Spring Creek | Spring Creek Basin Mustangs

High on a creek full of water

14 08 2024

Hold onto your paddles, folks, have I got some rainwater for you. 🙂

Brought to you courtesy of Mother Nature –> Southwest Colorado –> Disappointment Valley –> Spring Creek Basin:

A full water-catchment trough is always a good sign. Fortunately, though low (in the tank, uphill behind me), we’ve had enough rain lately to keep this trough full – and there have been a fair number of horses drinking here with the amazing grass around (don’t let the pic fool you; the galleta, in particular, is bonkers this year, along with the alkali sacaton). I may have explained this in the past, but it bears repeating: The triangular sheet of metal over the trough is an evaporation cover, designed to help slow evaporation of precious water in our (usually) dry climate. The shape of the cover is triangular so the horses have plenty of room to drink at the sides of the round trough.

The Flat Top pond looks small in this wide-angle view looking eastish across Spring Creek Basin, but although it has gotten pretty shallow in recent years, it’s a pretty good size.

Good thing I scouted the V-arroyo before I tried to cross it. Those are my tentative footprints in the pillowy, shoe-grabbing – and tire-stopping – mud in the center bottom of the pic. You might not think it’s too bad, but there’s a lot of water in/under that surface mud still, and it is NOT friendly to tires or shoes until it has a chance to seep deeper into the soil and dry out from the bottom up. Along the left side of the pic is the arroyo – we’re looking upstream. The bottom of the arroyo, where I’m standing on relatively firm ground, isn’t very wide (hence my name of the “V”-arroyo), and the road rises to my left – up a little water-carved bank that’s nothing like the wall still in place on the other side of the first Spring Creek crossing.

Holy Spring, err, RIVER! I know it’s hard to tell, but this is the first crossing of the usually-dry arroyo that is Spring Creek (when it’s not masquerading as a rainwater-swollen river). Yes, the other side is a road. 🙂 Well, it’s mostly a two-tiered wall; the right side of it is where I dug a channel in the wall the last time the creek ran (back in June) so I could get my ATV across and up and over. It has been widened by crazy people in a truck (I don’t know who … I don’t know anyone that silly/stupid/nutso), but it’s greatly eroded again and is going to need some custom shovel work. (And lowering of the water level. :)) The width here is probably about 25 yards? (Good darting distance.) And this water level is at least 4-5 feet below where it was at its highest/widest mark, behind me, so it’s already running with less volume than at its peak. (WoW!)

I took a lot of pix from here, and I wish I knew how to embed video; I’m still on a super-high from seeing all that water. Bear with me as I show you some upstream and downstream and high-vantage pix. (If you don’t think water in the desert is A BIG DEAL, you don’t live in a desert.)

Looking downstream. Note the two-tiered wall across the creek where the road is (should be). Most of the rocks at left are from previous flooding. But I will tell you, that kind of water can move BIG rocks. I have seen it, and I have moved big (enough) rocks out of the way of crossing in a vehicle or ATV. This is why the powers that be warn people against crossing flooded roads; that water literally grooves arroyos into our salt-desert landscape (milennia ago, this was under a giant ocean!).

Arroyo as defined by Merriam Webster: plural arroyos. 1. : a waterway (as a creek) in a dry region. 2. : an often dry gully or channel carved by water.). … Arroyos are a desert’s proof of water movement – that far bank/wall is much taller than I am. The wall where the road used to be is proof that they’re always changing – with more water.

Looking upstream. Note the water at far right; it was still finding ways to trickle along downstream.

A bit wider view from back up the road a bit. I mean … ?! 🙂 I knew, before ever I got there, that I wouldn’t be able to cross, but I did NOT know how river-esque Spring Creek would be. I love, love, love this place.

