This week on Arizona illustrated restoring a species back to the Santa Cruz River.

The Longfin Dace Minnow a cinematic meditation on archeology and filmmaking in one of the most remote places in North America.

And birdwatching in a time of quarantine Welcome to Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara.

We're here at the Sweetwater Wetlands on the banks of the Santa Cruz River near Princeton, I-10.

Now, the water here is treated water from a nearby facility.

It's unfiltered, naturally, through the wetlands and then recharges basins used at city golf courses and parks and schools.

Sweetwater Wetlands is also a tranquil park where visitors can view wildlife and many species of birds in a lush riparian habitat.

The long finned dace fish was once widely abundant in the Santa Cruz River.

When a series of wells were installed in the early 20th century, well, the river dried up, and with it the fish.

But now, Pima County, Arizona, Game and Fish and the Sonoran Institute are reintroducing the fish into its native riparian habitat.

This is long finned dace minnow [hauntingly beautiful music] (Michael) We are here today to reintroduce the Longfin Dace to the lower part of the Santa Cruz River here and in Tucson.

So this is a fish species that historically was was really abundant in the river all through Tucson.

And then when the river dried up in 1913, 1914, that spelled the end of our local Longfin Dace population.

Look at all that water.

So we went out this morning with Arizona Game & Fish and Pima County biologists out to Cienega Creek to the natural preserve area that the county owns.

“First Hall ” and then I brought with some nets as well.

So we have what are called seine nets, which are basically two poles with a long series of net in between.

And a person stands on either side holding the poles and walks through the water and scoops up the fish.

So we did that at Cienega Creek and captured about 600 Longfin Dace there and took about an hour and a half or so to do that.

We want to keep the fish in the water as much as possible.

Then we put them in the buckets and fill the buckets with water.

“Six, seven, eight.

” Put a little aerator in the bucket, a little bubbler.

So the fish had enough oxygen while they were being transported in these buckets and then hiked about a half mile back to our vehicles.

And then we drove them here about a 45 minute drive.

The main things you have to worry about transporting fish are temperature and oxygen of the water.

“So temperature is 19.7 degrees Celsius.

” [ominous music] If the fish are in a warm water when they're being transported, that gives them some stress.

And when the oxygen levels are low, just like us, they have a hard time breathing.

So we really want to make sure that the tanks that Arizona Game & Fish have are really well insulated to kind of keep the temperature stable and lower while they're being transported.

And then the bubblers help to keep oxygen in the water.

(Anna) “We have some buckets so you can add a little water in.

” (Anna) So they are a little bit sensitive.

I drive the same way I normally would, but I always do kind of feel like I should be like extra gentle while I'm driving the fish.

It's like you have a taxi or you're like an Uber driver, but you have 600 fish.

[music] ”32, ok, 33, 34, 35, 36.

” (Anna) If you took us and you just kind of transported us somewhere else and it was, you know, totally different conditions.

We might be a little bit frazzled.

So it's a lot of trying to decrease stress as much as possible.

And you hope for a high survival rates in their new home.

So if it continues to dry before we get monsoons, those fish could potentially just dry up.

So in one way, we're kind of salvaging those fish.

“What was the count in that bucket... ...you just finished off Nate?

16 ” [music, footsteps] The Longfin Dace has been a target for a while because the habitat, especially that we have here in the corazon of the Agua Nueva reach is pretty ideal.

Longfin Dace habitat.

But it's so distant from those source populations or those potential source populations in Cienega Creek that they haven't been able to make it back here on their own.

So we're basically giving them a helping hand so they come back here.

(Anna) “Sometimes you got to give a little nudge because they will try to shelter in it.

” (Michael)You know, it's exciting for Longfin Dace because we're bringing back some of the bio cultural heritage that the city of Tucson had.

You know, if you go back 110 years ago, there's a lot of reports of how abundant these fish were in the river before it dried up.

So we're bringing some of that back.

And, you know, Longfin Dace this is is a great species because it's not endangered.

So people aren't, you know, worried about it legally yet.

But it is one of those things that is disappearing as places dry up in drought, small streams dry up from drought across Arizona.

So the more populations we can support and enhance in places like the Santa Cruz River that aren't going to dry up, we're basically kind of putting money in the bank so this species doesn't become endangered in the future.

So it's been, you know, almost 110 years to the date that we've seen Dace happily swimming in the river downtown.

So that in and of itself is a is something to celebrate, to bring bring a species back after an entire century of being gone.

[music, indistinct talking, fades out] Over 10,000 years ago in the area we now refer to as the Sonoran Desert.

Now, extinct megafauna like Mammoth Co-existed with humans.

How do we know?

Well, archeologist with the National Institute of Archeology and History in Sonora, Mexico, and with the Desert Laboratory in Tucson journeyed deep into northwest Mexico to unearth evidence, looking for and creating stories in the sand This morning, we left the desert laboratory in Tucson, Arizona.

