Ravin’ ravens!

23 10 2025

I thought maybe a group of ravens was called a “cacophony” (if you know ravens, you know why I might have thought that). But no. A group of ravens is called an *unkindness*. How unkind is that?

Ravens actually are quite intelligent and very social. This website explains the early misunderstanding about their behavior that led to that term. They can also be called a “conspiracy” of ravens, a “treachery” of ravens and – perhaps my favorite, just because I’m a fan of alliteration – a “rave” of ravens! Also (boringly), a flock.

While the two pictured were engaged in an aerial disagreement (?!) across a large swath of ridge and sky, a third followed … maybe ready to console the loser or congratulate the winner? (There’s my own misunderstanding, shining through!) In any case, I was kinda stoked to see the above pic show up on my computer monitor. And very glad to get the lower raven’s wingtip juuuuuust within the frame of the original image (I did crop out a length of sky above them).





Heading down to water

22 10 2025

Tenaz and Skywalker make their way down a hill at sunset to one of Spring Creek Basin’s water catchments, now holding plenty of water after the rains a week ago.





Watcher

21 10 2025

Do you ever get that feeling like you’re being watched?

In the best possible way, of course! 🙂

I was sitting way up high on a hill in the northwestern part of the basin, after a huffin’-and-puffin’ kind of climb, and I was looking out at the view when I happened to look straight to my right to see a pretty little face looking at me from under the cover (or so she thought) of trees. Ha!

Pretty Rowan in Buckeye’s band is a curious girl!

We are having some absolutely gorgeous weather. It’s mostly dry again, though I keep finding little pools in arroyos and canyons and other little places of still-damp ground. The mustangs are growing their winter coats and starting to look fuzzy. My favorite time of year.





Admiring

20 10 2025

Not a bad view. 🙂





The blingy side

19 10 2025

Cassidy Rain remains morally opposed to posing for marvelous mustang portraits … but now and then, I “catch” her looking gorgeous (as she always does, willingly or not)!





Uplifted

18 10 2025

Lovely, wise Terra, napping on a sunny – and windy! – fall day in Spring Creek Basin.





So much water

17 10 2025

That’s Winona, and this is the same pond from a few posts ago featuring Temple. The rain FILLED this pond, which was looking a little weak (but better than dry).

Same Winona, same pond, same almost-overtaken-by-setting-sun-shade time of day after she’d walked around it.

It was like taking pix of a mustang at a LAKE with all that water in the background. 🙂 It was a weird and wild and most wonderful situation, and I hope to see a lot more scenes like it.





Changes

16 10 2025

Mariah was not impressed about being disturbed from her nap in the shade. I didn’t bother them long as I investigated the sound of water trickling and discovered it to be rain-remnant water trickling over rock down an arroyo just behind her band. Amazing!

By tomorrow morning (?), she might want more sunshine than shade as temps are predicted to drop to freezing for the first time this season!





Fabulousity

15 10 2025

We rarely get morning rainbows; we rarely get morning rain (and even more rarely with sunshine).

Along with a lot of rain the last few days (about 2.56″), we’ve had a lot of sunshine.

This IS Colorado, after all!

Yeah, so THIS happened yesterday morning!

The cottonwoods along Disappointment Creek are starting to glow gold. And yes, it was sprinkling through the sunshine, which brought the magic. (The above pix are looking west; sun rising behind me above the rain clouds.)

Wonder what it looked like back to the east? Here ya go! A lot different, eh? The sun was rising to upper right. This is Disappointment Road/Road 19Q looking toward Spring Creek Basin (not the road TO the basin).

Now I’m at 19Q looking west up Road K20W (not to be confused with K20E(ast) to Spring Creek Basin).

The sign struck me as funny under the rainbow. I mean, really, do you need a destination when the treasure is right in front of you??

Here we are at Road K20E looking eastish/southeastish toward Spring Creek Basin as the storm was passing to the north. (Sorry about the crazy glare-arrow; my phone’s camera lens is cracked.) Don’t make the mistake of driving this road for at least a few days! The cottonwoods at right line Disappointment Creek, which, yep, was running!

The rainbow (at least the main one) lasted somewhat longer than 30 minutes?!

It.

Was.

EXCEPTIONAL!

And when it finally faded, little curtains of rain were still moving south to north across the eastern(ish) part of the valley.

A person can never have too much magic in their lives. 🙂





Gold ‘n gratitude

14 10 2025

Mysterium contemplates … something? … while grazing with her band in the still-muddy eastern part of Spring Creek Basin. Spring Creek is still trickling, and the horses had been drinking there before making their way up this ridge.

I’d have loved to catch the ponies there, at the pond, drinking that glorious rainwater. … But I can’t begin to tell you how much I LOVED to see that glorious rainwater, its still surface mirroring the sky like glass.

I may have shouted and screamed and whooped and hollered with pretty massive, uncontainable joy. 🙂

Water, folks. It’s pure gold.