Jessica Rath For horses, donkeys, dogs, cats, and one pot-bellied pig! And, I almost forgot: two resident mice who live happily in a spacious terrarium. When I found out that there is an animal rescue organization in our area, I was excited because I love animals. And when I heard that their location was not far from where I live, I just had to learn more about it! The owners, Tina and Mike Kleckner, graciously agreed to meet with me, show me around, and let me take photographs. It was so heart-warming to get to know these two people who dedicate their lives to rescuing neglected, abandoned, threatened animals and to witness the deep, genuine love they give to their charges. They had no plans to take in animals when they bought their property in Youngsville. It sort of just happened – and the way they grew and changed with each new rescue is truly remarkable. It all started with one horse, Arrow. A good friend of Tina and Mike’s, Bridget McCombe from the Abiquiu Inn, had been rescuing horses from Oklahoma kill lots. Horse slaughter is outlawed in the United States, and any horse no longer useful to its owners will be sold or auctioned off at kill lots. From there, they’re sent to be slaughtered in Mexico. The transportation is inhumane and horrible. So, when Bridget had brought a truckload of horses back to Abuquiú and asked Tina and Mike whether they’d be willing to take one, they brought Arrow home. He was a thoroughbred off-track horse on his way to the slaughterhouse. Only three years old, he had won some 23 races, but because he was too young when they started racing him he developed a little bone spur, was deemed useless for making more money, and was sent off to slaughter. He changed the Kleckners’ lives, when they realized how much they could do for horse rescue. They acquired some more horses, but then, Mike told me, he really wanted a donkey. And a pig. When Tina came home from a weekend visit with her mother in Kansas, she was greeted with a loud HEE-HAW and first thought that their horse Belle had gotten ill with bronchitis! But no, this was Josephine. And soon after, they got another donkey, Wyatt. And quite recently they added Shoni, a donkey who had lost her siblings to sand colic – a serious gastrointestinal ailment which develops when the animal grazes on a sandy pasture. Since donkeys are very social creatures, the former owner felt that Shoni would be lonely all by herself, and so she joined Josephine and Wyatt. And the pig – I was curious, how did they end up with a pig? Tina explained: “ We’re now licensed by the State of New Mexico Livestock Board. We’re one of twelve licensed rescues in NM. When we get a call about an injured or hurt animal, we call the State of NM, and they will legally pick them up. They house them on their site for five days, and if nobody comes forth to say they are theirs, then we can legally adopt the animal. The State of NM called us a couple of months ago and said they had a pot-bellied pig that somebody had alerted them about over in Velarde. He was living in the wild, somebody must have dumped him, and his ears had recently been removed.” Mike added: “One ear was clearly cut off. The other ear was mangled, and dangled off his head.” Tina continued: “So, they asked, ‘Can you take the pig’? Pot-bellied pigs are considered pets, not livestock, so they couldn't take the pig, but they could pick it up and bring it to us, if we would be willing to give it a chance. We said, sure, bring him out. We knew nothing about pot-bellied pigs, but we knew nothing about horses either when we started, and we learned everything. So, they brought the pig, and we wondered, could it have been a coyote who bit off his ears, or a dog? But we noticed his reaction to human beings. He snapped at us like an alligator, he was mad at the humans, but he liked the dogs. Then we read up about earless pigs, and there were other cases where humans cut off their ears – to train their dogs for wild boar hunt. They use the pig with a bloody ear as bait. It took him a couple of weeks before he finally stopped snapping at us, and now he’s like a dog, he trusts us, but we had to earn his trust.” He probably can’t hear much because of the scar tissues around his ears, but all his wounds have healed really well. He wags his tail, and he loves everybody. “He gets along with the horses and the donkeys, and the dogs, and the humans. He’s part of the family”, Mike adds. “Pigs are so intelligent, I was trying to feed him, I had some older bananas cut up on a dish. I tried to put it down over the fence, and he figured out how to get the banana out of the dish which wasn’t easy for him to do because his mouth just doesn’t work that way. He turned the page about a week ago. He’s a totally different pig now. Before, when we had food, we had to be afraid he’d snap at us, but now he’s fine.” And what’s his name, I asked? Mike chuckled. “We didn’t know whether he was a boy or a girl. It’s hard to tell with a pig. We thought she was a girl and named her Piggy Sue, but then we found out he’s a boy. So Tina wanted to call him Sue anyway, because Johnny Cash wrote a song about “A Boy Named Sue''! Then somebody said, call him Sumo, so that’s what I like, and I call him Sumo.” But for Tina, his name is Piggy Sue. “If you listen to the words of the song, it’s just like our pig, because he snapped at