A pair of cranes spread their wings Nov. 25 while they prepare to land at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge spans 57,331 acres south of Albuquerque in Socorro County.
Geese take flight at sunrise Nov. 26 at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge offers us an opportunity to look back in time. While not really a wild place — it is far too small and heavily managed and visited for that — the refuge does offer us a glimpse into our wild past when humans first came on the scene.
A pair of cranes spread their wings Nov. 25 while they prepare to land at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge spans 57,331 acres south of Albuquerque in Socorro County.
My daily pilgrimages to Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge ended one year from the day they started on Dec. 21, 2021. More than a thousand photographs later, I am still processing not only the images but the richness of the learnings, questions and experiences as well.
As you can imagine, there were many challenges along the way — everything from a wrenched pelvis when a ladder rung broke to a mild case of COVID-19 during the last week of my year. My few absences — nine days in total — were all the direct result of visits to my 97-year-old mother.
What motivated me to commit to and sustain such a journey? I answered the question this way in my March 2022 article for The New Mexican: One of the important gifts of the refuge, a reason I think so many visitors have told me that it “feeds their soul,” is it reminds us that we humans are but a small part of the cosmos. Like looking at the stars on a clear night, our experience at the refuge can fill us with wonder and awe.
At times, there is a primordial instinct that catches us in our domestic lives: small though we may be, we too are made of parts of our planet, the stars and the universe beyond. The comfort in that experience is like that in the timeless embrace of a loved one, like a child being held by its mother or father and by the vision of the cosmos at night.
The refuge does indeed feed our souls. Though the universe is immense and expansive, we are a part of every atom in it.
The refuge offers us an opportunity to look back in time. While not really a wild place — it is far too small and heavily managed and visited for that — the refuge does offer us a glimpse into our wild past when humans first came on the scene.
Geese take flight at sunrise Nov. 26 at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge offers us an opportunity to look back in time. While not really a wild place — it is far too small and heavily managed and visited for that — the refuge does offer us a glimpse into our wild past when humans first came on the scene.
Courtesy Don Boyd
The wonder and awe we experience is the result of a glimpse into a world that existed before we reshaped it to meet our species-exclusive needs. In our shared cultural and myopic arrogance, it is easy to think that everything on this planet revolves around us. In modern times we have certainly ordered our lives and designed our habitat as if that is true.
Being on the refuge every day, I have constantly been reminded of how each plant and animal, from the bears, mountain lions, cranes and geese to the willows and fungi, is here because the evolutionary process over millennia accounts for their presence. Each living thing here owes its existence to everything else, and has been here far, far longer than we humans.
To our credit, we recognized the importance of saving some of this ecosystem. Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge owes its 57,331-acre riparian habitat to some far-thinking humans who understood what its loss would cost all of us.
“Year of Refuge” has been a deeply personal journey, a process of self-discovery, one of seeking to know how wonder and awe are awakened in me and what refuge means. Every day I have discovered new reasons for appreciating this place that has been set aside for the lives of the animals and plants that have been here long before we human animals arrived.
A murder of crows in fall light.
Courtesy Don Boyd
I could talk about beauty that is ever a part of what refuge means to me. But, I would rather you look on as I did at a seemingly endless murder of crows, a ribbon of moving, black silhouettes against a late afternoon gold-toned canvas of autumn cottonwoods.
I would rather you look at the two deer whose quiet feeding I have interrupted. Half-hidden in fall’s soft afternoon light adjacent to the Rio Viejo creek, they have scant seconds to decide if I pose a threat to them. Responding to my silent entreaties by not bounding off, they allow me time to mount my camera atop the tripod.
Finally, I want you to see a pair of sandhill cranes, mated for life, as they make their brief, awkward transition from birds with seven-foot wingspans to land animals that need the Earth to sustain them as much as I do.
A pair of deer stand along Rio Viejo creek at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.
Courtesy Don Boyd
All of these are timeless moments, the place of no clocks or business or signs or flashing lights nor anything else that calls me to be anyplace else but where I am. Just places where I in my refuge can see, hear and feel the life so abundant around and within me.
On Tuesday, Jan. 17, at 7 p.m., I will be interviewed on Zoom about my “Year of Refuge” by Trisha Sanchez of Friends of Bosque del Apache. I will present a short slideshow and speak briefly, followed by Sanchez’s interview. You will be invited to ask questions as well following the interview.
These meetings are typically reserved for Oasis members of Friends of Bosque del Apache — those making a monthly donation. However, in January, Friends are kindly allowing anyone interested in the “Year of Refuge” project to register and join in. You are also welcome to pass along the registration link below if you know others who might be interested. At the conclusion of the interview, Sanchez will draw from those attending for a 16-inch by 20-inch print of the snow-capped Magdalenas from the refuge.
This is the fourth and final article reflecting on Don Boyd’s experience as he traveled through a Year of Refuge at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, where he photographed daily for 12 months beginning Dec. 21, 2021. If you missed the first three articles, you may find them online in theMarch 21,June 27andOct. 3editions. You can follow his continuing journey atFacebook.com/DonBoydPhotographyand sign up for the blogs and newsletters at his website,www.donboyd.com, and be informed when the book, Year of Refuge is available.
The moon sets on the Chupadera Mountains on Nov. 8 at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.
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