2/16 Sonoran Desert Museum

The Sonoran Desert Museum is mostly a botanical park, but since it also contains animals from this area, it is a zoo as well.  I am camped at Gilbert Ray Campground nearby, but it has been cold and drizzly in this desert, so I have been mostly huddling inside around my electric heater and keeping my furnace running at night.  

However, some fellow RVers that I know from a women's forum stopped by so we headed out to the museum for a few hours--wearing jackets, of course.  I bought a season pass, and my friends got in using the two guest passes they gave me.  I will be back here in a couple of weeks and the passes are good through February 2018, so I think I will get my money's worth. 

I have been here several times--the first way back in the late 1990s when my son was working for a summer nearby here.   Except it was 110 degrees and sunny that day!

Lots of paths to follow, and it is easy to get lost, but there is always something interesting to see.  

A local deer in this pen.  

And there is black bear in this area, but he has his back to us and is taking a nap.  See the black lump on the ledge?

Here he is! 

Nice view across the valley.  Tucson is in the distance, but my campground is only a mile away.  You can see the low clouds in the distance. 

This little burrowing owl was all fluffed up against the cold. 

We saw several yuccas in various stages of blooming.  Maybe this one will be flowering when I come back in a couple of weeks. 

And another. 

And here is one that is almost in bloom.  It needs to open just a bit more. 

This is a young saguaro where the main stem died and two new stems started growing.   Saguaro National Park is just down the road, by the way. 

Pretty hummingbird in the hummingbird house. This is a Costa's hummingbird, and his throat is dark red or purple depending on the sun. This is a male--the females are drab so they can hide in the nest.

  
 Can you see the hummingbird sitting on a nest?  I circled it because it blends in so much.

Here is an enlargement, but this is a very tiny bird.




A couple of Gamble's quail in the bird house.

This bird was all fluffed up and crouched against the cold.  Don't blame it.

By this point, it was getting colder and really starting to drizzle heavily, so we headed back to my campground for sandwiches.  

Will take more photos when I come back, and hopefully, it will be warmer and sunny, resulting in more birds and animals being out then.