us like an alligator. In the song, the parents called him Sue to make him stronger; he lost his ear in a bar fight, and he snapped at some guy like an alligator! This is too weird! So he’s got to be a Boy named Sue!” Mike said that they have a total of 26 animals that we’re feeding. Seven horses, three donkeys, six dogs, seven cats, and two mice! Another story! They have some barn cats, and they noticed that they were playing with something on the ground. Something tiny – the size of a thumb – no eyes – rolled up into a little ball. Mike exclaimed, it’s a baby mouse! No hair! He started stroking its chest, and soon he noticed that it’s breathing! He took it inside, researched what to do next, and learned: where there’s one there’s more. Sure enough, when he went back out he found another one. Mike got a tiny paint brush and some baby formula, and he set the alarm, and every four hours he would feed these two little mice. Nine days later, they opened their eyes. They probably were only a day old when he found them. They could never survive in the wild, once they’re used to being fed. Both Tina and Mike became quite attached to them. At a Holiday gathering they had a line of people waiting to go into the bathroom to see the two little mice (who live in a large terrarium) and to hold them because they are so cute. But if they had a male and a female, they’d multiply…. They called their equine vet who’s used to work on 1000-LB animals, and asked whether he could castrate the boy. “The vet thought we were nuts”, Mike laughs. “Finally somebody told us to wait another six weeks. If you have a male and female, you’ll have babies. But if you don’t, then you know you’ve got two females. And we never had babies.”. I was curious: “Did you already have this ranch when you took in the first horse?” Mike explained that they had the house, but nothing else. They went to Big R in Santa Fe, bought some horse panels, and built a round pen. Then they built the paddock where the horses spend most of their time. Then they fenced in some pasture land, then they built some walk-ins, so the animals could get out of the wind and the sun, and then they built a barn. It was a process, because there was absolutely nothing for horses here. They bought some water buckets and some horse panels and built the round pen – that’s how it started. When I looked around outside, at the two big barns, the different paddocks, and the feeding stations with lots of hay, I was duly impressed. What a labor of love! Tina agrees. “ We had the heart and the passion, the willpower to do so, but it was a lot!” Mike adds that they started in 2018, so everything one can see has been accomplished in the last five/six years. It’s been a journey! Mike and Tina have so many stories about all their rescued animals, one could write a book. Here is another one, the story of Marshall, a German shepherd mix. They had a chihuahua when they first moved out here, and the poor creature was killed by a coyote – right in front of Tina’s eyes. So, they decided they needed a big dog. Two days later Tina found a totally emaciated dog right by the Youngsville post office, one could see each of his rib bones. And he followed her home, two miles on a dirt road. When the dog saw the rain barrel he just plopped right in it and started drinking. Then he took a big dump, and out came a ketchup package from McDonalds’ – he must have been scavenging for a while. He was so emaciated and had mange all over. Tina and Mike decided to clean him up and started feeding him – that’s how they got Marshall. He’s not a marshal but a marshmallow, Tina claims, but he does a good job chasing off the coyotes. The Horseshoe Canyon Rescue Ranch is limited to taking in only ten large animals. For other animals, Tina and Mike try to find connections; for example, the Christ in the Desert Monastery has two horses that they arranged. “This is good, because Mike and I do this all by ourselves”, Tina adds. “We don’t have help. So, we don’t want to get so big that we can’t give each animal proper care. That’s our mission right now; we had a call yesterday about nine wild mustangs in Colorado – would we take them? We can’t, but I connected them with somebody who can. We have a huge network now, the State helps us a lot with that too.” “ This work comes with a lot of heartache. We had our first equine loss last week, Belle, she probably was in her twenties. She was the first horse we directly purchased from the kill lot. That was tough. She’s in a great spot now, in the back, where we have a little cemetery.” Tina is clearly moved, but she has a wise strategy that helps with grief. “A friend told us, ‘this dog or horse taught you so much to love, and now in your heart you have room for another one.’ When we lose an animal, we make sure we fill that spot right away.” Mike adds, “ When we lost a cat, we came back with two! Another one of our special needs, he’s blind in one eye, and only one ear! This is Rocky – from the Rocky-movie – and we got Adrienne, his girlfriend, both from the shelter.” With Marshall as guard dog and three donkeys (they keep coyotes away too), Mia, the chihuahua mix, can safely enjoy the sun. What a pleasure to know that all these animals who otherwise would be suffering or dead have such a safe, happy place for the rest of their lives. Thank you, Tina and Mike Kleckner!
