Not so fascinating!

For what I anticipated to be a fun day of odeing at Sandia Wetlands by Balmorhea turned out quite miserable. For starters, I couldn't fall asleep last night until 2 AM, so not my perkiest this morning. I had hoped to spend at least 3 hours there, hopefully more.

As soon as I arrived a couple of things were immediately apparent. Although I brought extra food and water so I wouldn't be rushed, I had forgotten a hat. No way could I endure, much less enjoy, odeing with no hat and no shade. I considered leaving.

Had I been in my pickup, I would have had a hat. I keep all kinds of things stashed in my pickup.  I scrounged around the car that we never leave anything in. Not always kept clean on the outside, but neat and new looking on the inside. All I could come up with was a reusable grocery bag that I kept rolled up in the door pocket so I don't end up with so many plastic bags at the store.... when I remember to use it.  And a plastic face shield that I keep on the dashboard since the pandemic. That was it. Nothing else. A couple of face masks don't count.

So I wrapped the bag around the face shield and arranged it on my head. Had to be redone every now and then as wind blew it off, or it worked its way down over my face. But it worked. Luckily the face shield had an elastic band that secured it around the head so that helped secure the bag-wrapped shield somewhat. And luckily, hardly any wind.

Next things I noticed were workers with loud weed-eaters working out in the wetland. Not a big deal, but somewhat spoils the ambiance. And I felt rather conspicuous in my "fascinator hat."

The mosquitoes were ravenous! Even though I don't react to them, it's most annoying. I'd just about be focused on a damselfly and the biting fiends would provoke me into swatting at them. Of course, the ode disappeared post haste.

But neither the 100° heat, nor mosquitoes, drove me away. What finally did me in after a couple of hours was pain in my back. Just can't do this stuff anymore.

I don't know yet if I got photos of the two species I most wanted from there, a Desert Forktail and Paiute Dancer. Will need help IDing my photos. Here's one that I found fascinating. It's of a pair of Rambur's Forktails, in copula, with the female eating a male Desert Firetail. You don't see that every day.

I probably messed up on getting a Paiute Dancer by not studying the book before I searched. I didn't realize they had blue-ringed abdomens so I dismissed all that had that as Blue-ringed Dancers. Later, when I looked in the field guide I saw my mistake. Here's Blue-ringed Dancer from today. (The Paiute has a different patterned thorax.)

I'll update tomorrow.