Sundance is 3, Butch is 2 (they’re almost identical in size), Kestrel is 1 (she really is), and Ember, of course, is the baby. What if both Sundance and Butch are Luna’s? Maybe they were born sorrel - like Ember.

It was partly sunny - mostly sunny - when I got out to them, around noon, which becomes important to the story later.

Steeldust

Home sweet home on the range. The above photo was taken from the road just up from the dugout intersection, looking eastish.

Grey/Traveler

Jif is still with Traveler’s band … I suppose I’ll keep looking for her for a while, given her recent disappearance. She walked slowly, but she didn’t seem to be limping.

Alegre and Gaia

Gaia stamped a foot just as I took this photo. The gnats are still buzzing, but they seem to be *less.* I stamped and swatted and fidgeted, too, but I was never driven so insane that I had to go for the head net.

Bounce

Bounce, trotting after Alegre and Gaia. When I first saw them as I was driving, Alegre and Gaia trotted away, so I stopped, turned off the Jeep and made some notes about Steeldust’s and Grey’s bands and Chrome and Hook. Then I drove on, where, just around the next curve, there they were. She must like me; she used to go a lot farther than that! I snapped the above pic of her and Gaia and drove on to the split where the doubletrack goes back to the water hole. I checked it - totally dry - then drove on south. But when I looked back, I saw Bounce leading Alegre and Gaia toward the water hole. Didn’t he know it was dry? The horses - all the northern bands - had been in the area, but they had seemed to move on in the past couple of weeks as the pond became a stinky puddle. As I watched, Bounce led the little procession, then stopped, dropped and rolled on his right side, got up, dropped and rolled on his left side, then got up and TROTTED to the dry pond! Oh, mister. He obviously didn’t know it was dry and was anticipating a drink. If there’s so much as a puddle of water in any of the arroyos that cut through there just south of that pond, I certainly don’t know about them. I wondered if he (or Alegre) knows about Wildcat Spring … I’ve never seen him up in that area, but Steeldust’s, Grey’s, Seven’s and the bachelors know it’s there because they’ve been frequenting that area recently. When I went back past that area later, they were gone. I hope they found water. The pond below the roller-coaster ridge road is the only *pond* now with water.

Not too far away, guess who found me? My boy Roach and company. I was happy to see them because I hadn’t for a few visits. But my happiness at seeing them turned into concern. Poco managed to find himself a prickly pear patch, and I guess they had a close encounter. I’m sure the cactus got the better end of that deal - it left at least three spines in Poco’s face (including one directly below his right eye) and a small cluster under his right jaw. ARGH. Didn’t his mama teach him about cacti!?

Poco and Bones

This photo may be too small to pick out the spine under his eye. Of all the pricklers he’s stuck with, that one’s the longest - naturally. When he’d shake his head to ward off the gnats, he’d do so gently, so I know it was bothering him. I haven’t seen them for a while, so I have no idea how long he’s been stuck. And I have no idea how he’s going to rid himself of the spines. Too bad I can’t just walk right up and help him out!

Dear, sweet boy Roach snuck up on me behind a tree (in front of me) while I was photographing Poco’s spines, then casually came out from behind it, just grazing. He never seemed surprised, and even though I was stamping and swatting, he never spooked. He went around the tree, and I thought he was heading back to Poco and Bones, who had gone back to grazing, but then he turned around broadside and decided to take a nap under the tree. Guess he’s not too worried … or he figured now that he’d successfully snuck up on me, he was in perfect position to keep a close eye on me. He’s one of my favorites; personality plus.

Thunder was rumbling, and I was about as far away from the basin entrance as possible at that point, so I bid farewell to the boys and girl - I hope Poco sheds those spines soon?! - and headed back around. This is a good time to note that the basin has been getting rain, somewhere between enough to dampen the dust and enough to change a bit of geography in the first major arroyo crossing (Spring Creek) before the first intersection. If it rained, I didn’t want to be on the interior side of that arroyo. (And here’s an interesting side-note to this note: The horses don’t seem to be down in that area at all for water - it’s there, however thin a trickle.)