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~Jessica Rath After an extraordinary long winter which started with freezing temperatures in the first days of November and lasted all the way through April, spring has finally arrived. And, even faster than in other years, spring is almost gone! Just in time for summer, for swimming and kayaking, Abiquiú Lake has nicely filled up with plenty of water. Something that most of us have sorely missed for the last few seasons. Before I moved to New Mexico in 2000, I lived in Berkeley/California. When I told people of my plans, the common reaction was: What?! You’re moving to the desert?! Well, I had visited friends who lived in Santa Fe, and they had taken me to Taos and other gorgeous places in the north, so I knew that I wasn't going to live in a dry, sand-blown desert. But I certainly didn’t expect that I’d end up close to a splendid lake. It didn’t bother me that it is an artificial lake, with a dam to store the Rio Chama water. It was just perfect for swimming, other people were kayaking, sometimes there was even a sailboat. The speed boats – well, one just had to ignore them. But for the last few years, the water level steadily sank until it was too low for the boat ramps. Swimming became dangerous because of blue-green algae. What was going on? I looked at the history of the lake to find out more. The work on Abiquiu Dam started in 1958. It was created to control the amount of water which would flow from the Rio Chama into the Rio Grande in Espanola. When it was finished, it was considered to be the fourth-largest earth filled dam in the world: 325 (now 340, raised 15 feet in the 80s) feet high, 1,450 (1800 now) feet across from one edge of the canyon to the other, and 2,770 feet from the upstream to the downstream edge. A mile-long conveyor belt had to be installed to bring fill dirt from the borrow areas to near the dam, from where it was transported via dump trucks to wherever it was needed. The dam was completed in 1962, but – surprise! – there wasn’t a lake at all! The dam was used strictly as a flood barrier. Apparently, in the 1970s there were conflicting attitudes about the development of a recreational lake which would flood the area on the north side of the dam. Much of the land was private, and there was concern that the dam wouldn’t be strong enough to hold so much water. On the other hand, the Espanola Chamber of Commerce petitioned for the construction of recreational facilities because of the obvious benefits for local businesses. I don’t know how it happened, but I’m glad they won! With the higher water levels, this summer looks promising as far as swimming and other water activities are concerned. But what about the coming years? Will the water stay high? I wanted to find out and made an appointment with John Mueller, Operations Manager at the Abiquiu Dam (which is part of the U.S.Army Corps of Engineers), who kindly agreed to answer my questions. First of all, I wanted to know why the water was so low for the last two years – was it just the drought or were there other reasons? John explained that it was usage, primarily. The purpose of the reservoir was to control flooding from the dam down to Espanola, where the Chama meets the Rio Grande. Initially, there wasn’t much water stored – not enough for swimming etc., it was just a puddle at the bottom. In the spring there was more water, but it was slowed down for flood control, the water was released at a controlled rate. But, in the mid-70s the San Juan Diversion Project changed things. (He shows me on the map). The headwater of the native Chama River is southeast of Pagosa Springs, it flows along the Colorado border, and then into Rio Grande. The Bureau of Reclamation Tunnel is 26 miles long, it collects water from the headwaters of the San Juan River, flows through a tunnel underneath the Continental Divide, and comes out east. It is placed in Heron Reservoir where it connects with the native Chama River. The water is purchased by contractors, municipalities, and water authorities including the City of Albuquerque. They can store it in Heron Lake, and they can store it in El Vado Lake including native (natural Chama, not San Juan-Chama) water. They use it for irrigation and drinking, mainly. In the 70s the water was stored year round for the contractors. They can ask for it whenever they want or need it. “We can’t STORE native water like El Vado does. We can only hold it, slow it down, and eventually release it. The only water that is stored is the San Juan-Chama water, for these contractors, to be sent down when they request it. In the 80s and 90s and early 2000s they were not calling for it, but then when they did ask for it, our water level kept dropping. This is partly related to the drought, and also, Albuquerque is growing and needs more water. For the last 10 years the water level has been reduced.” There is currently legislation and a process that is being developed for Abiquiu Lake to have the ability to store native water in addition to San Juan Chama imported water up to an elevation of 6230 feet, although it is uncertain when this may be implemented. I asked about the blue-green algae. It’s actually NOT an algae John corrected, but a bacteria. It grows in warm, stagnant water with high nutrients such as nitrates, sulfates, etc. from agricultural run-off. Less water, higher temperatures, more nutrients: the perfect growing conditions for algae. “Last year we had more water because the El Vado Dam is being worked on. To do the maintenance, they had to drain their reservoir and we took that water. Also, the snow melt is a contributing factor for the high levels. We have to hold off releasing the water like we normally would at this time of the year, because there are other tributaries like the Ojo River. We have to reduce our release because at the Chamita Gate down there, at the Chevron Station where the Ojo comes in, there would be too much water otherwise. We’re only releasing about half of what comes in. But we’re going to release that water eventually, for agricultural purposes etc.” And good news for this summer: “On July 1st whatever we’ll have over will be locked into storage until the end of the season, that’s going to help us keep the water up here. Because of El Vado and the snowpack we have a higher storage through November. Potentially also next year, depending on when they complete the maintenance at El Vado. Right now, it’s a foot and ½ going up every day. We’re at the level of 2013 I think. We're probably gonna come up another 6 feet. However, it will not last. This year and next year, we’ll have a lot of water! Definitely this year, and it’s looking pretty good for next year.” I thanked John for his time and the interesting information and went to the overlook and then to the main boat ramp to take some pictures. There were already some picnickers, some kayakers, and one speed boat. It’s still too cold for swimming, but we can look forward to a glorious summer!
