Exploring the delta of the Colorado River/Sea of Cortez, 1922
For those interested in the natural history of the delta region of the Colorado River where it meets the Sea of Cortez, I suggest reading Aldo
Leopold's "A Sand County Almanac."
While most of the book describes regions north and east of Baja, his chapters on Chihuahua and Sonora include a description of a hunting/canoeing trip
with his brother through the delta in 1922. Needless to say, many of the plants, animals, birds and waterways they explored and he described so
vividly no longer exist in this area, at least in the abundance he observed, including jaguars and sandhill cranes, but many beaches in Baja still
have this amazing variety of wildlife.
And it sounds like they were warned of various and fantastic dangers that never materialized, much the way today's travelers to Baja are often
cautioned by well meaning friends who fear for their safety.
Leopold was a trained naturalist and a gifted storyteller. Their constant quest for water will be familiar to many Baja travelers. They devised a
creative way of determining if it was safe to drink from shallow wells they dug along the way through the estuary. It is certainly unique and requires
the cooperation of a thirsty dog.
Reading this book always makes me feel a keen sense of loss. The Colorado River and its delta ecosystem have declined dramatically in the last
century. Considering how magnificent the sea life remains in today's Sea of Cortez, I can only imagine what it must have been like with the
flourishing river delta that existed during Leopold's time. Delta's are the lifeblood of seas and oceans. To lose this one is an incalculable loss.
Excerpts from the book:
"It is the part of wisdom never to revisit a wilderness, for the more golden the lily, the more certain that someone has gilded it...For this reason,
I have never gone back to the Delta of the Colorado since my brother and I explored it, by canoe, in 1922.
"For all we could tell, the Delta had lain forgotten since Hernando de Alarcón landed there in 1540. When we camped on the estuary which is said to
have harbored his ships, we had not for weeks seen a man or a cow, an axe-cut or a fence. Once we crossed an old wagon track, its maker unknown and
its errand probably sinister. Once we found a tin can; it was pounced upon as a valuable utensil.
"On the map the Delta was bisected by the river, but in fact the river was nowhere and everywhere, for he could not decide which of a hundred green
lagoons offered the most pleasant and least speedy path to the Gulf. So he traveled them all, and so did we...For the last word in procrastination, go
travel with a river reluctant to lose his freedom in the sea."
"The still waters were of a deep emerald hue, colored by algae, I suppose, but no less green for all that. A verdant wall of mesquite and willow
separated the channel from the thorny desert beyond. At each bend we saw egrets standing in the pools ahead, each white statue matched by its white
reflection. Fleets of cormorants drove their black prows in quest of skittering mullets; avocets, willets, and yellow-legs dozed one-legged on the
bars; mallards, widgeons and teal sprang skyward in alarm. As the birds took the air, they accumulated in a small cloud ahead, there to settle, or to
break back to our rear. When a troop of egrets settled on a far green willow, they looked like a premature snowstorm.
"Most small game on the Delta was too abundant to hunt. At every camp we hung up, in a few minutes' shooting, enough quail for tomorrow's use...
"All game was of incredible fatness. Every deer laid down so much tallow that the dimple along his backbone would have held a small pail of water...
"All of this wealth of fowl and fish was not for our delectation alone. Often we came upon a bobcat, flattened to some half-immersed driftwood log,
paw poised for mullet. Families of raccoons waded the shallows, munching water beetles. Coyotes watched us from inland knolls, wating to resume their
breakfast of mesquite beans, varied, I suppose, by an occasional crippled shore bird, duck, or quail. At every shallow fjord were tracks of burro
deer. We always examined these deer trails, hoping to find signs of the despot of the Delta, the great jaguar, el tigre.
"By this time [he wrote this book in 1949] the Delta has probably been made safe for cows, and forever dull for adventuring hunters. Freedom from fear
has arrived, but a glory has departed from the green lagoons.
"Camp-keeping in the Delta was not all beer and skittles. The problem was water. The lagoons were saline; the river, where we could find it, was too
muddy to drink. At each new camp we dug a new well. Most wells, however, yielded only brine from the Gulf. We learned, the hard way, where to dig for
sweet water. When in doubt about a new well, we lowered the dog by his hind legs. If he drank freely, it was the signal for us to beach the canoe,
kindle the fire, and pitch the tent. Then we sat at peace with the world while the quail sizzled in the Dutch oven, and the sun sank in glory behind
the San Pedro Martir...
"To travel by plan in the Delta is no light matter; we were reminded of this whenever we climbed a cottonwood for a wider view. The view was so wide
as to discourage prolonged scrutiny, especially toward the northwest, where a white streak at the foot of the Sierra hung in perpetual mirage. This
was the great salt desert, on which, in 1829, Alexander Pattie died of thirst, exhaustion, and mosquitoes. Pattie had a plan: to cross the Delta to
California.
"When we launched our canoe above the border there were dire predictions of sudden death. Far huskier craft, we were told, had been over-whelmed by
the tidal bore, a wall of water that rages up the river from the Gulf with certain incoming tides. We talked about the bore, we spun elaborate schemes
to circumvent it, we even saw it in our dreams, with dolphins riding its crest and an aerial escort of screaming gulls. When we reached the mouth of
the river, we hung our canoe in a tree and waited two days, but the bore let us down. It did not come.
"We were lying flat on our backs, soaking up November sun, staring idly at a soaring buzzard overhead. Far beyond him the sky suddenly exhibited a
rotating circle of white spots, alternatively visible and invisible. A faint bugle note soon told us they were cranes, inspecting their Delta and
finding it good. At the time my ornithology was homemade, and I was pleased to think them whooping cranes because they were so white. Doubtless they
were sandhill cranes but it doesn't matter. What matters is that we were sharing our wilderness with the wildest of living fowl. We and they had found
common home in the remote fastnesses of space and time; we were both back in the Pleistocene. Had we been able to, we would have bugled back their
greeting. Now, from the far reaches of the years, I see them wheeling still."
\"Probably the airplanes will bring week-enders from Los Angeles before long, and the beautiful poor bedraggled old town will bloom with a
Floridian ugliness.\" (John Steinbeck, 1940, discussing the future of La Paz, BCS, Mexico)
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