Bounce, Alegre and Gaia were gone from the dry pond when I passed … Grey was still hanging out near the road with his family. Twister must have rolled in the spring just before I saw them the first time because he was as dark as Two Boots, but when I came back around, he had dried into his (muddy) rosy grey color again. Chrome and Hook were still guarding the trail to the spring.

When I got back around to where Steeldust’s band and the other bachelors had been, they weren’t anywhere to be found. I walked off the road in both directions in case they were just below the drops - nope. I had been gone for about three hours, so I figured they might have gone to water … but where? The spring or the arroyo?

The sky didn’t look terribly threatening (but it was completely cloudy by then), and I hadn’t been on the middle part of the loop road in a while since the horses had been back in the east, so I decided to go that way and see what I could see.

Note to self: Voice of intuition not always right. As I drove, I kept thinking, they’re not down here; no way they’re down here. Damned if they didn’t show up on top of the finger hills almost directly across from me! They grazed their way up from an unseen-to-me draw in the hilltop and into the open, then gradually made their way to the top and over. The skies didn’t look threatening, remember, so I wasn’t too worried. Besides, I was still pretty close to the intersection. I hung out there for a while, actually enjoying the wind that kept the gnats away, then went back to the intersection and north. The horses were at the base of the northeast side of the hill and not very visible. I decided it might be OK to call it a day and head back across Spring Creek for the evening.

It started sprinkling. Nothing to worry about.

The sprinkling got steady. I crossed the arroyo and headed - slowly - toward the entrance, trying to decide whether to just stop somewhere and wait it out or call it a day.

Another note to self: Voice of intuition not always loud but sometimes right on the money. I kept going, and about halfway out on the road through private land, my tires started kicking up mud. Uh oh. By the time I got to the curve by the dilapidated cattle corral, I could barely steer, and braking wasn’t much better. I made it around that curve and put it in four-wheel-low. The Jeep doesn’t like it when I don’t come to a complete stop before putting it in low, but I didn’t dare stop. My heart has pounded that hard during mountain bike races but never while sitting still.

Note to readers: If it starts to sprinkle in the basin, get out. Now.

I’ve never been so happy to make it to the county road - an all-weather, graveled road. I came home via the highway, and when I got to the highway, the rain had stopped there, but behind me, the basin was a single curtain of grey shroud. I couldn’t see so much as a single landform.

Gotta be happy about that - for the ponies’ sake!

(Other horses: I also saw three of the “southside boys”: David, Cinch and Mesa. They were just inside the herd area from the county road. And a couple of days ago, I saw Seven’s band by the spring.)

BLM links

Found these links today on the Mustang Saga blog: http://mustangsaga.blogspot.com/2008/07/blm-considers-euthanizing-excess-wild.html

The BLM home page has been updated with the WHB material at the top of the Spotlight…

http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en.html

Link to the statement page:

http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/prog/wild_horse_and_burro/Statement_06_30_2008.html

Direct link to the feedback form:

http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/prog/wild_horse_and_burro/feedback.html

WHB Home page with a link to the statement:

http://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/prog/wild_horse_and_burro.html

 

Grim news - July 2, 2008

If you haven’t already seen this news, I hate to be the bearer of bad news. If you’ve seen it from one source, here are a few more. The article headlines kinda say it all. The BLM’s Wild Horse and Advisory Board just met Monday in Reno, Nev., and that’s apparently when all this came out. I’m kinda stunned, so for now, read the articles linked here.