Read More Taos News 4/28/1960 Albuquerque Journal 7/22/61 ~Jessica Rath Got ya – you probably thought of chile. But that’s not what I mean, the topic of this article is: grapes. The grapes used for wine-making. Did you know that the first wine-making grapes in the U.S. were grown in New Mexico, not in California? And did you know that the initial reason for producing wine was the Catholic Church? When the Spanish colonists settled in the Americas, including what is now New Mexico, several Catholic religious orders built churches and established missions so they could convert the indigenous populations. Franciscan monks followed the colonists to the upper Rio Grande valleys and to Santa Fe which in 1610 became the capital of Santa Fe de Nuevo México, a province of New Spain. The monks had to celebrate a daily mass, and for the sacrament of the Holy Communion they needed wine – which had spent many months on galleys coming across from Spain, then overland to Mexico City, then from there via trade routes up to the Santa Fe province. The wine was shipped in caskets with lead tops, which was probably poisonous; or it was shipped in goatskins, and by the time it arrived it was probably vinegar. So, the monks used choke cherries for making early wine. The Spanish King had forbidden the exportation of grape vines because he was concerned that the New World would take over wine making. But some monks ignored this edict and smuggled some vines into what is now New Mexico, started to cultivate the stock, and soon produced their own wine – with a variety of grapes that is known as the Mission Grape and is still used today. I learned all this and much more when I visited Stan Bader, owner of Las Parras de Abiquiú, a five-and-a-half acres organic vineyard. “Las Parras” is Spanish for grapevines, the perfect name for this gorgeous property. I wanted to learn more about grape growing and wine making, and I couldn’t have come to a better person. Stan’s obvious love for and extensive experience with this topic make him a veritable treasure trove when it comes to anything related to grapes. Officially, he’s retired. In 1996/97 New Mexico’s department of Agriculture was trying to encourage the growing of grapes, to boost the industry, and Stan thought this might be an interesting thing to do after retirement, as it would allow him to spend a lot of time outdoors. “In 1996 we put our first grapes in and it has been a learning process ever since”, Stan told me. “I put in 200 Cabernet Franc grapes, and supposedly they’re the hardier grapes for cold weather. After one year they grew fantastic, 20-foot long vines. But when we came back next spring and started to prune, we found that they were literally dead. All the way back to the root. I went to an education conference in Albuquerque, and I was asking an old-timer what was the cause, why did this happen. He said, ‘This is the best thing that could have happened to you!’ WHAT? ‘Well’, he said, ‘you tear those out and put something in that will grow’. So that’s what we did. We took everything out, and kept six plants for 10 years, but they were never able to produce except for a couple of years. The roots never died, but the top does.” I wanted to know WHY these grapes didn’t do well, and what other varieties would be more successful? “The grapes used for Cabernet Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, and other French wines just don’t do well here”, Stan explained. “Partly because of the cold, but also because of desiccation. We have no way to block the cold spring wind that comes down the Chama River, and that wind has extremely low humidity. The vines get dried out. We learned over time that if you keep their feet wet, if you keep the root zone wet over the winter, then the bud that’s produced up on the vine can survive.” “You can take a razor blade and cut across a bud – that will expose the primary, secondary, third, and sometimes even the fourth bud. You’ll see that the primary bud has died, it is brown. But the secondary isn’t. It’s green. It will take the place of the primary. BUT – it’s only half as productive as the first one. And if you lose THAT one, you’re looking at the third one, and that one is there to keep the plant alive and survive that year, but you have to wait for other years to get fruit. We’ve had situations in the 20-plus years that I’ve been growing grapes here that everything, particularly the white grapes, died. And we had to start all over again. The roots are fine, and the little vines from the ground up which are pencil-size or a little bigger, they survive. In the spring the sap is starting to come up. You’ve already done some pruning, and if you can see drops of sap at the tips where you pruned, it means it’s coming alive, the roots are sending the moisture up. But if there’s a cold snap, if it’s in the 20s for a whole night or anything longer than five hours, that’s their death. If it’s under five hours you might get them through. The old trunks are too brittle. The moisture inside is mostly water, that water crystallizes, freezes, and then it expands, but the brittle wood can’t, and it cracks. They can be 1/4-inch wide and go all the way to the ground. That kills the trunk, kills the arms, and you’ll have to take those out. The thin ones, pencil-size or a little larger, are more limber and the freezing doesn’t split them.” “A lot of the popular grapes which come from the Mediterranean area, from France, or from Germany, we can’t grow. But we can grow hybrids. Almost all my grapes are hybrids, except for Riesling: that’s a grape we can grow here. There’s a sweet version of Riesling, and there’s a dry version. They both grow here in New Mexico. Riesling is a popular wine here. While we have problems growing Cabernet Sauvignon or Merlot here