Cold weather has hung on longer this year than usual, but the trees are finally flowering, the birds are nesting, and it’s warm enough to hit the hiking trails.

The egg belongs to a pigeon family (or rock doves? they’re pretty similar) nesting near our balcony. If we’re lucky, in a few weeks we’ll have photos of a fuzzy little baby bird.

In the meantime, I’ll be hiking some of the dozens of trails that surround my city in literally every direction. I’ve always been an occasional hiker, but this year I’ve gotten more serious. I finally bought real hiking boots so now I have to use them.

When it comes to hiking, we’re spoiled for choice here. I can go west and find easy trails down to the Rio Grande (or one of its feeder rivers), north for lovely forest hiking, east to the high desert hills, or south for an easy hike up to some lovely petroglyphs. I could hike every weekend for a year and not run out of trails. This might be my new life goal.

All this hiking has made me realize how little I know about my local nature. Living in Utah so long, I eventually picked up some understanding of the local geology and a few of the common plants and animals, but I haven’t really picked up much about New Mexico yet. When I first hiked down to “the river” I wasn’t really sure which river I was hiking to. I can pick out the aspens on my forest hikes easily, but I don’t really know the names of the pine trees I’m walking past. Most of all, I wish I could identify the beautiful rocks I see everywhere–pitted black rocks south of here, smooth blue-grey sedimentary rocks down near the river, and light pink and green rocks just everywhere. I like geology enough that I took a class in high school, then another one in college, and I’m still terrible at identifying rocks.

As I hike around and watch our backyard bird nest, I’ll try to read more about what I’m seeing around me. If I find anything interesting I’ll let you know. Until then, happy trails to you. –Corvus