http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2008/06/blm_considers_ending_wild_hors.html - Associated Press article titled “BLM considers ending wild horse roundups, killing some animals”

http://www.newsweek.com/id/144279 - July 1 Newsweek article titled “The Wild Horse Is Us: An advocate of the American West’s mustangs blasts a proposed government policy to cull the herds.” The figures at the beginning of the article are backward, I think.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/144415 - July 2 Newsweek article containing Sheryl Crow’s comments; includes information about James Kleinert’s film, “Saving the American Wild Horse”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25465974/ - MSNBC article titled “Feds consider euthanizing wild horses in West: Population in holding pens jumps in Nevada, elsewhere as adoptions dip”

http://www.wildhorsepreservation.com/news_alerts.html - article on the American Wild Horse Preservation Campaign Web site titled “BLM Considering Euthanasia for Thousands of Wild Horses”

A little more about the herd

I got an email recently from Ann Bond, who handles a lot of public information for the public lands office based in Durango. Ann has close ties to our Spring Creek Basin horses and has even adopted a couple of burros through the BLM. She came up with some great questions while reading the blog and suggested I answer them on the blog.

“TJ - I had some questions while I was reading up on the ponies - how do they find enough to eat, what do they eat, how do they seem to handle the gnats, where do they get water, how do they handle the heat, etc.?”

What follows is from the email I sent back:

“The water is especially interesting lately - there’s not much of it. Recently, I’ve seen them drinking out of muddy hoofprints in nasty white-alkaline arroyos, from Wildcat Spring and from a ribbon of water in an arroyo (I’m not sure if that’s Spring Creek or if it’s a tributary) just down from a secret seep. Of the two water holes that have water, one is almost dry, and I’m not sure the horses are using it anymore anyway. Few of the horses are using the so-far-good water hole (Roach’s group and possibly Seven’s band). And the water’s on at the catchment, but none of the horses are up in that area (likely because of lack of grazing as well as memory of the tanks being empty).

“To be honest, I don’t know how they find enough to eat, but I talked to my mom this morning, and she commented on how fat the horses are. I sent her a pic of Houdini with her 2-plus-month-old filly, and Mom, a horsewoman, thought Iya was a yearling and Houdini was pregnant! Jif, Traveler’s dun mare that had been missing, showed up thin and limping, and Molly, the muley bay mare that had her foal almost a month ago, is thin - but (our BLM guy) said she was aged at 20+ by Cattoor, so that’s understandable. The others -
especially Luna! - are just downright fat. Even the stallions - particularly Steeldust and Hollywood - have gained weight. They got pretty lean earlier in the spring when they were fending off the bachelors.

“As for what they eat - everything they can wrap their little lips around, I think! Luna eats practically all the time (she IS fat!), it seems. I’ve seen ‘em nibbling on those kinda spiky-sagey plants (I’m not sure what the
plants are - it’s not sage; it has a kind of rubbery feel, and it’s taller/bigger than sage), and the sage - just about everything. The cheat grass is post-purple - nasty stuff. I hate it almost as much as I hate the gnats for sticking in my shoes and socks. Whatever they’re eating, it’s a good year. I hope the fat they’re putting on now carries them into August.

“They seem to handle the gnats better than I do, that’s for sure! They stamp and shake their heads, and their tails never quit swishing, it seem, but they’re fairly calm for how annoying it must be. The gnats do go away at night (around dark), but they’re back by about 8 a.m. Some seem more bothered than others. When I see Bones (the grey mare with Poco and Roach), it’s hard to get pix of her because it seems she never stops shaking her head. And they don’t seem at all bothered by the heat. They hang out in the open - I have seen the pinto family and some of Traveler’s under trees - and from recent observation, I think they go to water  pretty regularly - middle of the day and evening at least. I’m sure they also drink first thing in the morning.

“I’d love to go out there sometime with a botanist or someone who knows all those plants. I’ve learned some, but although I walk around through it all the time, my plant knowledge is embarrassingly limited.”

If anyone has any questions about the herd, I’ll certainly try to answer them. You should know that the more I learn about the wild horses, the more I realize how much more there is to learn.

