Sunday, August 08, 2004
Chaco Culture NHP, Nageezi, NM - May 17-Aug 8
Our last month here was as good as we hoped for. With the increasing number of afternoon thunderstorms (the "monsoon" season), we had fewer nights of really good telescope viewing, but still managed to find new & interesting objects. Leaving the telescopes was especially hard. Hopefully we will retain some of our knowledge for our next time here. We became good friends with GB, head of the astronomy program, and will miss him greatly -- both as a mentor and friend.
We also learned about Iridium flares -- satellites that flare out and gather a lot of light at predictable times. By going to www.heavens-above.com you can enter your latitude & longitude and receive a list of ones in your area. Some are so bright you can see them in the daytime. It's quite impressive to be able to tell people to look at a certain spot in the night sky and then see a bright flare. It almost looks like some sort of UFO approaching. Willie became the one who kept track of them for the rest of the volunteers.
We became friends with a young grad student (Jessica) working on an elk study for her thesis at NMSU in Las Cruces and spending the summer studying the elk in Chaco. We went out "elking" with her one afternoon and got to see some new & different parts of Chaco and the surrounding area, plus got to see several elk. The elk are radio-collared and then tracked later with an antenna and receiver. Jessica roams around pointing her large antenna this way & that until she gets a signal, and then off we go in that direction looking for the elk, either by vehicle or on foot.
The area was lovely and a pleasure to be in -- seeing the elk was an added bonus.Willie had a birthday at Chaco, and it was a fine day. We woke up to a cloudy, slightly rainy & cool day, which was a treat in itself. We had many nice activities during the day, culminating with a surprise visit with Jessica in the evening. All in all, a very different but wonderful way of celebrating.
Our time ended with several potluck celebrations. It's amazing what good food people can come up with so far from the grocery stores. You quickly learn to keep enough on hand to be able to provide for a couple of potlucks at a moment's notice.
We also saw three life birds while at Chaco. Sage Sparrows are common there, and we managed to see some while on the Penasco Blanco Trail with GB and a group of students. Then on our last evening there, we went to look for a pair of Barn Owls reported to be nesting in a hole near Chetro Ketl. The Loop Road closes at sunset, so we needed permission to be on the road late -- the ranger who gave us permission actually joined us to watch. And it's good that he did, since he had a spotting scope. The faces of the owls looking out at dusk would have been unmistakable with binocs alone, but with the scope they looked adorable. Barn Owls are not listed as being in this area, but there is nothing else they could be. When darkness finally drove us from our watch, we managed to spot a Common Poor-will in the headlights on the drive home, another "lifer". We stopped and watched it taking advantage of the beams of light, eating numerous bugs attracted to them. Two "lifers" in one evening! What an ending to our time here.# posted by Doug and Willie @ 6:18 PM 
