Bird photographers have for many years flocked to Bosque del Apache in New Mexico for what surely must be one of the worlds great bird spectacles, the sight of thousands of cranes and geese lifting off at dawn. Of course such a spectacle can be witnessed at countless places around the world, but what makes Bosque special are the clear crisp dawns and the proximity of the spectacle, you can often be just 10 metres or so away from Snow Geese.

I last visit Bosque six years ago. There had been a lot of photographers then but the explosion of interest that has occurred with the digital age now makes photographers at Bosque far more numerous than birders. On some evenings at a Sandhill Crane roost the photographers outnumbered the cranes as rows of telephoto lens trained on small flocks tumbling out of the red evening sky.

Both the Snow Goose and Sandhill Crane feature prominently in our book and although I already have a lot of material on Sandhill Cranes I was lacking one or two special shots of Snow Geese. The week gave me some fantastic opportunities but one magical moment will live with me for a long time. During the middle of the week on one night the temperature dropped to - 13 deg C. As it got light I looked out on 40,000 Snow Geese the closest no more than 5 metres away all packed tightly on the ice. The sun at Bosque rises fast, as it peeped over the horizon a red glow illuminated the necks of the geese, pools of breath rose from calling birds backlit against the light, this scene lasted just a few seconds before the light became too harsh, but long enough to bag some pleasing images, one of which I hope will make into the book.

While in New Mexico I visited a number of rock art sites including Petroglyph National Monument near Albuquerque home to a number of symbolic bird petroglyphs. They include a magnificent Macaw a symbol of the once busy trade in macaw feathers and live birds made by the Pueblo Indians.

Other interesting glyphs included some controversial footprints that some say are Roadrunner prints and others dispute, so many of the illustrations seem open to interpretation. The roadrunner is New Mexico’s state bird and its popularity in everyday life is reflected in business names, on signs and the local radio travel bulletin is known as roadrunner travel.

Mountain Bluebirds gave some great photo opportunities with a flock of around 15 birds regularly visiting a Juniper tree in the desert. Gambell’s Quail proved far more elusive, a regular either heard or filmed breaking cover in westerns, these quail scurry in groups through the desert scrub giving the briefest of views. After baiting a site with seed for five days I finally enticed a group within range of the camera.