Hawk Hunt - Part II

In my previous post I mentioned along the country back roads in our area that there are many small farm houses and several ranch homes. I took a couple photos of this gate, fence, house and stone wall in the background [the 2nd photo has the tail of a horse at the far right]....

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PADRE ISLAND NATIONAL SEASHORE

Back in the city, we kept driving toward the islands with our destination being the National Seashore [a Federal park]. In the trip's entire drive [coming and going to the park] we saw only ONE hawk, perched high on the power lines. Another White Tailed Hawk. As soon as we pulled over to take a photo of it, it swooped down off the line and in a blink of an eye, it was too far away for the lens without the zoom. We stopped at the beach and walked for about an hour along the shore. This part of the park, where we turned around to go back to the car, is located in an adjacent county...Kleberg County [also named for a family associated with King Ranch, son in law of Richard King, founder of King Ranch]

A few beach photos. What I found curious was the yellow nylon rope and the bird prints....notice how the bird walked AROUND the rope? Smart one!!! Keeping itself from getting tangled in the line!!! ---

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LAGUNA MADRE"Mother Lagoon"

Leaving the area, before exiting the park boundaries, we veered off the main road and drove a short distance to Laguna Madre. This Lagoon feeds into the Intercoastal Waterway, stretching from its beginnings at USA Border in Brownsville, Texas....to....Galveston, Texas, with Corpus Christi in between. At the end of the park road, picnic tables, boat ramps, kayak and boat rental housing, and several miles of shoreline for the sports enthusiasts. This is what we saw once we got out from the car to walk some more...

...the 'totem' images in real time show milage to areas around the world and the direction from the Lagoon. It was kinda 'messy' but still fun to read and use my imagination...for instance:

India 9155 miles - Kalamazoo Michigan 1201 miles - Norway 5165 miles

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Padre Island National Seashore - a History

This area wasn't always a national park!! What, then? If you guessed ranch land, you were correct! In fact, from Laguna Madre back to the main park road and across it on the opposite side of the road is another fenced in area, with locked gates. And in the distance, far from the road, between the road and the dunes and Gulf of Mexico, there are some long standing structures of historical value. In fact, these are the ONLY visible structures from the days of ranching.  It's of the Novillo Line Camp.  “The Novillo Line Camp is the last historic resource within the National Seashore that reflects human use and occupation of Padre Island. Located a few miles within the northern boundary and entrance, the camp was the northernmost line camp used by the Dunn cattle ranch in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It is also largely intact with a collection of small buildings, a pump well, wind mill with concrete water holder, and barbed wire and board corrals.“   What is a line camp you ask?  A line camp is more or less a bunkhouse with out buildings and water.  The following photos are what I took, from quite a distance, then making use of my camera's zoom lens...



Read more HISTORY
The Dunn Patriarch



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Nookworm, aka Ms. G, asked about cotton and its culture from seed to 'factory'. I took the liberty of some research:

Texas is the #1 state for cotton crops [some 6 million acres]

According to this online site, Texas' #1 crop IS cotton [and ironically #6 crop is marijuana?!!!]

The round covered picked cotton  [as seen here] isn't a bale per sé - it's technically a "module"

A "bale" of cotton is produced ONLY after picking, cleaning, seeding, and drying and grading....then, a bale weighs 500 pounds

Where did cotton originate? No one knows for sure....but this site shows, Mexico, India and Egypt.