The lab sits on Tumamoc Hill a popular recreation area.

We headed to Sonora, Mexico, where we rendezvoused with archeologists from the National Institute of Archeology and History in Hermosillo.

I've never been on any kind of scientific expedition.

This is my journal of what it was like.

We're stuck in the sand and one of our trucks has an overheating radiator and we're in one of the most remote places in North America.

But this gives us time to explore, and there is always something interesting to look at.

We get unstuck and the radiator cools down and then a few minutes later we get stuck again, which is always a good opportunity to look at plants or look at the sunset.

Pedro, do you see that line?

That dark blue... Yeah.

So that is Earth's shadow.

Really?

Yeah.

Think about it.

So the right after sunset, I mean, that makes sense.

And then boom.

Whoa!

Eventually we make it to our destination and set up camp.

In the morning, I see this prickly poppy blooming next to my tent.

It's a flower I know well.

And it makes me feel at home.

I even water it.

So this is an aerial overview of kind of the core site.

And this shows our last field season years ago when we were doing excavations.

This right there is where the Clovis point was found.

And then here this is the vicinity of where the mammoth remains were found, including molars and tusk remnants.

This is a site where 10,000 years ago, human beings coexisted with megafauna like mammoth species that are now extinct.

The archeologists are using drones to survey the area and the topic of drones and documentary comes up.

I say I think drone shots are overused for the most part, and they represent such an inhuman point of view.

But sometimes you need that perspective to understand where you are and the scale of a place.

We'll go into the dunes tomorrow.

But today we're just at the edge of the dune field.

One group scours the area for artifacts, placing a red flag wherever they find one.

The other group does a deeper excavation.

So we're recording all the data that we need to start excavation, what kind of sediments they are if we have material on the surface to start digging.

We are looking for the corners of the posts from last season to make a more accurate grid and expand from where the archaeological artifacts were found.

Often what archeologists are doing is they're there digging with brushes.

So we we joke about spending a lot of our lives sweeping dirt Every inch of the site that's excavated also has to be screened to make sure they're not missing bones or artifacts.

What does it say?

If you put it here and it sticks it's a bone not a rock.

So we're looking for really small bones from rodents, from reptiles that you wouldn't be able to see in the bigger screens.

So as we're walking around out here trying to imagine what this was like, 1000, 5000, 10,000 years ago, it's just so arid now.

But there must have been some sort of big playa filled with water and attracted animals out here.

And people, too.

There's so many layers of stories and narratives, human and non-human, geological, ecological, spiritual, and then the day to day I'm definitely in a data collecting mindset.

But in the back of my mind, there's always the human story and of course the individual stories of the people who were here.

And there's a sense of reverence for the items and the landscape that we're standing on.

Well, first of all, I feel very privileged to work in this kind of place, because this place has evidence of the most ancient people that have inhabited this continent And apart from that this place is amazing I really like working here because the mountains, the dunes make me very happy.

And just being here is a totally different experience, because you are away from the ci you can camp in a place like thi It makes me very happy.

You know, scorpion fossils Also luminesce.

Really?

Yeah.

It's a structural glow sort of thing.

Yeah.

It seems like the best way to capture the feeling at night of being totally cut off from the rest of the world in this luminescent place is to take long exposure, still photos, and knit them together to create the illusion of movement.

I sleep better out here than I have in over a year.

It seems like a place where anxiety can't reach.

All of the music you've been hearing is played by Robert.

He's constantly serenading us.

The theme of plants leading us to amazingly cool archeological places is a serious theme with this project.

So this plant is the remnant I'm holding of Sand Food or Pholisma sonorae and a truly incredible desert plant.

This is a parasitic plant.

So what happens is these plants have these roots that go deep into the sand below and they're tapping in to these other perennial plants and parasitizing their moisture.

So when it's this is fresh, these stems are about yea round white, full of water, and they taste it.

Earth water is this beautiful, earthy desert flavor to the water.

So we came here because I wanted to see the fresh ones and found them while I was doing so.

Kayla and Jay got a little bored when I was freaking out after finding the sand food, and they dropped down in this bowl and then just started finding artifacts left and right.

So I don't think it's coincidence at all that this really rare plant that is one of the most important food and water sources for people in the desert, Hia C-e Oodham relied heavily and rely heavily on this plant for nourishment in the dune.

I don't think it's any coincidence that this is a pretty robust population.

We're finding them scattered all around this blowout.

And the fact that this blowout has so many archeological artifacts, I don't think it's a coincidence.

Robert tells me that these dunes are the Grand Canyon.

He explains that the Colorado River eroded these grains off the sides of the canyon and carried them hundreds of miles to this area.

On our final morning, Robert finds the largest scorpion yet and talks about how most of the animals we're encountering have probably never seen another human being.

Before we leave, I'm asked to take the group picture.

As a filmmaker, I'm always on the outside to some degree.

