A windy autumn day

A high wind advisory was in effect at 8am through Saturday morning. I was busy inside and didn't walk the dogs to the river. 

 I did take Gretel solo to the Brown Canyon Ranch House and walked the Duck pond loop for 2.25 miles.

 The parking lot was empty. We had the entire area to ourselves. Gretel does great when she's solo with me, walking up front but never going out of eye sight. She will stop and look back at me to make sure I'm safe and awaits further instruction.

 The trail had been recently maintained for both hikers and cyclists. And the pond had also been trimmed of its reeds that can quickly take over. There was water in the pond. Recent rains elsewhere had also brought water to the smaller drainages in the area. 

 The jackpot for me were the wild senna shrubs along the maintenance road. I had noticed them last year but the seed pods were already open and empty. This time I picked as many as I could fit inside the paper envelope I had brought with me just for seed collection. I will grow these seeds inside and hopefully a few plants will germinate and eventually grow in my yard with soild amendment. There were also many Mexican sunflowers along the road. Goldfinches love to pick the seeds from these flowers. The wind wasn't as strong as predicted, but it did bring with it a chill. A flannel shirt took care of the chill. I stopped by my old lot and picked up a few pal fronds, checked the main, and then drove off to Bisbee. By now it was 4pm and I was hungry. I had a quick dinner at the Guadalajara diner by Safeway, stopped at the new Arctic Circle for a cheeseburger for tomorrow, and then drove home. Gretel was my shotgun rider the whole time and took her job seriously. I stopped by the San Pedro River at 5:20pm. The sun was setting and the dust was visible in the air. We walked a road south toward the former Bouchay house, but had to turn around at the 0.3 mile mark due to flooding and a downed cottonwood. That tree was felled in a previous windstorm as the leaves were dead. The road was also badly rutted from heavy vehicle traffic. So Gretel got a good three miles today. I feed her separately before letting the other dogs back inside for the night.