dry creek

June 26, 07
3ish
Gibson Ranch - Dry Creek
very warm, clear, slight breeze

"Creeking" with my brother Joe & my kids - wanted to get "above" and "below" the earth photos for the heaven project. (See http://www.heavenartproject.blogspot.com/)

Plenty of little fish in the creek, and some pretty good sized ones, too - Dee is on a rescue mission with tiny ones who have ended up in a stagnating little branch of the creek that is drying up, catching them & releasing them into the main creek. Surrounding the creek, the grass is all dry and brown - only the grass at the very edge of the water is green, with all the trees hugging it as well, it's a swath of green through the otherwise dry June landscape.

We go wading up the creek, the kids try to catch little fish with fast food cups we find, but the fish are too fast. The water is amazingly warm, even in the parts that go up over our knees and make our long shorts wet half way up our thighs. Gravel gets stuck in my sandals and Phil keeps wanting to take off his flip flops but then finds shards of glass, as if to illustrate why I insist he keep them on.

I find a big bush along the creek edge with white puff ball flowers that have a mild, pleasant scent - bees really like them, too. We hike/wade our way up the creek over fallen trees, through shallows, even find some big "rocks" that seem spongy, that are actually gray clay, with anacharis growing on it. Actually a non-native aquarium plant that can be invasive, I fill a fast food cup full of it to take home and put in my pond.

We wade nearly all the way to where Watt Avenue crosses the creek, then head back down creek again. We begin to see several black phoebes as we head down - I even see one snatch a big bug right out of the air while flying - pretty impressive.

Little fresh water clams are all over the creek - at one point the big rock in my sandal turns out to be as big a clam as any - and I thought I was imagining the rocks in my sandals larger than they could possibly be. On our trip up-creek, we found the top & bottom shell of a good sized turtle who become somebody else's meal; on our way back, I pick up the lower shell & pack it away for it's pretty pattern, to the disgusted amusement of my teenagers - who would know -