But that lets me see these worlds I get to drop into with fresh senses.

An archeological expedition is an interpretive dance and a flower is an old friend.

The pandemic inspired more and more people to spend time in the outdoors.

And in many cases, it's opened a whole new chapter in their lives.

It's certainly the case for Ken Lamberton.

When the pandemic hit, he was forced to quarantine on his property near Bisbee.

And over time, he became more and more in tune with his natural surroundings and its many winged visitors [soft music throughout] I was sitting in my backyard last April and an Elegant Trogan flew over my head underneath the porch and landed on my gate.

And I happened to have my camera with me and I turned around, took some pictures and it's like I've seen an Elegant Trogan here once before.

That's a bird that people come from all over the country to see.

And you know this this corner in the southeast corner of Arizona.

My name is Ken Lamberton, and I'm an author, mostly of natural history, writing.

This is Banning Creek and it's in the in the center of the Mule Mountains.

most people have probably seen i because they're driving to Bisbee and they look down on this canyon and they see this amazing place.

You know, Oak draped woodland.

We moved here about twelve years ago and just fell in love with the place.

It's it's a little outside of Bisbee.

So, so we don't get, you know, you know, the stacked living quarters that they have in Bisbee.

But we're, you know, we do have some neighbors.

[trickling water] But it's a wonderful place full of wildlife, we get a lot of great species like Coati, Coatimundi some people call them, they come in their little troops right through the yard, pulling apples off the tree, you know, and throwing them down to the foxes, which is what my wife claims.

Very inspiring you know.

and I can go right up my front door and hike for miles in any direction and not see anybody else.

[soft music] Ive stumbled across mountain lion kills, you know, in these canyons, and then I'll set up a camera there, a wildlife camera and and get dozens of pictures of the mountain lion as it comes back repeatedly to feed off of its kill.

So, yeah, it gives me lots of material to write about.

I had a really nice Clay colored sparrow, which is a rare bird for our area.

When the pandemic started, my life, like a lot of people's lives, shrink down considerably.

My wife and I just stopped traveling.

We just stayed home.

I mean.

And so, you know, as a as a naturalist and, you know, a person who writes about natural history, I was kind of casting about looking for, you know, what to write about.

And it was my my daughter who's a wildlife biologist, put me on to this.

This blog called Substack.

And she said, You know, dad, you you make all kinds of journal notes and and writing about your home.

Why don't you blog about the birds you see in your yard, you know, and so I mean, that kind of clicked and I looked up the the platform and it looked interesting.

And so I started contributing to it.

My blog is called The Big Yard.

And originally it was called the Big Yard Bird, watching at a time of quarantine, and now I've altered the title a little bit.

It's still called the big yard, and now it's the big yard notes of a pajama birdwatcher.

And so it's the pajamas, right?

Because I can sit in my yard.

I don't have to change clothes.

I can drink my coffee.

I can take pictures of birds.

And uh.

And if it works, you know, pajama bird watcher.

Why not?

As long as I'm capable, I'll keep pushing through it, and I really enjoy, you know, putting birds on the page.

That's what I do.

I take thousands of pictures that I delete, but once in a while, I get lucky and get one that's actually in focus and looks halfway decent.

And and those I keep.

sparrows, Tanangers, Orioles.

Yeah, 167 or so species.

Doves calling.

I hear doves calling right now.

That's the other thing about bird watching.

It's not so much bird watching as bird listening.

Notice whats around you.

You know, Somebody just sent me a note on my blog about that.

So how do you how do you find these things or what is it about noticing wildlife?

And so I've been thinking about that a lot lately.

I think I think first of all, we're kind of attuned to see things when they move.

And so it's a matter of paying attention, right?

You see something move.

Look at it.

If you don't know what it is, that doesn't really matter.

You know, just get a good look to see what it is and figure out maybe later what it might have been.

[soft music] I was raised Catholic and my my wife was raised Baptist, so that was really odd combination to begin with.

But but we're both very spiritual people.

And and for me, I mean, nature, nature for me is the hand of God.

You know, it's it's where I connect most profoundly with the creator of the universe.

You know, people say, do you believe in evolution, it's like evolution isn't a belief, it's a fact.

You know, it's like, you know, is that something you just accept?

Right?

It's a fact.

[soft music] To me, this is this touches me in spiritual places, for sure.

[soft music] Before we go, here's a sneak peek at a story we're working on and I realized nothing is more important than love and compassion and helping other people.

It changed my entire directive of the way I think about everything.

People resonated with my art and I was surprised.

I was surprised at how popular I became.

I was surprised at how many people wanted my art.

I have 51,000 almost 52,000 followers on Twitter.

That's where the majority of my time is spent on social media.

I like lifting up other artists and helping promote them.

I relate to people who are artists because I think the best art comes from human suffering.

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Thank you for joining us here on Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara.

We'll see you next week.