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Faywood

A tough decision, not going to get the Montezuma quail, but a good decision.
We would have been pressed for time, going all the way down into West Texas,
then back to Northern New Mexico for our client by Wednesday. We don’t want
to hurry from place to place, we want to take our time. We’re here at
Faywood Hot Springs, taking our time. Taking our time, and counting birds.
This is a very birdy place, here, and nearby City of Rocks State Park. Kestrel, gambel’s quail, white winged and mourning doves, roadrunner, ladder
backed woodpecker, loggerhead shrike, raven, verdin, rock bewick’s and house
wrens, ruby crowned kinglet, curve billed and crissal thrashers, green
tailed and canyon towhees, chipping black- throated song and white crowned
sparrows, dark eyed junco, house finch, and house sparrow. It’s a very busy place.

Posted on

Faywood

South from Albuquerque to Las Cruces. There, at lunch, a difficult
decision. Continue southeast to Davis Mountains State Park in Texas for a
long day and the Montezuma quail, or hang a right for an early stop at
Faywood Hot Springs. We went right. Sixty-degree air. Hundred six-degree
pools. It was a good afternoon. The campground here is a little tight for us. We might not have come in if
we had scouted it first in the Jeep. We made it in without adding any marks
to the outside of the rig though, and I feel safe now until it’s time to
move it to leave. Not many raptors today. We did get to see some nice flocks of sandhill
cranes in the air, and a few on the ground. White crowned sparrows, house
finches, white-winged doves, curve billed thrashers, and road runners. I learned more about those fakey trees at the top of Monument Hill. Termini
tells me they’re called Frankenpine. Cellphone towers camouflaged as trees.
Yeah. Right. Can hardly tell them from the real thing. I’m pleased to report that I also got a rise out of him with my smart aleck
comment about the Buffalo Bills. Termini happens to live in Buffalo.