Only mama knows

A picture is worth a thousand words, eh?

Left-side belly …

Right-side belly …

Only Alpha knows when baby is coming. The rest of us just have to wait!

Jif with Two Boots and Twister. She’s back with Grey/Traveler’s band. She’s thinner, and she’s limping on her left front, but she seems to be doing all right. She’s keeping up with the band, and that’s always a good thing. It’s hard to tell the extent of her injury; it was hard to even pinpoint her injured leg. I thought it was her left, then it looked like her right … I’m pretty sure it’s her left. But I also saw her take three to four steps that looked completely sound - before she stumbled and almost went to her knees.

Lunch break

Most of the Bachelor 7 (minus Mouse) with the basin in the background - looking southeast. Not all you see is in the herd area, but a lot of it is. From left: Kreacher, Chrome, Aspen and Comanche. You can just see Hook’s mane and Duke’s head behind the other horses.

Duke. He seems to be doing well, hanging out again with the Bachelor 7, who are all still practically part of the family of Steeldust’s band.

Now to really freak you out …

I think this is a baby collared lizard. Check him out, all puffed and preened! I saw this lizard when another one raced across the road in front of my Jeep and led me to the rock this one’s on. They both disappeared under the rock.

Given this one’s muted coloring, I think this is probably a female collared lizard.

Bull snake? Pretty cool, really!

All we can do is wait for Alpha. She’ll foal when she’s darn good and ready to foal!

Good news

Take a deep breath on the Jif mystery. David Glynn was out in the basin this weekend, and he and his horse, Buck, came across Jif! Alone but seemingly hale and hearty. From his description, I think she was tucked away farther east than I looked, back in the little hills beyond that water hole off the doubletrack. You can bet I’ll be looking for her this coming weekend! Many thanks to David for providing that welcome information! It’s good to have another set of eyes out there!

What on Earth is she doing out there? Alone?! David said one of his thoughts was that she was off having a foal, but he didn’t find one. That was one of my initial thoughts, too, but she just didn’t look pregnant. It’s possible the horses got separated while grazing, and when the other horses wandered off, she found herself alone. Maybe she’s been hanging out waiting for them to come back. The last time I *know* a band used that water hole was Thursday evening (while she was missing). Sunday, the water was clear, and the horses had moved back closer to Spring Creek. The clear, shallow water makes me think they hadn’t been to the water enough to stir up the mud.

Relief!

One less

Some sad news to report: Jif, the little dun mare Traveler stole from Hollywood earlier this spring, is missing. I saw all the other horses this weekend, and she’s not with any other band. Duke was back with the Bachelor 7 following Steeldust’s band on Sunday, so my hopes of her being with him were dashed.

Thursday evening, I climbed a tall mesa in the area where the horses had been and walked all along the top of it (not very big on top, but it affords a good view of that area), and I didn’t see her. If she’s down in an arroyo, I wouldn’t see her, even from there. I also hiked Friday and Sunday in an area that’s cut with arroyos and has more trees than the other areas, but I never found her.

I went a long time thinking Slate, the grulla mare that had been with Bounce and Alegre, would show up … but she’s still missing. Even with all my hiking in the herd area, I haven’t found a trace of her. (I last saw her Dec. 29, 2007, from Round Top.) I don’t know what the normal mortality in the herd area is, but I’ve/we’ve lost three horses (all mares) since last fall. Ceal was thin, and I didn’t expect her to last through the winter, but Slate was only 9-10 (she was an introduced mare from Sand Wash Basin), and I think Jif was young, just 3 or so.

This was taken Monday; that’s Jif at far right.

She wasn’t visibly hurt or limping then.

It’s the reality of life in the wild, but I feel so helpless to just LOSE her without a trace, without knowing what happened.  

And Lady Alpha still has not foaled. Maybe she’s not pregnant at all but just fat, like Luna?! I’m still watching.

