Sunday morning we drove out to LA (Tujunga Canyon to be exact) to visit our friends, Chick & Leslie. Thanks for a great time - we love you and wish we could have stayed longer.
Monday - driving home to Pahrump through Death Valley. The plant below is a Dodder plant - it is a parasitic plant that can't survive without a host plant. It looks like orange spaghetti.
Below - a beautiful mountain view.
Today we drove out to Ash Meadows where we met this little guy.
Ash Meadows is a wildlife refuge with a number of natural springs and reservoirs. It was so nice to see all this water with small fish in the middle of the desert.
Below is a picture of Devil's Hole - is a geothermal aquifer-fed pool within a limestone cavern. Its waters temperature remains about 92 °F. It branches into deep caverns at least 300 feet deep from an opening at the surface that is approximately 6 by 18 feet. According to geologists, the caves were formed over 500,000 years ago. The pool has been known to have waves due to far away earthquakes. It is the only natural habitat of the Devils Hole pupfish, which thrives despite the hot, oxygen-poor water.
Below is a diagram of what it looks like below the surface.
Here is one of the reservoirs - lots of different types of waterfowl and minnows.
Had to do some catching up this morning...love the jeep ride in your last post.
ReplyDeleteDevil's Hole is very interesting...and I always find it a pleasant surprise to see water in the desert. It's for sure you are seeing places I haven't heard of and I am making lots of notes!