Category: Arizona

The rumbles of possible monsoon rain brought water to the washes, toad song, puddle reflections, lower temperatures, and high humidity.  But mostly it just teased us with stormy skies that skirted around the valley I live in.

Brushy Mt obscured

Aridzona needs monsoon rain, yet there’s a fine line between not enough and too much.  A little over a week ago the rains came, sometimes harder and longer than others.  The ground tends to dry out rapidly.  On the ranch the soil is mostly decomposed granite, the kind of stuff people love for yard landscaping.  It provides for good drainage.  But of course the land isn’t flat around here so there are washes, usually dry, and both natural and human made drainages.

The berm you see in many of my photos was created long ago when this was an active ranch with more cattle than the current three.  Natural water flow is encouraged to gather in a low spot.  I live opposite that low spot and haven’t yet seen water pool there.  Just cows.

I also hadn’t yet seen water flow in the wash that crosses my driveway.  So when the rain stopped I went to see and was drawn in like the pied-piper by a song I didn’t know, and here’s the video.

Back home I started researching the sound of frogs.  I wasn’t sure what they looked like but discovered they were Spadefoot Toads, capable of surviving underground for years until there’s enough rain.  Then they court, mate, lay eggs, and tadpoles grow within about a week to bury themselves digging in with their spade-like rear legs, then they wait.  They are a non-poisonous toad, lacking the parotoid gland that can produce toxins.  Though rarely seen being only 2-3 inches long, they inhabit a large territory in the western US.  There is also a European species of Spadefoot Toad.

OK, now you know more than you wanted, but I did the research.  And borrowed a photo because I couldn’t get any.  (Photograph by Bruce D. Taubert  https://brucetaubert.smugmug.com/ )

Slices of a Cottonwood tree

I went out again later to no sound and discovered other puddles with reflections, not something I see often in the deserts of Arizona.  But bring on that monsoon rain and pretty soon there will be green grass and bugs.  After dark the toad song returned.  And the bugs were out, so hope those toads were hungry.

My 5th-wheel (center), truck parked behind me

The next morning under sunny skies the ground was dry and hard so I figured it was a good time to move my truck and park on the uphill side of the driveway and currently dry-wash.  Nothing happening at the new to me toad pond.

Just before 11am, the monsoon rain began, gentle at first with lots of rumbles all around.  Soon the tempo increased as the temperature dropped.  I could feel excitement building as I circled the windows to watch the show.  Suddenly lightning cracked right overhead and wind blown rain raced by sideways. I love the exhilaration!

By 2:00pm when I walked to the toad pond the ground was dry and the air steamy.  No song, and only a wee bloated toad being pushed around by water beetles.

Such is life on the ranch.  Another day of clouds in motion, mostly teasing and grumbling but bringing very little monsoon rain.

Yet heavy rain warnings continued for the week.

Rain overnight left the surface ground moist and the 64° felt cool on my skin.  I had a morning doctor’s appointment, just routine checkup if I actually went routinely.  With a 90% chance of heavy rain I took my rubber goulashes along in case I had to ford the wash to get back home.

Saw this dead rattlesnake (about 3 feet long) on my road on the way out and only bones on the way in later.

After the doctor proclaimed me healthy, Joann met me and drove to the Granite Dells with Watson Lake.  Because monsoon rain began in buckets we didn’t hike.  But it stopped by the time we made another stop along a sweet little creek.  More reflections and flowing water.

Before heading home I stopped at the thrift store and just couldn’t resist yet another hat.

The drive home was as cloudy beautiful as the morning drive in.

And the day ended with a most colorful sight.

Back to life on the ranch and another day of afternoon monsoon rain with clouds dancing around the feet of Brushy Mountain.

I can’t believe all the mushrooms popping everywhere.

No toad action at the slowly shrinking pond, just well watered prickly flowers.

Sadly I had to return to Prescott the next day, but for good reasons.  I picked up my new glasses, actually just replaced lenses, and had a bone density test.  I also grocery shopped and spent a lot of time in the truck waiting out the monsoon rain in between.

Fortunately, my wash didn’t look like this.  So I drove across to home for easier unpacking.  Besides, I didn’t figure to go out again for a while.  I took my chances.

So, once again, back to life on the ranch and more monsoon rain clouds.

I took almost all day to create a 20 second video that will lead most all new YouTube videos.  It’s an intro of sorts.  Please let me know what you think.  I used it at the beginning of another video that took three days to create.  More later, but you can watch it here.   And PLEASE, Share, Like, and Subscribe.

That night the sunset colors were 360° with a rainbow thrown in to the south.

Suddenly it’s the last day of July. Where has this summer gone?

I tried unsuccessfully to get shots of a Gray-breasted Jay bathing in the metate water and then a Kestrel flew in and I got lucky with that. WOW! My first closeup of this beautiful bird.

The month finished off with more monsoon rain that came down hard but didn’t usually last too long.  That’s a good thing.  That hard monsoon rain is what causes flooding which means I can’t drive across the wash.  The gentle female rain is just enough to make the grass weeds green.

BTW, This is on my side of wash.  Wonder if it floats?