FREE INSIDE: INSIDE: A Fool's Tale............1 Welcome.................2 BBNHA....................3 Park News............4 Wetland Project.....5 Lions & Bears.........6 Rare Bats ............7 Guide......8 Touring Hiking Big Bend......9 Cactus Rustlers......10 Backcountry........13 Safety Tips............14 Map/Phone #s.....15 SPRING 2002 A Refuge for Species of Concern .1 and Rio Grande Wild & Scenic River & Scenic Wild and Rio Grande O The Big Bend The Big Bend The Big Bend The Big Bend The Big Bend A Visitor's Guide to Big Bend National Park Bend National Big to Guide Visitor's A Nature's Last Resort Nature's AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO AISANO . XXIII N Big Bend National Park is much more than just precipitous canyons, spectacular mountains, and rugged vistas. It is also more than merely Bend Big forms, life many For hiking. and camping for a destination National Park means life itself. Protected within park boundaries, survival. for resort last their find species rare ofsome these In this issue of the Big Bend Paisano, we get to know a few of these importance priceless the reaffirm way, the along and species, special of our National Parks. Joe Espinosa Joe OL photo by photo V P P P P P P P P P P Past and present projects include: Please enroll me as a • Operate book sales outlets in Big Bend National Join...Join... Park and Amistad National Recreation Area member of BBNHA Please accept our • Publish trail guides and brochures and assist with ANNUAL DUES invitation to join the the publication of The Big Bend Paisano ___Individual ($25) ___Associate ($50) Big Bend • Sponsor an on-going Seminar program ___Corporate ($100) Natural History Association • Provide annual grants for research projects and ad- LIFE MEMBERSHIP minister grants and gifts received for the park ___ Individual or Family ($250) The Association's goal is to educate the • Support the park's volunteer, Junior Ranger, and ___ Corporate ($500) public and increase their understanding educational outreach programs ___ Benefactor ($1,000) and appreciation of the Big Bend Area Your Benefits as a Member and what it represents in terms of our his- • A 15% discount on items sold by BBNHA ___ New Member ___ Renewal torical and natural heritage. You can be • A 10% discount on most seminars an important part of this effort when you • A subscription to The Big Bend Paisano Mr./Ms./Mrs._________________________ become a member. • Current Big Bend calendar Address_____________________________ • Discounts at many other association bookstores in City_______________State/ZIP__________ BBNHA was founded in 1956 to aid educational, visitor centers at other national park sites historical, and scientific programs for the benefit of Big Bend and its visitors. • Opportunity to support scientific, educational, and Make check payable to BBNHA or charge to: historical programs in Big Bend ___ Visa ___ Mastercard ___ Discover Card No._________________Exp. Date____ Signature_____________________________ DETACH AND MAIL TO: BBNHA, P.O. Box 196 Big Bend National Park, Texas 79834 Tel. (915) 477-2236 e-mail [email protected] Your membership dues will be gratefully received, immediately acknowledged and efficiently used. Your membership dues are tax-deductable. BIG BEND NATURAL HISTORY ASSOCIATION NON-PROFIT ORG. POST OFFICE BOX 196 U.S. POSTAGE PAID BIG BEND NATIONAL PARK, TEXAS 79834 www.bigbendbookstore.org BIG BEND NAT'L PARK, TX PERMIT NO. 0001 TheTheThe BigBigBig BendBendBend "Spanish for Roadrunner" Orienting and Educating Visitors to Big Bend National Park AISANOAISANOAISANOAISANOAISANOand the Rio Grande Wild & Scenic River PPVOL. XXIII NO. 1 SPRING 2002 FREE P been conspicuously absent from PPPP Montezuma quail, or “Fool” quail, it had already disappeared the Chisos Mountains. A Fool's from the El Paso region by 1883. Lingering over the last few By 1901, it was fading from Cen- sips of coffee, reluctant to leave tral Texas. By the 1930s the “Fool” the parade of birds appearing in quail was already rare in the the yard, I spy one, then two, then Tale Chisos Mountains. By the 1960s, more scaled quail. One lone bird tional in spite of almost 20 years of “pro- makes a tentative approach to park, in- tection” in a national park, it was water, the rest waiting under cluding apparently gone from the Big cover. Finally, all make the break Mexi- Bend and confined to the Davis and come to drink. Watching can Mountains of Jeff Davis County, from the window, for a moment species and the Glass and Del Norte I see not the little “cottontops,” seldom seen anywhere else in Mountains of northern Brewster but rather the boldly patterned the United States. For research- County. In the early 1970’s, orni- Harlequin. But in a blink, they are ers, the park offers a natural thologist Harry Oberholser was gone. Just as surely gone as the laboratory in which to study moved to write, “In Texas, the Mexican gray wolf, the desert the intricate relationships be- Harlequin quail has almost bighorn