Similar view, but this shows the bend in the creek at right. … Try to follow me upstream: See McKenna Peak (the pyramid-shaped pointy peak)? Way back there is the source/start of Spring Creek, which – as you all know, being loyal, wonderful readers of this blog – drains Spring Creek BASIN (along with all its multitude of widely (and narrowly) and wildly variable tributary arroyos). As you may or may not know, the creek doesn’t roll in a straight line from there to here (or beyond/behind/downstream of me). So that bend goes around to the left – upstream of the southernmost *major* drainage/arroyo in the basin – and past another creek/arroyo crossing (below the dugout, if you’ve visited). It comes from the eastish side of the basin – with the northernmost *major* drainage/arroyo entering from the northish to also run back to (really from) the northeast. Are you still with me? There are three *major* drainages in Spring Creek Basin with Spring Creek being the lowest, middle drainage – named as the very-most-major drainage and namesake of the basin it drains.

Water is important here. Knowing how it flows is part of the importance. Back in the very-long-ago day, some other silly people – who apparently didn’t know about arroyos and the highly-erodable quality of the salt-desert soil – tried to dam Spring Creek just below the confluence of the third major arroyo. Thinking they would create a reservoir out of which to irrigate land for farming (what WERE they thinking?), they built a dam and dredged miles of irrigation ditch; the remains of both can still be seen. As the story goes, the first major rain of the (likely monsoon?) season brought water rolling like a river down every tiny arroyo, down to and through the big drainages, blasted a hole in the dam that likely had cost boatloads of blood and sweat and resulted in tears (!) … and they went away *disappointed* (har har). … Mother Nature always wins, folks.

Well, I knew better than to attempt the crossing of Spring Creek Basin’s *river* (without more rain … which we’re getting again as I type … the creek would likely be done flowing within 24 hours … though the water will last in pockets and seeps for a good long while), so despite the big group of a couple of bands of mustangs not far away, I headed out, already on a great big, marvelous high.

What you’re looking at in the pic above is our crazy-good grass, which amazes me because of the little – but always valuable – rain we’ve gotten this summer (this year, really; it’s been pretty darn dry since *last* year). The galleta grass is particularly bonkers this year, along with the sand dropseed and/or alkali sacaton (very similar in appearance). This is from right inside the basin’s main/western boundary entrance looking eastish.

From here, my next destination was the south rim of Spring Creek canyon, through which water runs out of Spring Creek Basin, out across lower Disappointment Valley and into Disappointment Creek, which delivers water – along with a “healthy” (aka large) dose of salt and sediment (apologies) – to the grand and spectacular Dolores River.

Spring Creek, draining Spring Creek Basin. 🙂 Around the near (left) bend, before the far bend, there’s a fence across the wide-open low ground and a water gap across the creek; that’s the basin’s western boundary. Way yonder, on the horizon, on the far side of the farthest rimrock and even beyond that blue-grey tide of rain, is the south shoulder of eastern Utah’s La Sal Mountains.

Not even my phone’s widest angle is wide enough to take in all the gorgeousity of Spring Creek through its canyon, so here’s another bit of view that takes in more of the upstream canyon area. Spring Creek Basin stretches north (straight ahead of me) and east (to my right) and south (behind me) from this perspective on the canyon’s south rim.

Those layers. The canyon is neither super deep nor particularly long. But it is so gorgeous.

In just the short time I walked out and spent along the rim, the storm to the west was already passing.

Looking upstream across the heart of Spring Creek Basin, where another storm loomed on the northeastern/eastern/southeastern horizon.

And because this is a blog about the wild horses of Spring Creek Basin, there IS a mustang out there, though I’m not sure he’s visible. As far as I know, the young mister is the only one to have crossed the creek (within view, anyway). 🙂

Grow, grass, grow!

Better late than never (this was the last day of specific rain in the forecast). I think we can be said to have gotten some monsoon rains this summer. Despite all the worry leading to this day (yesterday), soooo amazingly grateful. 🙂

* Thanks to Charley Pride for the inspiration behind this post’s title – “(High on a) Mountain of Love.”

