Devil's Backbone

Devil's Backbone

 

We visited Devil's Backbone for the second time on Wednesday this week.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day to be outdoors!  Devil's Backbone is located in the foothills west of Loveland, just north of Hwy 34.  It is the southern access point to an extended trail system that extends north, running along the hogbacks that run between Loveland and Fort Collins.

 

 



 

The trail can be shared by hikers, mountain bikes and horses.  The trail initially goes to an outlook point, where you can look into the next valley and see the entire front range.  It is an easy trail, with a gradual incline, and it is about 1.6 miles roundtrip from the parking lot.  You could easily continue to hike northward, and do the whole circuit - about 5 miles or so?  This picture above shows the strata quite well.  The hogbacks are made up of sandstone, upheaved eons ago.  It is very easy to study the strata on this hike.

 

 





Here we are at the lookout.  There is a nice sign to name off the peaks in the distance.  Long's Peak is to the left of Jordan's head.  The mouth of the Big Thompson Canyon is above my head, behind that distant ridge.  The flooding that happened from the rains two weeks ago has caused widespread damage all along the river basin.  You can't see it from this vantage point, but just a quarter mile to our south is where the Big Thompson river runs south of Hwy 34, and the flood has most certainly left it's mark.  After our hike we drove a short ways until we reached the road closure, and were just amazed and saddened at the destruction we saw.  Mud and debris everywhere...  Shortly after a group of hikers took this picture of me and the kids, another lady arrived and chatted with us a bit.  She was from Baton Rouge, LA, and was here volunteering at the Loveland shelter with the Red Cross.  She was enjoying a day off and seeing the sights.

 

 

Since this was technically a girl scout hike (even though Rylan was the only scout in attendance), I covered with her some more backcountry advice and worked on naming plants with her.  We saw several Lacy Tansyasters (above) along the trail, which can be easily identified by their trademark daisy-like petal formation and delicate, lacy, sage-green foliage and round bushy habit.  We also identified yucca, pear cactus, sage, cottonwood, chokecherry, golden currant and yellow rabbitbrush (below).

I didn't get any pictures, but we also watched two bald eagles circling, as well as a red-tailed hawk and a kestrel.  The only other creatures we saw were beetles and pesky grasshoppers - including a monster-sized one that was four inches long! 

 

 

The biggest win for this hike was the fact that both Owen and Colin made it the whole way.  Usually Colin requests to be carried, but here he is, almost near the end of the hike, still going strong!  Owen was fueled by something else - he really, really, really needed to go potty.  ;)



Fossil Creek Reservoir Regional Open Space - First Visit

For background information and directions, go here

So.  I made it a New Year's 'intention' to get our feet wet in nature study.  I down-loaded the Book 2 Winter 2012 ebook from the Handbook of Nature website.  I shuffled our school schedule around so that we would have a dedicated time of day to do this - EVERY day.  I even built a new blog to show and tell about our adventures!  Now comes the hard part.  The actual DOing.

In our new schedule, Mondays are dedicated to Project Wet.  Years ago, I spent about $30 bucks and attended an all-day training with my fellow teacher-ed students and we all did a couple of lessons out of the manual and got to take the book home at the end of the day.  I haven't looked in this book since, except to teach a co-op about the water cycle a few years ago.  The projects are all interesting, but not all are doable for us (like, for instance, we don't live near a saltwater marsh or the ocean).  So, to get the ball rolling, each Monday we can visit a local natural area that involves water (and around here, there are an incredible amount to choose from - river, stream, wetland, lake...) and improvise.

Last Monday's choice (mine) was to revisit the Fossil Creek Reservoir.  We've been here once before, with our homeschooling group, for a Bald eagle talk/watch a couple of years ago.  Back then, we did see an eagle as it soared over the water.  We didn't see much else.  When you are in a crowd of about 10-15 chatty families with busy children, the wildlife is going to duck for cover.

This time around we made our visit in mid-morning.  Our nature walks are timed to be a good break after an intensive early morning of math and reading lessons.  Everybody is in need of some wiggle-time and fresh air by that point.  It also lessens the chance of there being scads of other people about.  I like it when it is just me and the kids... we all enjoy ourselves much more and there is a lot less distraction.

I brought my camera and Jordan brought his new camera that he purchased with his Christmas money, and his assignment was to take a decent picture of every bird that he could find.  I also brought our binoculars, since this is a rather large lake.

Fossil Creek Reservoir is a favored habitat for Bald eagles in our area - along with several other species of birds.  We went with the high hopes that we would spot one.  We did, but it was on the far side of the lake from the viewing area we were watching from, and we couldn't get a photo of it before it veered off into the distance.  We didn't see any other birds (besides the ever-present Canada Goose) - quite surprised and disappointed by that... but it is January after all.

We did learn some things:

HOW TO BE QUIET

As we made our way from the car to the viewing area, the gigantic stillness began to take hold, and the kids realized how noisy they were actually being.  Noisy 'shushing' ensued...  but finally, we were all quiet enough that we could listen to what was going on around us.

* constant tiny 'cracking' noises coming from the icy shoreline

* the honking sounds from the geese, which carried over the water and ice

* a very strange, but distinct 'booming' sound coming from across the lake

* Noisy traffic from the interstate to our east, and the road to our south

* air traffic from overhead as the planes landed or took off from the Loveland Airport.

HOW TEDIOUS RESEARCH CAN BE

We were very puzzled by the booming sound.  My only reasonable guess is that it was a frog (well, several of them, actually).  After investigating on the internet and combing through the list of amphibians native to our area, the only one that (sorta) fits the sound is the Bullfrog.  I have never heard a frog in the wintertime - let alone the middle of January!!  Even after listening to each and every species of local frog call on youTube - I still think that it must have been bullfrogs we were hearing.  It seemed to surround the northern side of the lake.  We will be going back next Monday (we didn't go yesterday because it was freezing and threatening snow, and Dean was home for MLK day... and we were in the midst of a dryer repair that Dean was doing - so skipping out of the house to go on a nature walk was not in the cards...)

What we liked:

* We were one of three vehicles in the parking lot - but we didn't see anyone else.  It's nice to have the place to yourself.

* The paved walkways.  I still like to take Colin in the stroller when I can - we can go further and it kills my back to carry him very far.

* The signage.  Lots of information about what you are looking at.

* The sightings board - up-to-date info about the latest eagle sighting.

* The public restroom - nice and clean!

* The viewing platform

What we didn't like:

* The traffic noise.

* The limitations posed by the limited number of trails - but it also goes with the territory.  Wildlife is 'king' here - and they limit your mobility to give the wildlife maximum habitat.

Wildlife we saw:

Bald eagle (maybe)

Canada Geese

Wildlife we heard:

Canada Geese

Bullfrog (Rana catesbiana )

So, as our first official foray into all things nature... I would say it went pretty well. We didn't drag out the sketch books or identification books yet, but those days are coming. We just have to keep practicing the fine art of being quiet. (yeah... that'll be the day!)