The Desert Is Not So Deserted

My parents were visiting on Sunday and we decided to get out and go on a hike (surprise surprise!). I was feeling tired and not very motivated, so I looked up easy paths in our area. I found one called the North Loop trail in the McDowell Mountain Regional Park that boasted little elevation change and less than an hour hike – winner! After a quick stop at the visitor's center where we viewed a small collection of snakes and the cutest baby turtles (they were eating tiny flower petals!), we found the trail head and a fun surprise. Turns out this particular trail had 34 mapped out "points of interest." We had such a great time stopping at each number to learn about different plants, mountain ranges and fun desert facts. Like, have you ever seen a Packrat Nest? Did you know that Packrats love shiny things such as jewelry, and in fact if they are carrying food back to their nest, they'll drop it in order to "trade" for the shiny object! I just think it's funny picturing a rat getting all google eyed for a piece of jewelry. But I guess humans do, so why shouldn't rats?! And we learned that a Barrel Cactus can drink too much water that it will fall over! We had a lot of fun on our educational trip :) Here I am with Mom and Dad

Paul was the Artistic Director for these next two. The Saguaros were sooo tall!  Did you know these cacti need a "nurse plant" to provide shade for the first 25 years of their life? And they don't even start growing arms until they are 60-80 years old!

  

"Old Saquaro, won't you be my nurse plant and give me some shade?!"

Here we are learning about the Palo Verde Tree, Arizona's State Tree. Paul and I used to call this tree the Wicked Witch of the West because it has green bark. Weird! Now that we know it's our state tree we won't call it that anymore. At least not in public.

Aaaand nightmare of all nightmares, we ran into a snake on the trail! We're 99% sure it's a Diamondback (poison! rattle! danger!).  Luckily for us we were far enough away that it just lay straight like this the whole time we stared at it. Can you see it?

Ewww! 

Well that's all for now! Come visit us and we'll take you on some cool hiking trails too!