Comments : 14 Comments »

Categories : Brumley Point, Colorado, Disappointment Valley, La Sal Mountains, McKenna Peak, Ponds, Rain, Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Spring Creek canyon, Temple Butte, Water, Water catchment

Oasis

15 05 2024

Skywalker passed his bandmates to find undisturbed water upstream in the Spring Creek arroyo.

The creek isn’t flowing (alas); this is water forced to the surface by bedrock. It WAS enough water to satisfy both his band and two or three other bands – at just about nearly the same time. That’s amazing.

Comments : 9 Comments »

Categories : Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs

Spring Creek ice

24 01 2024

A young stallion walks into the Spring Creek arroyo to drink from thawed ice along the edges. The white you see on the “beaches” and banks isn’t snow – or ice. It’s salt. All of the soil (and water not in the catchments) is alkaline, and it comes to the surface in various places, especially near damp places such as arroyos. Not the whole length of Spring Creek has ice in it; the above-pictured section is where water has come to the surface and frozen. In the summer, until it dries up, it’s a seepy place for the mustangs to drink.

Comments : 10 Comments »

Categories : Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs

Up the ridge we go

2 01 2024

Couple of things:

Yes, it really is (still) that dry in Spring Creek Basin and most of the rest of southwestern Colorado. Pooh on the U.S. Drought Monitor for thinking (erroneously in my oh-so-very-humble opinion) that we’re only “moderately dry.”

And: proof that mustangs and mountain goats have a common ancestor (!). 🙂

That’s Sundance (and one of his mares) on a finger of a ridge at the very southeastern end of what we call Knife Edge (which actually is fairly broad on top). This pic, taken with my phone as I hiked out to a series of hills to get up to the ridge that snaked down to where his band was, isn’t even wide enough to show how far to the right I had to go to get to that access area – where I could bypass the rimrocks. The other side of this ridge features a little cove, where a couple of the horses were grazing as I drove up the road to the point where I started hiking, but it’s all rimrock-locked. In other words, the only way TO that point is back up the way they got TO it in the first place.

OK, a third thing: You know I’m going to show you all some scenery from up on that ridge, don’t you? 🙂 (Here’s a crazy thing: As much hiking as I’ve done in Spring Creek Basin during the last 21 (starting to inch up on 22?!) years, I’ve never been up on that particular ridge or on the very top of Knife Edge. … The horses are very good guides at getting me to new places. :))

Upon leaving my buggy to start my hike (the big ridge and Sundance’s band are directly to my left), this was the first view that made me reach for my phone (aka easy-to-access camera). I’m just south of an area of Spring Creek Basin that I call the east pocket. Knife Edge is basically to about my 11 o’clock, and the sandy-colored ridges at the right of the image are what I call Valentine Mesa. The mountains are a stone’s throw away (!) in Utah; from the ridge I was later on with the horses, they’re mostly blocked by the bulk of Knife Edge.

I’m up on the ridge that leads to the horses’ location farther down at the fingertip end of it. That big rise of grey Mancos shale and orangier (!) sandstone is Knife Edge. The southern peaks of the mountains are just visible way, way out against the turquoise sky. Spring Creek canyon is visible at far left. That’s the basin’s western boundary; the farthest treed ridges are the southern/southwestern boundary of Disappointment Valley above the Dolores River and its canyons.

Looking left-ish from the above pic, that’s Spring Creek cutting through Spring Creek Basin in the middle ground. What I call the “weeping wall” is down there, and it provides a pretty constant source of trickling water for the mustangs. At far upper right is the eastern end of Filly Peak in the basin’s western region, and straight out is Flat Top. Round Top is barely visible at left. In about the middle ground – shadowed on its northeastish length – is the ridge I call rollercoaster (though it doesn’t look very rollercoastery from this perspective). … And see the glimmer just above/beyond it? That’s the rollercoaster ridge pond, still decently full of water (semi-frozen, depending on conditions). That’s the pond from the “Reflections” post recently. … And what do McKenna Peak and Temple Butte look like from THIS perspective?

