About 30 minutes after I got set up the rain started, so I decided to use my car as a hide ('blind' for my US friends). After another 15 minutes 2 cars from the Phoenix Police Department converged on me after receiving reports of a suspicious car parked in the desert! An hour later I was approached by an officer from the Gila River Indian Reservation Police, Although I was not trespassing, he wanted me to be aware that I was very close to the reservation boundary. All of the officers were very polite, but I think they probably scared all the vultures out of the area by driving out to where I was parked.
The upshot of this is that I saw no vultures until I was driving home! However, there was a surprise event for me when I watched 2 wild dogs leave their pack and trot over to my meat feast! They were very calm and did not seem at all bothered by me.
Wild Dogs (click to enlarge)
Breakfast (click to enlarge)
This one chose the bloodiest piece he could! (click to enlarge)
The only other visitor I had was a lonely Mourning Dove... not quite the carcass eating vulture I was looking for!
Mourning Dove (click to enlarge)
One other shot from today... a couple of Cormorants flying to the south of where I was located I thought it would make a nice landscape shot. When I downloaded it to my computer I practiced a little post-processing - turning a fairly drab, grey landscape into a faux-sunset shot. The process involved changing almost everything in the shot, but I think that the result was successful. Here is the before and after for comparison:
Before (click to enlarge)
After (click to enlarge)
I think that next weeks trip might be to a new place - The Salt River Restoration Project... watch this space for updates.