in the northern parts, we can grow other grapes, and we learned to make really good wines utilizing these grapes.” I had no idea that grapes are so sensitive but, not everything works here in the valley, Stan says. Other places like Velarde for example, at the mouth of the canyon of the Rio Grande, are much better for growing; people there can grow all kinds of grapes whereas Las Parras can’t. They can grow Riesling, Gewürztraminer, grapes for German wines. “I say that I can tell people more about what NOT to do, than what to do. I learned the hard way. “ “I got into this because of my interest, as a kind of hobby. I ended up doing way more than I should have, my first 200 vines were a mistake, sort of – but other varieties, the hybrids, did well. Like Léon Millot, for example; the French used it to color lighter wines because it has a dark skin for color. They use it to color wines like Pinot Noir which doesn’t have a good dark color, but has great fruiting flavor. The addition of Léon Millot grapes gives the wine a robust color”. For Stan, growing grapes is a lot of work, but also a lot of fun. He warns though that it is very difficult to make a profit. Crop production isn’t all that robust, the vines just can’t produce like they do in California. Also, up here in northern New Mexico the grape vines native to the mediterranean regions (they’re called “vitis vinifera”, different from vinifera hybrids) don’t grow. Wineries pay a premium price for those grapes whereas for the hybrids they don’t. And Stan’s vineyard is too small to have mechanical pickers, so the grapes have to be picked by hand. Plus, they have to be pruned, fertilized, watered, weeded, and if there are any pests, one has to spray. Luckily, here in the north pest control is very minimal, except for powdery mildew which can be controlled pretty easily with a food-grade mineral oil spray. Las Parras is a certified organic, whole farm, but the wineries don’t pay anything extra for organic grapes. Most wineries don’t produce organic wines because all the grapes are mixed together. “On my five and a half acres I’m doing well if I can get close to 20 tons”, Stan is telling me. “Last year we only got about half of that. For one, we had terrific winds in the spring, the whole time when they were in bud-break state and started to flower. That strong wind inhibits pollination. Grapes don’t rely on honey bees, the blossoms are too small; they rely on other native bees, and they can only handle a light wind or breeze. Plus, May AND June had periods when it was blistering hot, close to 100 degrees, that shifts the grape plant down in terms of growth. So they didn’t produce that much.” I was curious to learn where the Las Parras grapes would end up: “ I sell my grapes to four different wineries. Prior to Covid, I was almost exclusively selling to Black Mesa Winery in Velarde. Covid disrupted the wine business, people weren’t going to restaurants, and a lot of the wine is being sold to restaurants. Lots of wineries were left with wine that they couldn’t sell. Now, after Covid, Black Mesa is selling and making hard apple cider, because some parts of the community don’t drink wine very much. They drink beer. Apple cider right now is a hot item, and it can be ordered in bistros and similar establishments that sell beer. So, they don’t need so many grapes, and I sell to other wineries as well: to Tony Black’s Smuggler Winery in Bosque, to Jaramillo Vineyards in Belen, and to Sheehan Winery near Albuquerque.” After the interview we walked across the vineyard a bit. It was a windy, blustery day so I said hello to the resident cat – “He thinks he’s a dog”, Stan said – and then I left. Maybe the next time you drink a glass of wine, if it was produced in New Mexico, you might ponder whether any of the grapes came from Las Parras. And good luck to Stan for this year’s crops!
`Jessica Rath Maybe you remember that the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Espanola had a Discovery Day on Saturday, March 11th. The Center is such a fantastic source of research and exploration in our area, and their work with injured wildlife is so much appreciated, that we wanted to follow up with a deeper look. So, we reached out to Ambassador Animal Specialist Raelynn Archuleta who kindly agreed to an interview with me. It was a pleasure to meet with a young person who is enthusiastic about her job. Clearly, Raelynn’s dedication to the animals she cares for is 100%. She grew up in El Rito and got a Bachelor's in Wildlife Fisheries Conservation Ecology from New Mexico State University’s main campus in Las Cruces. “When I graduated in 2021, I started as a volunteer here at the New Mexico Wildlife Center, mostly while I was looking for jobs. Then I decided to do the internship that was offered. After that, I got hired as part time staff and finally full time staff as this is what I really wanted to do,” she told me. “I've always been interested in wildlife, ever since I was little.” I asked her about the animals at the Center; are there any endangered species? “The walkabout path that we will visit shortly hosts our ambassador animals. They are non-releasable, mostly due to human impact, human imprints, and because of really bad injuries that they had. Some of our injury ambassador animals cannot be released because it can be fatal. Our hospital site can rehabilitate and release animals whenever that’s possible and is closed to the public. Manchado ( a Mexican Spotted Owl) came to us in 1998. He was found on a highway in the mountains of south central New Mexico, most likely hit by a car. He had a serious head injury. Then, during care, one of the rehabilitators noticed that cataracts had developed in one of his eyes from the injury, rendering him unreleasable. There are less than 