To know a place: Oak Point Nature Preserve: parking lot

Showing posts with label parking lot. Show all posts

5/03/2020

Noonish

The sun was high, contrasts were sharp, colors were saturated, and the wind was a-blowing. Not a great time for photos at Oak Point. I'd have arrived earlier, but the guy ahead of me at the drive up mailboxes at the post office had to try stuffing his box into each of the mailboxes repeatedly. It's just not gonna go, dude.

I've never seen so many cars in the round parking lot at Oak Point, but couples and family groups were keeping their distance from other groups. Families were picnicking on blankets. Old friends had lawnchairs six feet apart in the shade. We were all glad to be out!

West of Jupiter Road

Swallow nest under Jupiter Road, above the trail. Mom swallow tolerated me only so close before she flew off.

A very young wren was having its first short flight lessons, coached by a shepherding parent. The baby's downy fluff sticking out in the wind looked like all of us with delayed haircuts.

A red-tailed hawk circling overhead probably belonged to the nest on the tower arm.

Happy cottonwood fluff season!

Prickly pear in bloom

11/07/2015

Balancing actors

Skip to my Lou in the parking lot

Took an uneventful walk on the trail under Jupiter Road and on west. The natural trails were way too muddy on my Friday afternoon off. My brain was whirring (but it's pages weren't loading).

Getting back to the parking lot, I found all the action was within a few yards of my car. Folded-wing skippers were having a departmental strategic planning session. I loved the velvety green and brown body and the puppy-dog eyes. This was the largest skipper. Most were all dusky or mostly ochre.

The polka dot appearance of the prickly pear eventually clicked on a memory of insects on the cactus plants at the Dallas Arboretum's Rory Meyers Children's Adventure Garden last fall. Sometimes my brain works like fat fingers in an old card catalog! Those succulent-eaters were pretty devastating. I hesitate to call them "pests", but I was cheering for the cactus side in that game.