Bosque del Apache (sunset), NM - Nov 2008

While at Elephant Butte Lake, we took a day trip up to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. It's located near the town of San Antonio, New Mexico and about 60 miles from our campground.

Tens of thousands of migrating birds spend the winter there and this famous refuge goes to great lengths to encourage and protect the birds -- even to the extent of planting acres of grass and seed crops to keep them fed during the winter.

There are many species of waterfowl that live there year-round, but the migrating birds (sandhill cranes and snow geese) begin arriving in late October and their numbers peak in December. Around mid-November, the park hosts The Festival of the Cranes -- this is when photographers arrive in droves to try and capture the magic of the arrival of thousands of sandhill cranes.

We arrived at the park late in the day as we knew that sunset was one of the best times to catch the birds en masse. During the day, the birds are out eating in the fields, but at sunset, they flock to the park's ponds to seek shelter from their predators. They all arrive over a 30 minute span and it's quite a spectacle to see. We enjoyed the sunset show so much, that we plan to go back for the sunrise mass ascension. That too is supposed to be an awesome experience.

I took way too many photos and had a hard time editing them down, so hope you enjoy them all!

These are the sandhill cranes -- large birds with very long legs and necks.



Our first stop was at the "Flight Deck" -- a wooden pier that juts out into the main pond. The snow geese come and go throughout the day and this large flock had just taken flight when we arrived.


Same pond, but with another flock of geese after they arrived.


The same pond --now empty -- a little later in the day as the sunset changed to colors to lovely pastel tints.


The refuge is very large -- covering many acres of land. Driving around gave us plenty of views of ponds and fields. The trees with their fall colors were lovely and the mountains in the background made for a pretty picture.


The afternoon sunset added a special glow to this scene of thousands of snow geese eating in a field of grass.



As sunset arrived, so did the first of the cranes. Their graceful curves were silhouetted by the pink skies.


Here they are with their landing gear down -- ready to set down.



Then comes the final swooping down to join another group. As they land, the approaching cranes begin quacking their greetings to the others. It wasn't a big deal until there were thousands of them making great noises.

This is not the best of pics, but it was hard to get a good shot as the light was fading. There are thousands of birds in the water, both geese and cranes, and hundreds more in the air coming in for a landing. The twilight was filled with a blur of the motion of the incoming arrivals and our ears were filled with the sounds of flapping wings and honking and quacking. It was magical!