Saltos Canyon

Saltos Canyon may have its waterfalls in January, but most of the year it's a dry canyon with a few seeps and stagnant pools.

In late September we searched the lower reaches of the canyon for water where we might place some cameras.

The only water we found were a few small pools, and yellow jackets lined the seeps like drunks in a bar.

The potability of the water is another question.

It leaves a rime when it evaporates, possibly a derivative of gypsum which is abundant there.

But few vertebrates can live without water so we continued our search for a suitable place to set a camera.

After a mile and a half the canyon opened up, and we found a pool pocked with hoof prints.

We set a cam there in the shade of the mule fat.

We returned a month later. 

Wood rats, Peromyscus, and a Heermann's kangaroo rat visited the puddles.

Though kangaroo rats and pocket mice can live on metabolic water from their food, a photo of a drinking k-rat would have been a prize.  

Black-tailed deer and cottontails also showed, but they weren't regulars.

Bobcats were more frequent visitors.

Two of them, though not together, were often snapped in a swarm of moths. 

So the bats were there too.