ALONG THE WAY

along the way Confessions of an ARIZONA LOON

"DO YOU BIRD?" OUR GUIDE ASKS. "NO, I write for Arizona Highways," I respond, hoping this explains my thus far unremarkable presence on our tour of the birdlife of Tohono Chul Park in northwest Tucson. "But," I add quickly, "I do like birds." What's not to like? Birds of my acquaintance appear to do little harm, spending most of their time sitting in trees, looking for food, building nests. Birds give us something nice to look at and listen to when we are doing nothing much else. I've long played with the idea of bird-watching as a hobby, imagining the leisurely walks through the great out-of-doors. The free tour offered by Tohono Chul seemed like a good place to start. The trails and gardens of the park give visitors a close look at the plants of the Sonoran Desert. With the plants, come the birds of the desert. So, joining the migratory morning-hour pattern of other Tucsonans, I make my way to the park for one of my first birding expeditions. The experience will prove to be far more complicated and faster paced than I had imagined. For one thing, you have to see the bird. The park booklet lists 45 of the more common species to be found in its environs, including hawks, doves, owls, hummingbirds, thrashers and one type of vulture. Yet during the tour's first half-hour, I don't see a feather much less the whole package until someone else points the way. These guys are fast, and I don't mean the birds. The first call goes out. Mockingbirds in the date palms. My fellow tour-takers snap to attention. I stare upward hopefully.

Another bird spotted. The tour-takers raise their heads and binoculars in a synchronized motion that would stun a Rockette. I have no binoculars. I squint ever upward. "Did you see his wing patches?" our guide asks about a bird they've found in another tree. Wing patches? Where's the bird? "Oh," the tremulous sighs rise as binocular-enhanced heads move in a matched arching swivel. "A cardinal." Where? "Wooooo," heads swivel again, mine following three wingbeats behind. This time I catch a glimpse of a fast-moving patch of red. "I'm surprised we didn't see any Gila woodpeckers today," comments a fellow tour participant as we walk. "Hum," I grunt. I wouldn't know a Gila woodpecker if one got caught in my hair. But, even without the binoculars and minus the eyes of a hawk, I find myself getting into the spirit of the occasion. I walk softly and keep my voice low. No, better than low. I'm all but mute. I'm not as worried about scaring the birds as I am about shocking my fellow birders. Every step of the tour has brought me closer and closer to the realization that I know almost nothing about birds. Oh, I can pick out a dove or quail, but consider the cactus wren, the Arizona state bird and one I should know. Used to the likes of us, the Tohono Chul cactus wrens gab away as we walk past. One joins us on the trail, dancing around our feet. Sweet.

by KATHLEEN WALKER

Wait a second. This long-tailed, striped-bodied bird is a cactus wren? I always thought they were starlings. I have spent years shooting dirty looks at the state bird, thinking of them as unwanted guests in the territory of my feathered Arizona friends. Well, I am learning and I am beginning to spot birds almost as quickly as the others do. One specimen sits on a branch directly over my head. "Get a good look at his eye," is the advice. I don't have the eye, but I do have an excellent view of his fluffy underparts. Having almost been hit on the head earlier by a falling date, I move along. We see Gambel's quail in the undergrowth, hummingbirds in the gardens. We spot a number of the heretofore elusive Gila woodpeckers, the males sporting their distinctive red beanie spots on the top of their heads. House finches cavort. Black-as-night male phainopeplas preen for their gray lady loves. Morning doves watch us watching them. "You should know, birding can become a real obsession with people," says the guide with a smile. Yes, but I still seem to be spending a fair amount of my time looking at the branches of bird-empty trees or sighting species we have already seen. I would like to make my own first sighting, to spot something new.

Then, I see them, a bunch of chubby little grayish birds sitting in a bush. Haven't seen their like before, have we? I point them out to the guide. Sparrows, she tells me. I think she says they are white-crowned sparrows, perhaps a step up from the everyday variety, but certainly no western kingbird, no ash-throated flycatcher, certainly no vulture.