2500 Mexican Spotted Owls in the United States and they are listed federally as a Threatened Species. This makes Manchado a rare and unique Ambassador Animal for his imperiled species." J.R.: What exactly is a human imprint? R.A.: Unfortunately, once a bird imprints on whoever feeds it first, this becomes irreversible. We have a couple of new human imprint animals here. People think that they're doing the right thing but actually they are doing the bad thing. When you see an injured animal, you should not talk to it or feed it. You should call the nearest wildlife rehabilitation center as soon as you can. Once an animal gets imprinted, it can’t be reversed. If you feed it from when it’s a baby, it will imprint you and think that you're its mom. It won't try and feed by itself. Because we’re humans and not birds, we can't really teach them their natural behavior like their actual mother would. J.R. That's good to point out. We tend to think we’re doing the right thing – there's a sick bird and you feel like you can help it. But that's a bad thing. R.A. That's also why there are a lot of signs, like, don't feed the wildlife. Once one person feeds it, more people are going to feed it. And that's when the animal is going to associate people with food. And that's when human and animal conflicts start happening. J.R.:Let me ask you about Dyami: How did he become an ambassador here? What is his history? R.A.: “Dyami” is Native American for “Eagle”. He came to us from Virginia in 2015, where he had fallen out of a nest as an eaglet. The previous vets who took care of him found out that he had developed cataracts at a young age. They thought it might have been a genetic thing. He also had a wing injury, probably from falling out of the nest. After several surgeries and physical therapy it was determined that his flight capabilities were permanently limited.That’s why he was deemed non-releasable. He was placed with the New Mexico Wildlife Center as an Ambassador Animal in 2017. And after he got transferred to us, after about a year and a half, he got beat up by a rat! We don’t know exactly how it happened, but the rat did some serious damage to him. He went back to the hospital, and when I started volunteering, he was doing recovery there, and that’s how we first met. When I became an intern he was released from the hospital and put into a new enclosure. I let him recuperate and settle in a bit. The previous coordinator had let me do some animal care, and she saw a connection that we had. I was soft-talking him, I had never been the “bad” person, so I started with him learning to re-trust humans. He took small baby steps, but we both learned from each other. To be able to present him on this last Discovery Day it took almost a year of trusting and bonding with him. When I was here as an intern I came at least three times a week for eight hours. When I became a seasonal worker, I was here five days a week for eight hours. Same thing with full-time, working 40 hours a week. I mostly spend an hour at a time training with him, associate him with choice base training, positive reinforcement, and to gain his trust. He is about eight years old. That’s still pretty young. Bald eagles normally don’t get their white heads until their fifth to seventh year. He’s not really “bald” – this comes from an Old English word “bala”, which means "white patch, blaze". J.R.:How old can Bald Eagles get? R.A.: Bald eagles’ lifespan in human care is 40+ years. In the wild, it is 20 – 30 years if that, because they lead a dangerous life, fighting for food and shelter, finding a mate. Also, Bald Eagles were endangered due to lead poisoning and pesticides. J.R.:What is your relationship with him? Is there a loving connection? R.A.: We don’t use the word “love”; they’re not domesticated, not like pets. It’s more like a trust-bond. He doesn’t necessarily love me but he trusts me. He recognizes me. It’s the first big animal I care for as a trainer, and we passed several milestones that have been recognized – this made me very emotional! More than him! [She chuckles]. J.R.: This must feel very special, to have a wild animal trust you – must make you feel good. R.A.: Yes, especially in our training: when he does something I know he can do, that’s really great. He does have his bad days too, when he just doesn’t want to do anything. Like today, when it’s cold and wet. So then we’ll do some positive choice base training, for example: if he comes and sits down on my glove and takes some treat from me I’ll call that a win for today. J.R.: Is the training for stimulation, to give him exercise? R.A.: Food is his main motivator, he’s a wild animal: he knows that if I do this, I’ll get a reward. We don’t use any negative reinforcement. We use LRS – Least Reinforcement Scenario. Training is also for educational purposes, and for outreach. And to get him physically moving. For if they just sit there, their health and QOL (Qhality of Life) begins to decrease. J.R.: What does he eat? None of our animals get live prey. We mimic what he would eat in the wild. Mice, voles, quails, chicks, and rabbits – cut up. But bald eagles mostly eat fish, they will steal the fish an osprey has caught! They’re scavengers too, if it’s already dead – they eat it because it saves them work. J.R.: What are your future plans? R.A.: This job is a door-opener, eventually I’d like to work with bigger exotics, but I want to get as much experience from here as I can. I envision zoos, aquariums; somewhat bigger facilities. We continued our conversation at the eagle enclosure. R.A.: His flight-ability is limited. He had a broken left wing when he was found. His high-soaring days were clearly over. He still can move and fly, he can do various hops, like a helicopter effect: he goes up and down.
