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Spring Flowers, Rio Grande

May 14, 2019
Nature

Spring Flowers and More Along the Rio Grande. The Claret Cup cactus is starting to pop! What a sight.

Notice that, although the flowers are very similar, the cactus in the first photo is different from the cacti in the lower two photos. They are both varieties of what is commonly known as Claret cup cactus, a type of Hedgehog cactus.

Green hedgehog cactus illustration — Green hedgehog cactus

More Spring flowers.

Desert globemallow illustration — Desert globemallow

image of creek — This is an ephemeral creek in Hondo Canyon, which enters the Rio Grande Gorge at Gauging Station Rapid. It is also the drainage crossed at the Horseshoe Curve on Hwy 68, outside of Taos. It drains the north slope of Picuris Peak.

image of peaks — Rio Grande Gorge and the peaks above Taos

Here, on May 13, we see a mid-winter amount of snow cover on the high peaks behind Taos. This and similar amounts of snow on other peaks in the Rio Grande watershed will be soon be contributing to a massive run-off. This run-off should give us Class V boating on the Taos Box run, and Class 4 (with one Class V rapid) on the Racecourse run. Stay tuned!