Ah, well, on life's little journeys, even the loons among us have to start somewhere. All AUTHOR'S NOTE: For tour information and times, contact Tohono Chul Park, 7366 N. Paseo del Norte, Tucson, AZ 85704; (520) 742-6455.

backroad adventure Be on the Lookout for Man-eating Birds and Other Wildlife When Traveling From the LITTLE PAINTED DESERT to the MAIN PAINTED DESERT

THE BIG BIRD ATE THE MAN. THEN ANOTHER man sat down in front of a rock and etched a picture of the big bird eating the man. About 900 years later, a visitor showed up in northern Arizona, stood in front of the rock drawing, and asked, "Why is that bird eating a man?" But everybody who might know died long ago, so the visitor made a note: "Watch out for man-eating birds in the Petrified Forest." I took the memory of that bird home with me. I'd started out this hot late-May day on a loop drive that would take me from Little Painted Desert County Park, 13 miles north of Winslow, to the main Painted Desert, about 60 miles to the east in the northern part of Petrified Forest National Park. And man-eating birds were the last thing on my mind. Instead, thoughts of how different the two "painted" deserts appear consumed me.

To the south of France. This is the arid Colorado Plateau between Winslow and Holbrook, a place that, with luck, will get a wineglass of water during an entire year. Still, the uncrowded Little Painted Desert offered a hint of its much bigger counterpart, a 43,020-acre undulating expanse of clay soils laced with a rainbow of materials. And plenty of worthwhile destinations awaited between the two spots. Leaving the overlook at the county park, I headed south on State Route 87 about 12 miles to Homolovi Ruins State Park, one of the most memorable stops along this route. Homolovi preserves the ruins of 13thand 14th-century villages along the Little Colorado River built by the Hisatsinom ancestors of the modern Hopi Indians who live north of here in the villages on Black Mesa. The ruins, I found, consist of piles of rubble, low walls and an excavated kiva. Fragments of ancient pottery lie everywhere. Removing the potsherds is forbidden, and respectful visitors have placed on rocks along the paths the bits of decorated ceramics they've found. Some form of tactile communication was going on. Visitors have made little circles and spirals and mosaics with the shards. We are all strangers, they say, but we are talking to each other across the centuries. Continuing south on State 87, I crossed the bridge over Interstate 40 and swung west into the center of Winslow, where the highway takes a 90-degree turn to the south. A mile south of Winslow, I turned east onto State 99. As I drove the next 5 miles to McHood Park, I kept looking for pronghorn antelopes, which are abundant in the area. I'd seen them many times before when driving through these flats, but evidently this weekend they'd all gone camping. McHood Park straddles the green waters of Clear Creek Reservoir, fed by a year-round stream. Even though it was a weekend, I encountered only a handful of fishermen. I'd been planning to buy an inflatable boat for places like this. Rowing between the cliffs along Clear Creek would have been a delightful way to spend a couple of hours.

At first sight, it seemed the Little Painted Desert really just a pull-out with a couple of ramadas could use a new coat of paint. In the bright morning light, the hills that unfolded below me showed the color of iced tea, dark iced tea. Later in the day, I knew, the sunlight would transform the hills from shades of orange and brown to grays and blacks. Claude Monet wouldn't have been impressed, but this is not the south of France. This is the arid Colorado Plateau between Winslow and Holbrook, a place that, with luck, will get a wineglass of water during an entire year. Still, the uncrowded Little Painted Desert offered a hint of its much bigger counterpart, a 43,020-acre undulating expanse of clay soils laced with a rainbow of materials. And plenty of worthwhile destinations awaited between the two spots. Leaving the overlook at the county park, I headed south on State Route 87 about 12 miles to Homolovi Ruins State Park, one of the most memorable stops along this route. Homolovi preserves the ruins of 13thand 14th-century villages along the Little Colorado River built by the Hisatsinom ancestors of the modern Hopi Indians who live north of here in the villages on Black Mesa. The ruins, I found, consist of piles of rubble, low walls and an excavated kiva. Fragments of ancient pottery lie everywhere. Removing the potsherds is forbidden, and respectful visitors have placed on rocks along the paths the bits of decorated ceramics they've found. Some form of tactile communication was going on. Visitors have made little circles and spirals and mosaics with the shards. We are all strangers, they say, but we are talking to each other across the centuries. Continuing south on State 87, I crossed the bridge over Interstate 40 and swung west into the center of Winslow, where the highway takes a 90-degree turn to the south. A mile south of Winslow, I turned east onto State 99. As I drove the next 5 miles to McHood Park, I kept looking for pronghorn antelopes, which are abundant in the area. I'd seen them many times before when driving through these flats, but evidently this weekend they'd all gone camping. McHood Park straddles the green waters of Clear Creek Reservoir, fed by a year-round stream. Even though it was a weekend, I encountered only a handful of fishermen. I'd been planning to buy an inflatable boat for places like this. Rowing between the cliffs along Clear Creek would have been a delightful way to spend a couple of hours.