Saguaro National Park – East

We had  previously explored Saguaro National Park on the west side of Tuscon, so we went to the portion of the park that is located east of town.  On the way to the park we passed by the Air Force base where literally hundreds of planes are being stored, including A-10s, misc. fighters (don’t really know the specific types) and hundreds of transport planes, both propeller and jet powered.  The were in lined up in rows for as far as you can see.

The park itself was not crowded so we had plenty of time to walk by ourselves through the cacti.

We were a little early for full bloom but did find some barrel cactus that were in bloom:

As you walk through the landscape, you come across groupings of cacti and other native plants that were pretty neat:

This is a hole made by a packrat which is an interesting animal.  Packrats collect stuff, including seeds, cactus pieces, grass, car keys, and bits of trash, and pile it into their homes.  They have been known to maintain their houses for multiple generations, passing down their treasures to their offspring.

Scientists studied former packrat homes that are nearby and are over 40,000 years old.  In them they found seeds from grasses, pinyon pine and juniper trees which are now only found up in the mountains.