COLORADO
A bighorn sheep climbed on to a roof in unincorporated Boulder County in early December and stayed there for over 24 hours, the Denver Post reported. As a “single and ready to mingle” guy, he may have thought it was an ideal spot from which to scan the neighborhood for eligible ewes. And bighorns — much like mountain goats and real estate agents — do appreciate a nice view. Eventually, though, the ram clambered down to the home’s deck, where he was stranded until a Colorado Parks and Wildlife officer cut away a portion of its railing to give him a clear path down. Colorado Parks and Wildlife spokesperson Kara Van Hoose said the bighorn’s reasoning remained unclear — “That’s one of the mysteries of bighorn sheep” — though hormones might have played a part. “We’re in mating season for sheep right now and rams just act strange. They get really weird, their whole behavior changes and they do anything they can to find females to mate.” Speaking as fellow mammals, that doesn’t surprise us.
NEVADA/CALIFORNIA
KSBW 8 News reported that Google Maps misrouted several travelers into the middle of the desert. Shelby Easler and her brother were driving home from Las Vegas when the app warned them about an impending dust storm and sent them on a detour. They followed the alternate route for two hours before hitting a bumpy gravel road that left them in the middle of, well, nowhere. Easler, who called 911, estimated that 100 cars took the same tour, including a truck driver who eventually stopped and urged the other cars to turn around. Easler said 911 told her that “this actually does happen a lot with Google Maps detours,” and that “if Google Maps tells you to take a detour, don’t do it because you are going to end up in sand.” The operator concluded, “We get calls like this a lot.” Google swears that the issue has been fixed, but we’re keeping our fingers — and GPS — crossed and our old maps and compasses handy.
NEW MEXICO
When we think of deserts, we picture forlorn tumbleweeds rolling through an arid landscape. And when we think of winter, we imagine snow-covered wonderlands. But since both snowballs and tumbleweeds are round and tend to roll, why not use tumbleweeds to make a “snowman” when you’re short of snow, as one generally is in the desert? KOAT7 reported that for 25 years, the Albuquerque Metropolitan Arroyo Flood Control Authority has kicked off the holiday season by building a 14-foot-tall snowman from the city’s rogue tumbleweeds and spray-painting them white. Voila! Bob’s your uncle — and you won’t have to worry about your Tumbleweed Snowman melting.
CALIFORNIA
David Kramer was hiking along a scenic trail in Point Reyes National Seashore when he spotted a “ghostly white” animal skittering through the grass and hastily snapped a photo. Dave Press, the integrated resources manager for Point Reyes National Seashore, told SFGATE in an email that in 25 years of working at Point Reyes, he had never heard any reports of “ghostly white” animals in the area. But the National Park Service’s Point Reyes Instagram page posted Kramer’s photo and concluded that the animal’s unusual coloring — or rather lack of it — was most likely due to “something called leucism,” a genetic mutation that causes partial loss of pigmentation and is often mistaken for albinism, the total absence of pigmentation. And the animal? An American badger! The Instagram post concluded: “Nature is just so amazing! Have you ever seen a leucistic animal before?” No, not until now, anyhow, though we’re still working on how to pronounce “leucistic.” We learn something new every day in this business.
Meanwhile, in other frisky California critterly hijinks, a coyote jammed up the morning commute on San Francisco’s Interstate 280 for over an hour, SFGATE reported. Deb Campbell, a spokesperson for Animal Care and Control, said her office receives a lot of calls about coyotes. According to Campbell, dozens of coyotes call San Francisco home, though that there’s never been a formal tracking study. Trouble tends to arise when people feed them, not when the wily canines get stuck in traffic. As Campbell put it, “When they eat Meow Mix, they become a problem.” We agree: If you want to keep your cat from becoming Coyote Chow, it’s best to keep them — the cats, not the coyotes — indoors. And keep both critters off the highways, while you’re at it.
Tiffany Midge is a citizen of the Standing Rock Nation and was raised by wolves in the Pacific Northwest. Her book, Bury My Heart at Chuck E. Cheese’s (Bison Books, 2019), was a Washington State Book Award nominee. She resides in north-central Idaho near the Columbia River Plateau, homeland of the Nimiipuu.
Tips of Western oddities are appreciated and often shared in this column. Write heard@hcn.org, or submit a letter to the editor.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Heard Around the West.
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