Summer solstice - June 20, 2008

Friday was summer solstice - shortest night and longest day of the year. It did seem like the shortest night - I got up at 5 a.m. and was hiking by 5:20. Here’s a timeline of my morning hike, trying to illustrate the horses in the light - and shadow - of their home range:

5:58 a.m.: Sun not yet risen. I saw a flash of white and a couple of the bachelors (Aspen and Hook) nearby and thought I’d found Alpha and Steeldust’s band. Nope. It was the “southside boys,” who range far and wide throughout Spring Creek Basin. Above is Ty and Copper.

6:03 a.m.: From left: Cinch, Copper, Corazon and David. You can just barely see Copper’s markings on his left front and hind pasterns.

6:23 a.m.: Grey/Traveler and his band - still missing Jif (see next post) - in the shadow of “lizard mesa,” northeast of Knife Ridge - with Round Top in the light in the background.

6:25 a.m.: Seven’s band on the edge of night and day …

6:32 a.m.: Iya, Houdini and Grey/Traveler (and the yearlings following) ran through the light over the saddle on the edge of Knife Ridge to the shade on the other side, following Steeldust’s band.

6:44 a.m.: The just-past-full moon took a long time to set over the far ridge on the west side of Spring Creek Basin. That’s Mahogany and Steeldust’s band.

7:06 a.m.: Almost full light. Grey and Twister looking back at Cinch and David and the other bachelors. I was still in the shade of Knife Ridge when I took this photo.

7:06 a.m.: The objects of Grey’s interest: Cinch and David. The rest of the boys are down the little slope behind the trees.

No bugs until 8-ish. No breeze until 9-ish. Simply gorgeous.

Finally … still waiting … huh?

Where to start?

Look who finally decided to make an appearance!

Duke saw me; I saw Duke. I think we surprised each other. Just to the left (his right) is the little entrance to Wildcat Spring off the main loop road. He shied at something I couldn’t see, and although I didn’t think too much about it at the time, it may prove significant …

This photo of Grey/Traveler’s band is similar to one I had on the previous post. Who’s missing? The significant part is that Jif is NOT just off to the side like she was outside the frame of the previous pic. She wasn’t anywhere. This is the “huh?” part of this post’s title.

Almost all the northern bands were clustered right in the same area, just north of the little water hole off the doubletrack (I’m afraid it’s going to be dry in another week or two). The only band missing was Seven’s, and I thought Jif might have been with them (however unlikely). They were farther to the south - no Jif. So then I started wondering if she’s with Duke - what he shied at. I saw him before I saw any of the other horses (except the pinto family, from the county road, on my drive to the basin), and I wasn’t looking for any other horse(s) with him. I really, really, really hope she’s with him because I don’t really like the alternative. It’s like a flashback to Slate’s disappearance.

And the “still waiting” comes to rest, of course, right squarely on Alpha’s (still-) round belly. She looks completely serene and calm (how many babies has she had??) … but no baby yet.

Grey/Traveler’s band in the background with some of the Bachelor 6 nearby. Left to right, the bachelors are (in order of heads): Hook, Chrome, Aspen, Kreacher. They’re not *quite* as close as they look because of the compression caused by the telephoto lens, but they’re pretty close. It was like being in the Pryors with all the bands so close.

This is just to the right of the previous photo: Mouse and Steeldust’s band. Mouse and Comanche - and sometimes bold Kreacher - are hanging out fairly close to the band. These pix were taken right from the road, and they were all just napping. It was hot (mid-90s) and windy, and the gnats are ferocious.

Bounce, Alegre and Gaia. Look how big she’s getting! I didn’t realize I’d caught Gaia and Bounce in the same stride until I saw the photos on the computer. I don’t know whether Bounce is Gaia’s sire or not. He was gathered with Slate, but Alegre was not gathered.

