Over the past few weeks, we have had what we at first believed to be a Peregrine Falcon visit our pastures. The first time we saw him, he sat quietly on a fence post up near the ranch house — we kept watching him through the binoculars, with no thought of grabbing a camera or sketchbook.
He has returned several times but now perches up high in one of the north pasture’s oak trees, too far for a decent view. Sometimes we hear his cry, which sounds a bit mournful.
Since I couldn’t get a good sketch from life, I drew these from online photos*. And found that we were wrong — apparently he is an Aplomado Falcon, a breed that once was prevalent across Texas but had gone down in numbers for a time. Texas Parks and Wildlife and the nonprofit Peregrine Fund have worked since the early 1990s to restore the population of these gorgeous birds.
* The two photos I used were attributed to the following:
Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, Los Fresnos, TX
Peter K Burian, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Hello Vicky, Just read your post about your husband's pain. Has trigeminal neuralgia been ruled out in his case? It is something that generally afflicts women over 65 (but men do get it also), and it's notoriously difficult to diagnose. Considered one of the most horrific pains humans can undergo. Since my Mother was diagnosed, I've been able to suggest to others a path to find relief. She too was seeing a very well regarded neurologist (actually 2 of them). After 2 yrs. and many different types of drugs, when they couldn't determine what the cause of her pain was, they referred her to a neuro-surgeon. She had not been in his office for 10 minutes and he had diagnosed it!!!!
ReplyDeleteI’m sorry to hear of your mother’s pain; we’ll have to remember to ask the new doctor about trigonomical neuralgia.
DeleteBill’s pain, which has been more or less constant for 6 years now, is in his right arm — leading the first neurologist to spinal disc surgery, thinking a specific nerve was being pinched. This new neurologist started Bill on a different pain killer that actually seems to be helping.
We don’t have the results of the new MRI yet but we’ll ask about the possible neuralgia at his next appointment. Thank you!