I’m so glad you wondered! 🙂 From a little right of left: Temple Butte, McKenna Peak, what I call submarine ridge (you can see the two “arm” ridges of the actual feature from here) and Brumley Point, on Spring Creek Basin’s southeastern boundary. The Glade is in the far distance, touching the sky. A little closer – middle ground – is Spring Creek and part of the basin’s loop road (rough, and I would not recommend driving a vehicle on this section). The ridge down to the horses starts to the left and runs through the nearer middle of the pic. Sundance was actually partially visible (his back), but I don’t think he shows up very well in this pic.

This pic (left) and the next (right) were taken from the same vantage point, but when I tried to stitch them together into a bit of a panorama in Photoshop, it didn’t work out so well. So, using the ridge in front of me as your guide, you’ll have to use your imagination a bit as you scroll up and down to look left and right (!).

If you can find the ribbon of road, out there in sort of the middle, heading uphill (to the left from this perspective), is where I was when I looked up and horses appeared, much to my wondering eyes! (Magic isn’t just the domain of Santa, folks.) If I’d been going the other way around the loop, downhill, which is my usual direction and preference given some fairly challenging road issues (!), I don’t think I’d have seen them because I’d have had to look back over my shoulder and up. I try to look in that area because I’ve seen Sundance’s band in that relative vicinity before, but see the little “cove” down to the right in the second pic (the one right above)? That’s where a couple of the horses were when I first spotted them from below, and if I’d been in a different place, I wouldn’t – couldn’t – have seen them there from the road.

Another lesson: Perspective often is everything. 🙂

Pretty dry out there. The forecast is starting to show us some glimmers of hope for coming snow. We got kind of skunked over Christmas, but fingers and hooves are crossed that our winter will start picking up in this newest part of the new year.

Comments : 15 Comments »

Categories : Brumley Point, Disappointment Valley, La Sal Mountains, McKenna Peak, McKenna Peak Wilderness Study Area, Ponds, Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Spring Creek canyon, Temple Butte, The Glade

Shadow drinker

7 12 2023

Shadow approaches the running stream that is Spring Creek for a drink.

With daytime temperatures at or slightly above 50 degrees, there’s liquid water for the horses to drink from shady-spot snow still melting.

Love her natural (probably greasewood) mane adornments!

(Although this is down in the Spring Creek arroyo, you can see the lack of snow, which is the current land condition. There are still infrequent patches of snow in the north-facing and/or shady areas, but mostly, the basin is free of snow, though still damp to muddy in most places. We have snow in the forecast for Friday.)

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Categories : Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs

So much to see

5 09 2023

A little Spring Creek Basin potpourri for today’s post. The inspiration was this little guy/gal:

S/he was little bitty, and my first thought was the usual “chipmunk,” maybe “ground squirrel.” There were a couple of little holes, the nearest right behind the critter. While researching just what s/he IS for this blog post, I realized that I don’t give these ubiquitous little busybodies much thought, though I see them all the time. I looked up the above terms and compared those pix with my pix … nope, definitely not either. Then I spotted a pic of an “antelope squirrel,” which fit the bill. Who knew?! There are several regional kinds, and I don’t know which particular species this little one is, but s/he was awfully adorable and fairly curious about the giant (how must we seem to such tiny creatures?) with the clicking box.

From the very top of the western boundary of Spring Creek Basin – the rimrocks you see as you approach the basin’s western boundary *from* the west – this is a view looking to the northwest out over Disappointment Valley:

Utah’s La Sal Mountains are those peaks on the horizon. This was taken right from the fence line at a little saddle. In most places, the sheer cliffs of the band of rimrocks form a natural boundary for the basin. In other places, where the horses could wander right on over, there’s fencing to keep them home and safe. In the very foreground, you can see some old wire from a previous fence; I’m standing right at the current fence (not seen). Between Spring Creek canyon (down to my left) – which is the drainage outflow of Spring Creek Basin – and what I call the northwest valley (simply the farthest little “valley” in the northwestern part of the basin, where our newest water catchment is located; up to my right), there are a series of what I call “bowls” – little “micro-valleys” between hills/ridges, for lack of a better term. The above pic was taken from the top of one of those bowls.