Although his sight is compromised because of the cataract, his eyesight is still a lot better than a human's. Falcons and hawks have the greatest eyesight. Vultures are the kings of smell. They can smell carrion, a freshly dead animal from one to five miles in the air. We've been building up slowly for Discovery Day last weekend, just having a couple of visitors, a couple of kids. If he doesn’t want to come out, I will let him be; I won’t force him. He feels safer when there’s a barrier between him and me and the public. If I would force him to do something, that would break our trust. We use “Big Eagle” gloves: they use us as a perch, for safety precautions due to the talons. And he’s heavy – he weighs as much as a gallon of milk, so I have a stick for my arm to rest on. If I start shaking, he’d shake too, which would make him nervous. All birds of prey see colors the way humans can. Full spectrum, also some ultraviolet light. ***************** On our way back to the office, Raelynn pointed out some other ambassador animals: various falcons and hawks, owls, a vulture. They all can be “adopted” (meaning, sponsored): please visit the Wildlife Center's website if you want to connect with one of these magnificent animals! And our best wishes to Raelynn for all her future endeavors. Interview with Leandro and Vangie Valdez ~ Jessica Rath “Everything has changed so much since I was young! We had no cars, but horses and horse buggies. My Dad did all the farming with horses, he had no tractors.” This is what long-time Coyote resident Leandro Valdez told me when I visited him and his wife recently. I wanted to find out more about Coyote’s past, and they graciously agreed to an interview. When I entered their kitchen, I noticed a prominently placed photo on the wall: It was from Leandro’s 80th-birthday bash at the high school in Gallina, which I had attended too. Hundreds of guests were there! Leandro and his wife Vangie are the third couple from the right; the other six couples are his three daughters and three sons with their spouses. I soon learned that a lot more had changed since the time of horse-buggies. Coyote used to have a highschool – the Charles Lathrop Pack School! Arthur Pack, then-owner of Ghost Ranch, donated the funds to build the school, and he named the school in honor of his father. He sold Ghost Ranch to the Presbyterian Church in 1955 and, together with his wife Phoebe, was the original donor for the Presbyterian Hospital in Espanola. When Leandro graduated from highschool in 1956, there were lots of children attending the school, some of them were bussed from grade schools in Youngsville and Cañones. “Every Sunday we had baseball games. There was a team in Coyote, a team in Gallina, one in Cañones; and they even had rodeos in Gallina”, Vangie told me. “There used to be over 100 kids just here! Now, kids come from Lindrith, Cañones, Youngsville, etc. to go to the high school in Gallina, but altogether there are less than one hundred. People don’t want to have kids any more. Plus, people moved away because there’s no work here.” Before, people were working for the lumber companies, and there was lots of logging in this area. There used to be a lumber mill in Gallina, and another one between Coyote and Youngsville; a lot of people would go to work there. “When I went to school in Gallina, there were lots of students – black students, white students. The parents would move to Gallina from all over the States, there was so much work because of the lumber mills”, Vangie said. Also, there were six stores in the area, not counting the two in Youngsville. Two in Coyote, two in Arroyo del Agua, two in Mesa Poleo. And across from the post office there used to be a restaurant. I asked Leandro why the work stopped: “Because of environmental protection – there were endangered species such as the spotted owl and salamanders, things like that. So they stopped the Forest Service from cutting timber. Now, they can cut only a small amount, to thin the forest out. At that time, the lumber industry, the Forest Service, and the schools were the main employers here.” Leandro worked for the Forest Service some 25 years, until he retired. Before that, he also worked in the logging industry for several years. And before that, after he graduated from highschool, he joined the military and was sent to Korea. The US Army was stationed there to protect South Korea and the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). He was 17 years old and stayed for ten months. A tragic accident which killed his brother who was 15 at the time forced him to get a hardship discharge and return home. His brother went on a school picnic at the Chama River near where the dam is now (which hadn’t been built yet). The river was about 12 feet below the road; the river itself was about 4 feet deep but had risen all the way to the road – 16 feet deep. The bus went around a corner, and the road had already been swept away – his brother drowned. Leandro returned to Coyote in 1958 and finished his tour with the military as a National Guard, even after he and Vangie got married in 1961; every summer he had to go for several weeks. He started working for the Forest Service, and he learned to work the pumper unit; there was no Fire Department in Coyote yet. He had a crew of fire fighters, and they would travel all over the US for the Forest Service, wherever there were fires. Montana, Wyoming, Washington, Arizona, Tennessee, Kentucky – he was the crew boss. In 1974 he became Fire Manager Officer, because he had experience with the administrative part. He had taken a correspondence course about computers; that helped him when he worked for the Forest Service. “At first, they said: we won’t have any computers here! But two years later, they had them” Leandro told me. Everybody had to learn for themselves how to operate them. The correspondence course helped him. I was curious to know how the two had met! It happened at a wedding dance in Gallina; Leandro and Vangie’s brother had already been close friends. Leandro asked her for a dance, and after that, they knew they’d be together. Vangie said that her Mom was very strict; for example, when Leandro wanted to take her to a drive-in movie in Regina, she was allowed to go only if her brother would come along too – as chaperone. Yes, there was a drive-in movie theater in Regina! There used to be a lot of entertainment here! After many people moved away, the stores would close, one after another. The store across from the post office (the only store that was still open when I moved here in 2009) used to have a laundromat. But then people bought their own washers and dryers; people didn’t use the laundromat any more and this store also closed eventually. Recently somebody bought the store again. But to make the gas station work would require a lot of money – new tanks and new pumps, because what’s there is outdated. If it would be a 24-hours gas station, it may work. Right now, people have to drive to Abiquiú or to Regina to buy gas. It may be convenient to be able to get gas in Coyote; however, if it’s a lot more expensive, people might think twice. In 2001, the New Mexico Magazine published a lovely article about Leandro and his way of life, written by Alice McSweeney. I didn’t ask how she knew about him, we had already chatted for almost two hours. But there’s no question that he and Vangie can look back at a rich, fascinating, fulfilled life. I’m glad that their memories and the history of this region is being preserved in different ways.
