Trees and Rocks

Jemez Mountain Trees

I love trees. Guess I’m a closet ‘tree hugger’. It is such a shame each time a tree has to be cut down. But I understand we do need lots of wood for the world. I do like to be able to go to the lumber yard and buy the kind of lumber or wood that I want when I want to make the Howling Coyotes that I sometimes make or when Lee wants to make a table or turn a bowl or candlestick on the lathe. It is nice to be able to build the shelters for the horses or shed for hay and I know that a lot of my house is built out of wood.
Yet, it is a joy to see all those big, tall trees when we go to the mountains. I never get tired of looking at them or taking photos of them. I guess I have just lived on the desert to long where there aren’t those many trees. The main two kinds of trees in the Jemez are Ponderosa Pine, Colorado Spruce, and Aspens.

Some of the trees in the Jemez are very young trees either started from a seed that may have fallen out of a pine cone and planting it’s self in the soil or possibly from being cached by a squirrel or chipmunk that then forgot when it had put the seed. Other young trees have been planted in area where there was a forest fire by the Forest Service or by groups of people who volunteer to plant them. I remember planting seedling pine trees in the Manzano Mountains east of Albuquerque when I was in Girl Scouts. Lee has told me about planting seedling trees in West Virginia when he was a teenager. It is a very satisfying feeling to plant baby trees that will grow up to be part of a national forest for everyone to enjoy

It is just as enjoyable to plant either seedlings or young trees in your own yard and watch them grow. Lee and I have planted trees in every home we have ever lived in except maybe a few apartments we lived in.
I love pines because they grow so tall and provide so much protection for the earth as well as all the animals that live in and under the trees. Birds that nest in them, squirrels that live in them, deer, elk, that bed down under the trees and hide in them from lions, and human hunters. I like the dead ones as well as the live ones. Dead standing trees provide homes for woodpeckers and look out perches for ravens, hawks, owls, jays, and other birds. Dead trees that have fallen to the ground slowly rot and decay becoming soil for baby trees to grow in as well as homes for chipmunks and all kinds of insects.
Spruce trees do all of the things that pine trees do but are always so pretty when they grow very thick on hillsides with their dark green needles. They also help hold the soil so it doesn’t erode during rain storms and when the snow melts in the spring. I love to hear the wind blowing through the tops of the evergreens whispering and sighing with a sing song sound.


Aspens my third favorite trees is not an evergreen like the spruce and pine are. In the winter there are no leaves on them. In the spring the tiny light green heart shaped leaves appear gradually getting larger through the spring and twisting and turning in the slightest breeze. Their leaves will rattle against each other as if they are talking to each other and to all in the forest. In the fall the aspen leaves turn a beautiful shade of gold that shimmers when they wind blows through them. Slowly the gold leaves die and fall to the ground to provide fertilizer for the next spring season of growth. In all seasons the white bark of the aspen looks so nice against the green and brown colors of the rest of the forest. With the white tree trucks and green or yellow leaves aspens are always photogenic even in the winter with no leaves and surrounded by snow.


Aspens are a favorite for deer and elk to rub their antlers on in the fall when they are getting the velvet off that has protected their antlers all summer while they were growing. I have seen lots of aspen trees with multiple scars from years of the deer and elk rubbing their antlers on them. Sometimes we see an aspen that has different scars on it where a bear has reached up and clawed the tree proclaiming its territory. But I really dislike too see where people have carved their names in aspen tree. I see no reason to damage a tree and take a chance on destroying it.
There are lots of other trees – juniper, pinon, cedar, scrub oak or jack oak and willow. In Ghost Canyon and near Porters Landing we have found some huge old oak trees that are called These don’t have the typical oak leaf with the scalloped edges but a long, smooth, narrow leaf. In both places there were some large trees that had died and we took out a lot of oak wood that make great fire wood for our wood stove. Some of those old oak trees were so big around that Lee, Dustin and I couldn’t reach around the trunk together.


Rocks Like Things
In the Jemez Mountains there are many, many rocks that were dropped there when the volcano exploded all those thousands of years ago. There are rock cliff that look like a giant extent woodpecker made holes in the rock. There are rocks sitting out in the middle of fields or in the middle of trees that look as if a giant had tossed them there the same as you or I might toss a small pebble. You never know where you might find a big rock or bolder when hiking or driving down the road. Suprisingly the rocks frequently look like a face or animal.
The most famous of these rocks is Teakettle Rock. It is a long drive to where you can see it regardless of which direction you decide to drive to it from. You can do in through Cuba, NM or go to Jemez Springs, and then to Fenton Hill and drive in, or go on to Fenton Lake and go in. There may even be other ways that I don’t know of. The Rock is on County Road 103 and about 20 or miles from anything else. It is worth the trip if you want to take a long rough drive and I do recommend having a 4-wheel-drive vehicle to get there.
When you get there take time to walk completely around the rock so you can see it from all angles. Some say it looks like an ostragh pecking at someone with the handle of the teakettle being the ostragh’s neck. Be sure to see the small cave under the rock, and the pretty meadow behind it.


Another of the rocks that look like something is what I call Bear Rock. It can be found on County Road 144 going from Jemez Springs past Fenton Lake, and taking the left hand road by the old Fish Hatchery that goes to Cuba, NM. Or reverse the route. The Bear Rock is about half way through. It sits just off the road in an open meadow.
On the right side of the rock you can see a bear standing on it’s hind legs. You can see the ear, face with nose, body with front legs dangling and then the hind legs it is standing on while maybe scratching it’s back on the rocks behind it.
We have found other rocks that look like peoples faces and I remember one rock that looked like a frog but I have not been able to find it for a very long time. We would also see cracks and small caves in a lot of these rocks and wondered who and what had taken shelter in them. Or what coyote, wolf or bobcat had raised its babies in the cave. I have often dreamed of finding a long, lost, sack of gold hid by an outlaw after a robbery or maybe some Spanish gold left by a conquistdors.