Tubing the Rio Grande

Yesterday was another fun day and I got to see some incredible things. Our dear friend, Alyssa, will soon be departing Big Bend for 2 weeks of school then her next assignment in Sequoia. So several of us have been helping her get ready for the semiannual big move.

Yesterday I helped her plant an ocotillo in her front yard and today I may help with another one. The park plants can only be harvested by rangers and replanted if someone has damaged them. These ocotillos were knocked down by a loony person in a car who was systematically aiming for them. We are hoping that these plants will take root in Alyssa's yard despite the fact that she won't be there to baby them along. In pioneer days, the branches were cut off stuck in the ground and secured with rope or wire. Hopefully each branch would take root and create a sort of living fence. I've never seen an ocotillo fence as pretty as the one pictured below but I have observed that they are very functional. Animals would not cross the fence because of all the heavy thorns! (Images from the internet)

After changing into clothes that could get soaking wet and possibly discolored by the river water, five of us went tubing down the Rio Grande! I like the canoe trips, too, but for a water lover like me frolicking in the water was the most fun! It was just barely warm and sunny enough to enjoy our time in the water, but most of us were goose-fleshed by the end of the trip. (About 2.5 hours!) The current was extremely slow so we also had to paddle a lot to get downriver.

Raymond, the park biologist, was our trip guide. He is always so much fun to be with as he has years and years worth of stories to tell and there are very few questions about the park that he cannot answer.  We saw possible beaver holes in the river banks, checked out some of the "hidden" hot springs, enjoyed watching the adventurous Alyssa and Raymond leap off "jumping rock", etc.

Along the way, I saw little white rocky circles on the underside of some overhanging rocks and asked Raymond what they were. They looked like the remains of barnacles. He told us that they were the old egg deposits of Dobson Flies. After they hatch the pupae drop into the river where they morph gradually in the silty bottoms. They then emerge, crawling up the river bank as hellgrammites, the next stage in their life cycle. The hellgrammmites have big pincers and if you are a hapless riverside camper you might get pinched by them as they emerge at night. Raymond said they hurt but are harmless. Boy are they UGLY!! (Images from the internet)

Hellgrammite - didn't I say they're UGLY?

Dobson Fly

The absolute best thing I saw was a bat drop from the cliffs into the river! I couldn't believe the poor thing fell. Raymond feels he or she may have been a young one. But the bat was eventually able to make his or her way to the rock face and climb carefully (hopefully) to safety.

Hoary bat. The one I saw was not "hanging" but struggled to climb head up the rock face.

We got off the river about 7:00 p.m. and had a wonderful cookout in honor of Alyssa with the visitor center volunteers. I'll miss her as we all go our different directions until next winter. I've got to practice roasting vegetables as she makes the best ever! Well, I'm back to doing wash and stuff today. They are also planning on doing a controlled burn of the invasive river cane today. So if the wind is not too strong the burn will take place and I'll get some cool photos of that, too.