Now facing the exact opposite direction, looking back into Spring Creek Basin, a little lower, near where I made my little friend:

This wonderful sculpture of an old juniper just begged to be used as a frame for this view of the basin, looking southeast. Note the grey mustang at lower right; she was grazing with her band and two others just below the height of the bowl. Visible across the background are landmarks often to irregularly featured in other images posted on the blog: Temple Butte above McKenna Peak (framed right through the upper part of the old tree), submarine ridge, Brumley Point (just right of the farthest top-right branch), Round Top and Flat Top. The snaking shadow-line at mid-right, above the mustang, is a low ridge along the south bank of Spring Creek. The canyon is downstream, farther right and out of this frame.

Would you like to see a bit closer look?

Of course! A marvelous view and a marvelous old grandfather (mother?) tree – what a view it has (imagine!!)!

Have I mentioned lately the fantabulous grass in the basin? Those ponies are eating like bears in hyperphagia (I’m only partially kidding). It’s pretty glorious – and incredibly satisfying to just hang out listening to the horses snip and crop and chew.

I’d been delighted by the ponies, charmed by the antelope squirrel, filled with gratitude by the bounty of grass (native grama, galleta, sand dropseed and alkali sacaton, if you want to know specifics (links may or may not be to the *specific* types that we have)), but the evening had more thrills in store. I’d noticed that the attention of a couple of horses was caught by something I couldn’t see, but as that happens quite a lot, and I was *focused* on framing the basin in the arms (branches) of the ancient juniper, it was a moment or three before another captivating face caught my eye:

One face but two somethings!

Now here’s a thing: Antelope squirrels may be called antelope squirrels (one wonders why?), but pronghorns are not actually antelope, despite the fact that they’re called antelope by most people. Kinda like the buffalo/bison thing. In any case, I didn’t know at the time about “antelope squirrels,” but I was thrilled to see these pronghorn buddies. I think they’re both young bucks, but females also have horns, which are smaller than the males’, and these weren’t super big. (I have seen females recently, with fawns.) Another interesting tidbit: Pronghorns aren’t hunted in most of Colorado. Despite being just about everywhere in states such as Wyoming (nickname: speed goats, which always tickles me), they’re not common in Colorado, especially this area of Colorado. We do have a fairly stable – and fairly small, 25-30ish animals? purely local observation – population in Disappointment Valley/Spring Creek Basin.

One …

… the other.

Thank goodness for long lenses and the quiet of inattention!

The curious stares lasted a few moments, then with a burst of speed too fast for this human to follow (with a camera …!), the boys put on a burst of their famous speed up the hill past a couple of unbothered mustangs (!).

Pronghorns could give humans lessons in sprints and interval training. As fast as they can hustle, they come to a walk or even stop just as quickly. All the better to check you out again, my dears. … Note the four o’clock blooming in the sunlight in the background. Most of the four o’clock plants/flowers are not currently blooming.

And they usually just as quickly lose interest in such slowsters as humans and mustangs. (Note the wonderfully healthy juniper trees branching over the buck and in the background. We’re losing a lot of trees to drought and teeny beetle-bugs.)

No trek above Spring Creek and the canyon would be complete without taking note of Spring Creek itself, which is trickling in places …

… and not a glimpse of water immediately downstream of the above pic. The creek makes a sharp bend to the left there and enters the canyon, just out of frame to the left.

We have an interesting phenomenon (is it a phenomenon when/where it’s normal?) here where water will run above ground (in the creek/arroyo bed), then disappear underground, then reappear (sometimes, in some places) above ground, in the creek/arroyo bed, downstream. With the geology and stone stratigraphy of Spring Creek canyon, there almost always are some little pools of water between the walls of the canyon itself. (A reminder: Spring Creek and its tributary arroyos drain Spring Creek Basin. That water then flows out of the basin, across part of lower Disappointment Valley and joins Disappointment Creek, which eventually empties into the spectacular Dolores River. Spring Creek is ephemeral; it runs only when we get a big (or sometimes not-even-so-big) rain event. This water is from the big rain(s) we got about a week ago, making its way downstream.)

