Davis Mountain State Park, Texas

I’d been here before and wanted to return and stay longer.  It’s a good birding location, and it’s just a few miles from Ft. Davis National Historic Site, where I’ve also been before.

Remember that I head west in part to escape the gray, icy, snowy, cold Wise County days and nights.  Well, guess what I got at Davis Mountain???  Cold and snowy…..VERY!  But first, the before:

An arty photo...........

Top of the mountain, looking across the valley toward the east....

Top of the mountain again....

AND THE AFTER

So much for my plan to set up my little tapestry loom on the picnic table...

When a dog has to go, a dog has to go.....

Tobey and I stayed inside.......

 AND IN THE SMALL WORLD CATEGORY

I was having a delicious cup of coffee in a health foods kinda place, and chatted, of course, with my table companion.  When she realized that I was an outsider, she asked me where I was from; when I said Virginia, she said her sister lived in Virginia.  Where, I asked.  She mumbled something that I didn't quite understand and then she repeated it: Nellysford.  And of course, I know exactly where Nellysford is, as I have kinfolk there.  This woman's sister actually lives in Wintergreen, which I guess has a Nellysford address.

Then I ran into a birder, and we started discussing birds.  As we chitchatted in the cold, somehow South Carolina was mentioned; turns out his deceased wife had gone to Columbia College:  Duh, so had I, for one semester before I decided the pond was too small for me and transferred to the university.  His wife graduated the year before I arrived.  Small world, indeed.

FT. DAVIS

  As an aside, I am drawn to these western US Army forts, established primarily to safeguard western migrants (mostly white) against the marauders (not white, and whose territory it was to begin with).  They were often so isolated, so far from anything that seemed civilized.   The men would have had duties and chores….and rampages against the people whose land they were taking.  But the women, the wives of officers and enlisted men:  What were their lives like?  How did they cope with the vast loneliness that must have engulfed them from time to time?  I don’t know, but I can wander and wonder.  

The last time I was at Ft. Davis, I became intrigued by the status of the laundresses; they were not merely women of poor moral character; they were paid and in some cases received housing (hovels) and a food ration.  When I inquired about them this visit, I learned that a dissertation had been written about them, so naturally, I begged to look at a copy.  What fun!!!  The social structure had Ft. Davis was quite stratified and complex, including officers, NCOs (black soldiers in this instance), and enlisted men; wives, who were acutely aware of their positions vis a vis their husbands; laundresses, who may have been single Mexican or native American women, or wives of enlisted men and the black NCOs.  Unfortunately, I  didn't have time to read the entire dissertation, but what a treat to be able to dip into it, even if for a short time.

And here is my Davis Mountain bird list  (mostly spotted at the two feeding locations set up by the park, and which also attract javelinas, as did my campsite).

DAVIS MOUNTAIN BIRD LIST

chipping sparrow               red breasted nuthatch    acorn woodpecker
ladder-backed woodpecker (female)                       canyon towhee
junco (don't ask me which kind)                             lesser goldfinch
western scrubjay                 titmouse                       house finch
white-winged dove             Berwick's wren            spotted towhee                     

NEXT:  The decidedly odd little hamlet of Marfa, TX.