Hollywood is a fierce protector of his adopted family, even though he’s not the band stallion. But that evening, when the band went to water, he drank right beside Mouse and Comanche - although he *was* between them and the band!

Later in the day, here he’s watching over Baylee while she took a little snooze.

Finally got a good look at Molly’s foal - I think she’s another filly. She’s sorrel like Roja, and not a white marking on her - like Roja. If I’m right about the resemblance between Molly and Roja, Roja is baby’s big sister.

Seven, later in the day, as they were headed to water.

Pinon and Ember were playing together late in the day and stopped to scratch each other’s backs. The sun was just barely gone from a far ridge. That’s daddy Steeldust at left.

These are my favorite two photos of the whole day:

Pinon, left, and Ember, wild, wild babies. I love how the light just cradles them in its glow.

That’s Hollywood at left, guarding the babies. The only thing I did to these last photos was “unsharp mask” and a little cropping. That’s just how they came out of the camera.

At the risk of being totally mushy, I have to say again that each time I’m able to enter the basin and share the horses’ world is a blessing unmatched. Their world goes on with or without me, and as wild and beautiful as they are, for them to allow me to sit back and observe them and take photos of them is just crazy cool. I’m grateful to them. This day was really the first time in a long time I saw them just hang out in the same place without being constantly on the move with the bachelors following.

Looking for Jif, I went up on the tall mesa just north (northeast?) of Knife Ridge so I could look down on the whole area the horses have been frequenting recently. I didn’t see her, but they were still there, snoozing in the sunshine, seemingly not nearly as bothered by the gnats as I was.

I wonder sometimes how they see their world, about all the trails and good grazing and drinking spots they hold in their memories. The foals are starting to nibble on things, following their mothers’ examples. (Luna, by the way, is fat. I’m sorry, girl, but there’s just no other word! Ember was 2 months old Thursday, and Luna is just as broad as Alpha.) That evening, I saw them go to the water hole, and I circled around the bachelors to see what they did. Mahogany led the way, but Luna drank first, followed by Alpha, then Mahogany, then the rest of the band. Mouse and Comanche weren’t shy; they stepped right up to the water and drank, so Hollywood joined them - like they were pals. Was he careful to drink between them and the band, or was that pure coincidence? Ha. Doubt it.

Two last photos:

One of my favorite-ever photos of Alpha, taken just near sunset.

And this one: Chrome, Aspen and Hook, running through the June sunshine just before sunset. Happy boys.

Back in the basin

Yep.

Nope.

And no sign of Duke.

Ms. Molly had her foal between June 3 and June 7. David Glynn, who visits the herd area frequently, provided news about the new foal while I was on vacation. He also emailed that he saw Duke this past weekend, not limping, and that he was interacting with some of the bands. Good news.

Molly is thinner than the other mares, but given her estimated age (older than 20!), that’s to be expected. This might be her last foal; she was gathered and released, and she got the immunocontraceptive. In her case, I think it might be beneficial for her overall health. I didn’t get very close to her, but her foal is a sorrel with the “muley” coloring around its muzzle. No telling yet if it’s a colt or a filly.

Alpha might be going for a world record gestation … or I have another theory. Last April, she was with Grey/Traveler, but she was gathered with a stallion I called Junior. She has always been one of the last to foal, and although I didn’t follow her (or the other horses) as closely in the past as I do now, I didn’t think it was quite this late when she foaled previously. So, what if, between Grey and Junior, she missed her heat and was bred a month “late”? She looks like she’s bagging up, so I hope she’s close.

The “other” bachelor group was down in the southwestern part of the herd area when I saw them, right from the county road. This photo shows all the boys but Ty, who was a short distance to the left. Here, from left: Cinch, Corazon, David, Copper and Mesa. I stopped and took pictures from over the roof of the Jeep until they “hid” behind some juniper trees. I moved down the fence until they moved into the open. They ran back and forth some as their wariness vied with their natural curiosity.