And I’ll leave you all with the glorious panorama that is Spring Creek Basin, from the northwest looking east/southeast/south:

Spring Creek Basin from high atop the northwestern hills/western boundary/rimrocks of Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area. Visible: Valentine Mesa, Temple Butte, McKenna Peak, submarine ridge, Brumley Point, Round Top, Flat Top, Filly Peak and, in the center, Spring Creek. (Click on the pic to bring it up in a separate window and enjoy it the better.)

So very much to see – and love. 🙂

Comments : 18 Comments »

Categories : Brumley Point, Disappointment Valley, La Sal Mountains, McKenna Peak, Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Spring Creek canyon, Temple Butte, Wild flowers, Wildlife

Doin’ the mosey

2 10 2022

Maiku was doing a little visiting the other day. Just checking out a couple of neighboring bands. He and two bachelors had a friendly chat, and then they all went back to the business of grazing – and drinking. In the background are the rimrocks above Spring Creek canyon, and Spring Creek was running that day after a rain.

We all love it when water is so convenient!

Comments : 12 Comments »

Categories : Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Spring Creek canyon

Autumn blooms

23 09 2022

As of last night, it’s autumn!

As of yesterday morning, at least one particular part of Disappointment Valley got 0.64 inch of rain since Tuesday afternoon!

In the pic above, Corazon stands in Spring Creek yesterday. Which is to say that he’s standing in water running in the Spring Creek arroyo in western Spring Creek Basin – water draining from the basin’s tributary arroyos after all of that lovely, wonderful, excellent, above-mentioned rain. The yellow glow is blooming rabbitbrush (also called chamisa), an early autumn bloomer in our high-desert wonderland.

I’m pretty sure we’re all happy about all of the above. 🙂

Comments : 10 Comments »

Categories : Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs

Full to the brim

22 08 2022

Have I mentioned the recent GREEN in Spring Creek Basin? Yes? Oh, good. … ‘Cuz it’s there. 🙂

Along with a little of this:

Two perspectives of Spring Creek, flowing with rainwater, the day before yesterday. The first image is directly as the road crosses the creekbed/arroyo; the second is just to the right – water flowing toward us. Interestingly, the road was dry to this point, but clearly it had rained in the northern and eastern (at least) regions of Spring Creek Basin. By this point, the major arroyos of the basin have converged (though there are still some that feed the creek’s westward drainage). The water was neither high (deep) nor terribly fast, but I didn’t cross. There are times to respect Mother Nature’s obstacles, and I deemed this to be one of those times.

Also a good bit of this:

This is the pond near the hill we call Flat Top. It’s rare to see it so full of water that it backs up so far to the right.

And this is the east-pocket pond, way back in the far eastern region of Spring Creek Basin, also full to the gills.

The pond pix were taken the day before those of Spring Creek running, which was the day after I got soaked going into the basin and getting caught in a lovely little drenching that did NOT go ’round. 😉

All the ponds are so excellently full; the above two are just examples.

So grateful. So very, very grateful.

Comments : 18 Comments »

Categories : Disappointment Valley, McKenna Peak, Rain, Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area, Spring Creek Basin mustangs, Spring Creek canyon, Temple Butte, Water

Nap time

11 01 2022

When the cold air is sun-warmed and the ground is soft (OK, muddy), a little nap is just the ticket when the belly is full (look at that belly!).

In the distance, clouds were clearing from the base of Utah’s La Sal Mountains – (relatively) warm ground plus passing snow over the mountains.

Comments : 12 Comments »

Categories : La Sal Mountains, Spring Creek, Spring Creek Basin Herd Management Area

Spring Creek Basin Mustangs