~ Jessica Rath Did you notice the acute accent over the second “u”? Some websites and printed articles use this spelling, while others do not. Maybe it’s because I was born and grew up in Germany, but for as long as I can remember, I was a stickler for correct spelling and pronunciation. Therefore, I found it puzzling that there were two ways to spell the name but only one (as far as I could hear) to pronounce: I had always heard it with the stress on the first A, or ['æ-bɪ-kjuʷ]. The Spanish language uses accent marks to indicate which vowel or syllable should be stressed, and Abiquiú should be pronounced with the stress on the second U, or [a-βi-'kju] (with thanks to Len Beké, doctoral candidate at UNM who specializes in New Mexico place names, for the correct phonetic spelling). So – I concluded that Abiquiú must be wrong, I had only ever heard Abiquiu, even from Spanish-speaking people. But where did this come from? Why would there be an accent mark on the last “U”, when the stress was on the “A”? I realized I had to look deeper, and soon found out that the current village was the site of a much older Tewa settlement. In fact, Native peoples had populated the area of the lower Chama River for more than 10,000 years! Ancestral Tewa Pueblo people had lived along the Rio Chama from around 1300 AD to the early 1600s. Poshuowingeh, 2.5 miles south of Abiquiu, was occupied from around 1375 to 1475. The Tsama Pueblo, an address-restricted area near Abiquiu, was occupied from around 1250 until around 1500, and Sapawe (or Sepawe) Pueblo, near El Rito, another ancestral Tewa site, was occupied from around 1350 until around 1550. It’s fascinating, if difficult, to imagine life in these villages or cities before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors in the southwest. Chaco Canyon, for example, was an urban center of impressive proportions, with “suburbs” reaching as far away as 155 miles. Some 30,000 to 40,000 people are supposed to have inhabited the whole region, with a few thousand residing in the great houses in the center. These were impressive multi-storied structures, up to four stories high, some with balconies, and some with 600 and 800 rooms. Other pueblos closer to Abiquiu were smaller, with Poshuowingeh (“Village Above the Muddy River''), for example, consisting of about 700 ground floor rooms, each being two or three stories high. Two plazas and a large kiwa completed the town. They were growing their traditional crops in fields on the east side of their pueblo. Closer to the Pedernal is another Tewa village, Tsi-p’in-owinge', or "Village at Flaking Stone Mountain". The pueblo was built around 1275 A.D. At its peak, more than one thousand people lived there. The pueblo was abandoned by 1450, long before the Spanish arrived in the mid-1500s. The multi-story pueblo was constructed of stone blocks quarried from the volcanic tuff (a welded ash material). Piñon nuts, juniper berries, ferns, willow reeds, and the fruits of the cholla and prickly pear cactus were some of the useful plants collected from the streams and woodlands. The people hunted in the mountains and along the Chama River to the north. They grew corn, beans, and squash in gardens located on the mesa and along the streams below. When I researched the question of the pronunciation of Abiquiu, I came across an article on the website for New Mexico's History and State Records Center which claimed that the word “Abiquiu” had its origins in Tewa language. But what does it mean and how would it be pronounced? I sent an email to the current State Historian, Rob Martinez, and Deputy State Historian Nicolasa Chávez , and explained my predicament concerning the pronunciation. Mr. Martinez’s terse answer made complete sense and I felt like an idiot for not having thought of it: “When I say it in English, I accent the A. When I say it in Spanish, I accent the U.” Yes, sure, but… Ms Chávez was more explicit: “I think the pronunciation with the emphasis on the first A is most likely the anglicized version of the spelling and pronunciation with the accent mark over the U. That said, the accent mark was probably a Spanish addition and the spelling a Spanish version of a Tewa word.” Now I can see better what happened: the Tewa word stressed the last U. When the Spanish wrote the word, they added the acute accent to the U to indicate where the emphasis should be. And when the Anglos read the word they ignored the accent and stressed the A. Now I just had to learn something about the original Tewa word! Luckily, I found Dr. Melissa Axelrod, Linguistics Professor Emerita at UNM, who specializes in Native American languages. She forwarded my email to UNM doctoral candidate Len Beké, who wrote back: “Pronunciation in Spanish is [a-βi-'kju] with final stress; English pronunciation is ['æ-bɪ-kjuʷ] with initial stress. No idea about Tewa. Initialization of stress in borrowed place names seems common for English generally, e.g. Amsterdam has final stress in Dutch but initial stress in English”. Well, I didn’t know this about Amsterdam, but I really wanted to find out about the Tewa word, so I asked Dr. Axelrod for help once again. She contacted Andrés Sabogal, a linguist who works on Tewa, and he sent me the last puzzle piece: “In Tewa it has final stress and like Len said the initial accent is the English pronunciation. In Tewa this is a compound word meaning chokecherry path, Ávé-shú' and the stress always falls on the second member of the compound, its head, in this case shú'.” When I researched the question of the pronunciation of Abiquiu, I came across an article on the website for New Mexico's History and State Records Center which claimed that the word
Chokecherry Path! What a lovely name. I bet the current citizens of Abiquiu still collect them to make jam and other preserves, just as they still harvest watercress, purslane, chimajá (spring parsley), piñon nuts, and many other wild berries, nuts, and herbs. I was thrilled to find wild raspberries one early summer in the Santa Fe National Forest – nothing tastes better than foraged edibles! Back to my original question. I’ve decided that Abiquiú is indeed the correct spelling AND pronunciation, based on the original Tewa word Ávé-shú'. Writing in English while leaving the accent mark out means you misspell the word. It’s a bit of a bother with an English keyboard, but it’s worth the effort – what do you think? |
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