Mesa Verde

walked along the river which was fairly high. Spring run off. Very windy still in the morning. No sites available to stay another night.

Philadelphus lewesii was in blossom. heavenly scent as you walked down the path.

there was a fire that went through the gorge last year and it was interesting to see what was burned and what was not... Very mosaic. Lots of greenery coming back where there was burn, but unfortunately i suspect a lot of it was the non native invasives.

there was an outhouse previously and i am pretty sure that structure was burnt, but a bench maybe 50 feet from it was fine. it is interesting to see how fires in a smaller scale don't necessarily burn everything. The lecture we went to in the winter he said this was the normal pattern, a mosaic. We only have the big devastating fires these days because of our past suppression of fires. had we allowed them to go through on a more regular basis they would remain small. Patch works would not be touched and the burned areas would be reseeded from these unburnt areas. it will be interesting to see how this burn regeneration progresses over the next few years. there were quite a few large trees along the rivers edge that were burnt.Read more