sheep, the aplomado fal- using over morning cof- tween the birds and their envi- reached that great destination of con, and others unknown. A grim Mfee as another day begins, ronment. For birds, the park of- all earthly life: extinction." thought, but…Mexican gray I look out the window into the fers refuge and shelter in a world The reasons for the quail’s wolves are being returned to New back yard and silently greet each where large tracts of unaltered disappearance have been debated Mexico, aplomado falcons fly bird that comes in for a drink of habitat are rapidly disappearing. over the years, but most certainly again over the Texas coastal plain, water and a morning bath. Shy habitat change and bighorns are settling in next Pyrrhuloxia, bold cactus wren, ...some threads of the tapestry that is from human door at the state Black Gap wild- darting canyon towhee, furtive Big Bend can, and do, break. disturbance is life area. Perhaps one day the little scaled quail, all year-round resi- at the root. The “Fool” quail will again haunt the dents, all well-known neigh- In recognition of the park’s di- quail requires open juniper/oak dry hillsides of the Chisos Moun- bors. Now a yellow-rumped versity of bird species, and its op- woodlands and a ground cover tains. warbler, a nervous ruby- portunities for education and of tall bunch grasses. Unlike other by Park Ranger crowned kinglet, several pale conservation through research, quail, the Montezuma digs Mark Flippo Brewer’s sparrows, a herd of the American Bird Conservancy for tubers and bulbs bossy white-crowned spar- last year named Big Bend as a Glo- in deep, dry soil, and rows, birds of winter and har- bally Important Bird Area. seldom flies or runs bingers of the coming spring. An important aspect of the when threatened. Soon the migrants will grace the IBA program is that it helps em- Instead it relies trees and bushes busily fueling phasize conservation issues spe- on its cryptic up for the next jump to the north. cific to each site. In the Big Bend coloration to With them will come the birds of region, air pollution, degraded hide, crouching “Impor- summer, the travelers whose water quality and quantity in the silently until the tant Bird journey north ends in Big Bend, Rio Grande, and the invasion of last second, then Areas are who will nest and produce an- exotic plant and animal species exploding from the places of in- other generation before they have direct impacts on wildlife ground in a flurry of head south again. I feel fortu- populations. With its overlay of wings. Of all the quail ternational nate. To live in an area where important designations, National species, the Montezuma is the significance for the natural cycles are preserved, to Park, Biosphere Reserve, and now most intolerant of habitat alter- conservation of birds be witness to the yearly move- Globally Important Bird Area, Big ation. ment of birds is a definite bonus Bend National Park is able to mus- In the 1970s, staff at Big Bend at the global, regional of my job. ter support and funding for re- National Park made an assess- or sub-regional level. For those who observe and search, monitoring, and protec- ment that some areas of the Chisos IBAs are a practical tool research birds, the value of a pro- tion of the resources in its charge. Mountains had recovered suffi- for conservation. Sites tected area like Big Bend Na- It would do us well to remem- ciently to provide habitat for the tional Park is profound. Cur- ber though, that even this effort is quail again. In 1973, 26 quail from must, wherever pos- rently the park’s checklist of birds not always enough, that some the Santa Rita Mountains in Ari- sible, be amenable to stands at 445 species, testimony threads of the tapestry that is Big zona were released in Pine Can- being conserved and to the park’s location along a ma- Bend can, and do, break. yon. Hopes were high. Surveys in to being delimited from jor migration route and to the In 1901 in the Chisos Moun- the years following the release lo- diversity of habitat types pro- tains, the great wildlife artist Louis cated small numbers of the quail surrounding areas, and tected here. Agassiz Fuertes, painted a portrait but by 1979, none were found. be large enough to sup- For birders, Big Bend offers of a singular little quail endemic to The last accepted sighting was in port viable populations the opportunity to see more the desert southwest. Known 1983. In the ensuing nearly twenty kinds of birds than any other na- variously as Mearn’s quail, years, Montezuma quail have of the species for which they are important.” The Big Bend PAISANO Page 1 Credits Message From the Superintendent Welcome Bienvenidos Volume XXIII# 1 Spring 2002 Welcome to Big Bend National Park and Bienvenidos al Parque Nacional Big Bend The Big Bend Paisano, is published by the National the Rio Grande Wild and Scenic River, two y el Silvestre y Escénico Río Grande, dos Park Service and the Big Bend Natural History As- unique areas of the U.S.