David (bay with the blaze), Mesa (solid bay) and Cinch.

Copper, Corazon and Mesa. Copper is a slight muley bay with left front and hind pasterns; his mane falls mostly on the right side of his neck. Mesa is solid bay; his mane falls on the left side of his neck.

Copper and Ty (black). Such sweet boys.

With such a fortunate encounter for my first sighting of the horses since my return from vacation, I knew it was going to be a great day. I used four memory cards (of various storage) and *saved* almost 800 photos (I probably culled at least that many). I don’t know why I took so many pictures this particular day, but a friend suggested that maybe it was because I really missed the horses. She might be right.

The northern bands were all up in the northeastern part of the basin again … which is really, truly the eastern part. I tend to think of it as northeastern because it’s “in the back” as far as the loop road goes, and tucked under the natural boundary hills. But I looked at a map recently (who needs a map when you know where you’re going?), and realized it’s pretty well centrally east. In this photo, Alegre and Gaia are in the foreground, and Molly, her foal, Roja and Seven are in the background. You can see the road in the foreground.

Sweet baby Ember and mama Luna.

Grey/Traveler and his family also were in the area, closest to the water hole - what’s keeping all the bands in this area, I think. Jif was just a little apart from them.

A picture like this is my favorite to take because it’s my favorite thing to see: interaction and evidence of affection among the horses. That’s Two Boots with her head over Twister’s back. They’re about shed out now. Two Boots shed out a lot lighter, even though she’s still dark grey. Last fall, she was *really* dark. And Twister is showing his pretty rosy grey color. Stepdaddy Grey in the background.

Too cute! Pinon here, standing up nice and straight for the camera. Definitely a colt. His little dark patch is clearly visible here. I’ve noticed something similar on a couple of other horses: Luna has an ever-so-slightly-darker spot on her right barrel, behind her shoulder, and Comanche has a dark spot that’s maybe about the size of a baseball on his right barrel. Luna’s spot is bigger but almost unnoticeable.

Back to front: Aspen, Chrome and Hook. While I was thinking about Duke, I realized the Bachelor 7 (six without Duke) have been dogging Steeldust’s band since just after I realized he was limping, around April 15.

Aspen and Hook decided to relieve the monotony by play fighting - with an audience. In the immediate vicinity were the other bachelors, Grey’s band, Steeldust’s band (of course) and Bounce’s family. Hook initiated the whole thing (tattle tale), and at one point, he got one foreleg up over Aspen’s back, and they went around in a full circle before Aspen was able to shake him off. Notice Mouse and Comanche snoozing in the background. That’s Kreacher at upper left, and in the middle ground is Grey and his band.

I had walked out from the road, over a hill, through a couple of arroyos and up another hill to try to get a better look at Molly and her new foal and was returning to the Jeep when I saw Bounce, Alegre and Gaia closest to me and the other horses a little farther out. I took the above pix of Aspen and Hook, wishing I was closer to them, but then I had an opportunity to get a little closer to where Gaia had just laid down and Alegre was grazing. A juniper shielded me from Alegre, but Bounce had me in full view. Conspirator? I’m pretty sure that even Grey and some of the other horses also knew I was there, but I don’t think Alegre ever did. She grazed farther away from me and closer to the other horses (which were back toward the water hole), and I waited until they were gone before moseying on back to the road.

Alegre and Gaia near sunset, taken from the road.

I drove around the loop road twice, looking hard for Duke. Never did see him, but on my way out, I saw Poco, Bones and Roach at the water hole below the roller-coaster ridge road.

He’s in the (obviously) dry part of the water hole - photo taken from the ridge road. Poco and Bones were just behind him to the east. This water hole and the one in the east, off the doubletrack, are the only water holes I know of that still have water. Spring Creek has water in places. No sign of the horses anywhere near the water catchment.

Not quite full … but pretty cool.

It’s good to be back.