Birds of a Feather

As I've wandered the city looking this way and peering that way, I've come to realize just how beautiful the local flocks of pigeons are. In flight, that is. They swoop, they circle, they make sudden U-turns. In the process, the group aspect changes from black to white and to black again. Just as though MC Escher had invented the pattern.

As these pictures show, the birds aren't exactly in unison -- some wings are on an upbeat, others on a downbeat. But it's amazing how such a leaderless flock acts more or less as one. It's long puzzled scientists, too! The latest study I've seen reference to features arcane mathematical models.

Look at the choices available above -- why on earth would all the birds choose to land on the same wire?

And all face in the same direction while they're about it?

But they didn't all take off at the same time.

Now here we have not a flock, but five very social birds -- acorn woodpeckers who were making a fine racket one day as I was out walking. Where's #5? Look closely and you'll see a couple of tail feathers sticking out from behind the utility pole on the left. There's also a bare pine top I can see from my kitchen window where up to six woodpeckers regularly congregate; they are a communally nesting tribe. By the way, you don't have to look very hard to see acorn-sized holes -- and home-sized holes in that pole above.

After years of woodpeckers, insects and weather, this is the fate of wooden utility poles. No doubt the reason we're likely to see a lot more birdless iron up in the sky (below).

Sometimes I wist, but bird photography is not my thing! My little digital snap shooter can stop a flock quite nicely (maybe one out of ten shots.) But to really take pictures of individual birds, I'd need a lot more camera and even more lens -- that plus the requisite tripod. Couldn't do any walking weighed down under that gear! So, for great Arizona bird pictures, start up near the top of this page under the heading Naz Nature on the right hand side. Firefly Forest, Nature Songs and Wings of Nature all post some terrific Arizona bird pictures. That's why they're listed up there!

After the fact note: I just located the picture of acorn woodpeckers atop a utility pole that I wish I could have taken. Click here for a treat!

Pinatas & More

The Mexican food store over on West Goodwin, in the Park Plaza shopping center is open. It looks good. Clean. Well stocked shelves. The cashier also said, "fresh baked bread every day."

And, in time for Christmas, a big supply of bright pinatas.

In addition to a basic produce section, plenty of interesting canned and packaged goodies.

A meat, cheese and deli counter.

And a bright yellow deli/ restaurant where, the owner assured me, they'd be glad to make mole for me! Wow.

All very interesting. One way of looking at it is that this old shopping center (Prescott's 1st, by the way) has suddenly become a place for food away from home. There's also the Thai take-out (above)...

...a little sub shop...

And a workman told me that the site of the former Liquor Barn is on its way becoming a bakery/ deli/liquor store, with the bakery predominating.

So I guess that change isn't always that bad! Even in Prescott.

The View from Vista

As the map from Google Earth shows, Vista Drive is one of three streets that border a hilltop; it runs a long block between Coronado and Country Club (in yellow) and is one of my favorite short walks.

Here's the street corner where Vista begins (or ends, as the case may be.) The bench says a welcome "welcome."

Vista is one of the more historic streets on the west side of town and had a good start, complete to a sidewalk, a feature that only one who often walks would notice.

But it was never paved; as a result, grading and regrading the roadway has covered the sidewalk in places.

The one remaining lamppost from an earlier era -- and, below, the stump of another.

Actually, I'm not carping...merely observing! That there's a sidewalk at all is rather amazing in this town! And it suggests the age of the street and its houses (all of which are comfortably tip top!)

Another feature of Vista Drive: the many trees, including mature Arizona cypresses, like the shapely fellow above.

With all the trees, residents are well prepared for birds -- I didn't count all the feeders in these oaks.

As you can see, I took these pictures of Vista Drive earlier this year, when things were greener. As they are at this house, which might well be one of the four surviving Sears Roebuck houses on the street. Last night, I met a woman who has lived on Vista Drive for many years and she told me that originally, there were five Sears houses (one burned.)

In case you weren't aware, Sears claims to have sold over 100,000 houses in 447 styles between 1908 and 1940, and some estimates put the number as high as 110,000, but the actual figure may have been closer to 75,000. Regardless, Sears sold a significant number of their catalog homes, many of which are still standing today, according to the article at this site. And here's a big gallery of Sears catalog houses, which were sold as kits, complete to the paint to finish them. Look at the prices and weep!

But back to my walk! I like the use of natural materials in yards along the street. Note the cactus bones above. In addition to the handsome snag (below), the ground cover made use of many pine cones.

Along the way, I was struck by the outline of this bike, which turns out to belong to an old friend of mine!

Finally, a picture to let you know that there is, indeed, a vista up around Vista Drive. Just walk a few steps down the little circle drive for a great view of the city and mountains to the east.

Local Link of the Day

One of my favorite overlooked Prescott area places is the Agua Fria canyon. Starting more or less at the Bloody Basin Road where the road crosses a Real River With Water, the canyon heads on down to Black Canyon City. It's deep, rugged and seldom more than a mile or two from I-17. Today, most of the canyon is within the new Agua Fria National Monument; features (aside from free-running water) include major Indian ruins and petroglyphs. I bring up all this background because a photo essay on the canyon by Bruce Colbert has been posted at the Coyote Radio website; Bruce works for the Big Bug News, which serves the area from Black Canyon City up to Mayer and Humbolt.

Note: Krazy Kelvin from way Down Under in New Zealand has listed Walking Prescott at his 21 21 21 Great Blogs to Read. Give it a look-see; he reviews some interesting stuff there!

