A new mystery plant

I went wandering around in a relatively flat area of Bulldog Canyon OHV area today. I saw, but did not get a picture of, a roadrunner, a deer, a cottontail, and a plump, brown jackrabbit (they are usually gray and ripped). I only saw one lizard today, too, which is strange this time of year. It ran across the road, holding its tail up high.

I crossed several small washes as I walked. Just about every one of them had horse prints in it. Horses cannot go anywhere in the desert without leaving a trail. I worry about the damage they are doing to the cryptobiotic soil. At least the riders seem to stay in the washes when they can. Anyway, I was wondering if deer ever dig up the soil when I ran across some deep deer prints in cryptobiotic soil. They don't usually do that, though. Their hooves dig in when they jump over something, but there are surprisingly few deer prints out there, considering how many deer there must be. I know there are a lot of them because there are places where they pass between mountains to get to water, and the ground is solid deer prints in those areas. Boy, that's a lot of yakking about one picture of a deer print.

I took a lot of pictures of one kind of plant. It's a very small plant that I have never noticed before. What is unusual about it is that it seems to be covered in something that looks like spider silk. Anybody that can identify it wins an autographed print of one of my pictures. Get busy, though, because you have to identify it before I do.

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