Brrrr!

Yes, dear reader -- those are glaciers below! If asked where I would like to explore (as if I could), my answers have always included Russia's Kamchatka peninsula, with its many volcanos, and those remarkable mile-high mesas called tepuis in Venezuela. But never the Arctic! Brrr! But to each his own: ask Maggie Kane, science teacher at the Prescott Middle School. She wrote in her on-line journal:

As I told my friends before I left, I love being on the edge of the unknown and going in to explore. Very few places on earth inspire exploration like the arctic, and very few people have done much long term exploration here. Institutions like UNIS are so wonderful because there, in one place, are many of the experts on a poorly understood part of the globe. It is thrilling to be out in wild country seeing a landscape and interpreting it, perhaps for the first time...

The arctic continues to pull and inspire me. Now having spent 3 summers in the arctic (Alaska 1985 and Baffin Island, Canada 1986) I feel more in touch with my entire planet. It allows me to truly appreciate so many things that most of us take for granted. A large rock to step behind in a strong wind can inspire gratitude, as can a hot cup of tea from a friend in the field. The little things that help you survive in a difficult environment take on huge significance.

I did read about Maggie's adventures in a recent Courier article, but I really learned about them a couple of nights ago over at the Crossroads Center, where she made a presentation...

...to an audience including local teachers, college students and even neighbors, like Sam and Linda who took me.

She talked of the stark beauty of the cold Norwegian island where the project, studying climate change, took place...

...explained some of the science measurements and experiments in which she participated...

...and showed how she could even take advantage of today's communications technologies to keep her students up to date on her scientific findings and what it's like out in the field in the Arctic.

It's a pretty cool idea for a science teacher to keep her hand in field work -- and to share the experience with her students. Do take some time with Maggie's journals; among other things, she posted a lot of very fine photos of her adventures (note the photo gallery link).

(I don't know if there's any relationship, but it turns out that there was another Kane family member who was big in Arctic exploration in the 1800s -- Elisha Kane. One of those factoids one comes up with when consulting The Google.)

Local Link of the Day

My son-in-law has a buddy who's into Route 66 in a big way. SIL, who's a map freak, is looking for an old road map of Arizona from the days before I-40 made driving across the state just like driving across any other state. His idea is to overlay old 66 on aerial map panels downloaded from Google Earth. Cool idea. First I searched my own map stash (I guess I also qualify as a map freak), but no old AZ road maps. Then I went on line and turned up this fine site which takes you on a reasonably good historic tour of the Mother Road and the cities and towns for which it was the lifeline. BTW, contrary to what the site author says, the cafe at the Monte Carlo turnoff didn't go under until a shooting occurred sometime in the early 90s. The truck stop there was in business the last time I went to Flag via Ashfork.

The Cigar Store Indian

I don't know if these statues of Native Americans are true cigar store Indians or not. Perhaps, in this day of easily bruised feelings and political correctness, many people don't even know what a cigar store Indian is. There's a very informative article at the Collecting Channel which says, among other things, that:

The most common shop statue in the 1800s was undoubtedly the Cigar Store Indian. Known as shop figures, these carved wooden statues stood in front of tobacconists' shops in almost every city across North America throughout the 19th century... Today, top examples of antique wooden Cigar Store Indians sell for as much as $100,000, depending upon the condition, artistic integrity, quality and intricacy of the carving.

This smaller guy (above) looks as though he was designed to hold cigars in his right hand -- the function of such a statue in a day when there were no billboards and a quick visual was the clue to a store's goodies.

The photos of the figures in the top three pictures were taken at one of the two old depot buildings out Iron Springs Road; I found the fellow below on our family drive out to Ponderosa Park last week.

It would figure that with prices as high as $100Gs for the Real Thing that the production of cigar store Indians proceeds apace. Consulting The Google produced almost 70,000 links! At this site some 39 different models are offered; another source shows step-by-step pictures of the figures being made by craftsmen in Thailand, of all places.

When my husband and I first moved out to this area in the 80s, there were two workshops producing cigar store Indians on US60 just east of Wickenburg (and one of the local Western curio shops on Whiskey Row had such a sculpt outside on the sidewalk.) The Wickenburg shop we visited was using a pantographic mechanical set-up to shape the figures from a master, which were then painted in different styles and colors. The last few times we made the trip to Sun City via US60, the shops were gone.

Nostalgia by Mail

No, I'm not taking money to blog about someone's biz. Fact is, it's very cold up here in the mountains tonight. I want to curl up in a pile of warm fuzzies as fast as possible. Aha! How about a post about what Mom/ Greatgrandma is getting her smallest great granddaughter for Christmas. See, Mom got this catalog -- and there was a Raggedy Ann (and Andy) on the cover and she remembered my own Raggedy Ann from oh so long ago and decided the little one should also have a similar doll.

That's where this started. But if you've never browsed the Vermont Country Store, you've got a treat coming. On the one hand, expensive candies from Europe (including Mozart chocolates like I always found in my room at the Intercont in Vienna); on the other hand, night shirts, yet, and Restless Legs Cream. Snuggies, long johns (in silk, too), chenille bedspreads. Bay rum and badger shaving brushes for the gents. Evening in Paris perfume and imported English tea pots for the ladies.

If these don't push your nostalgia buttons, I've no idea just what will! Try visiting the Vermont Country Store web site for a real G.O.D. (Good Old Days) fix. Me, I'm about to curl up in the middle of a bunch of warm fuzzies!