Walking Wild

Walking Wild:

As real-estate developments swallow up the wild and native lands in my neighborhood to build new homes and tilt-up structures housing small commercial enterprises, the canyons and some green spaces are the last remaining habitats for native animal species  which are being pushed further into cramped spaces. 

One of the negative results of over-development (and overcrowding) is native animals spilling out into the streets and parks of the neighborhoods foraging for food and ranging in the area.  Humans and their pets have learned to cohabitate with the wild kingdom in their own backyards.

This interaction often results in the human’s pets becoming the food for the hungry and displaced; sometimes, the wild animals hang out in the neighbor because they are aware of a continuing source of food without ranging and looking for it. 

Recently, I heard that there was a bobcat hanging in the neighborhood.  So, I decided to purchase a Stealthcam camera and put it along the trails in the neighborhood to confirm the rumor.  I wasn’t disappointed in what I found: 

 This is a bobcat walking on the trail after dark but caught on infrared mode.

 

 The bobcat walking toward the camera captured at night on infrared mode.

I also discovered the “coyote highway!”  I was stunned at how many were walking just feet from the backyards in the neighborhood – brazen, big, yet beautiful.  Lots of neighbors have lost pets to these voracious carnivores. 

Man and nature co-existing right in my backyard (Carlsbad, CA.)

Carlsbad Raceway

There they were, aged remnants of the competition, standing like old soldiers waiting their final resting places, to be remembered only by those who experienced the thrill of the race.

 

 At an earlier time, it was a manly pursuit of personal pleasure, speeding down a narrow asphalt drag-strip in a speeding contraption, passing adoring fans at the 1/8^th mile pole, toward the finish line, trying to shave off a second or two from their personal best time. 

And it was a place for motocross racers riding over the humps and hills, digging into the dusty curves like surfers riding a difficult wave toward their own triumphs, as the dirt swirled up like a mini dust storm from waves of bikes chasing each other, like dueling hummingbirds, now had long laid down and covered the evidence of what had been.

But now there was an eerie quiet where fans once cheered, where the sound of roaring engines came to life, where the smell of gasoline, nitro-methane fumes, and hot oil wafted over the crowd, and rubber tires screeched against the hot pavement propelling pride to the checkered flag. 

A hand-painted sign at the entrance of the old racetrack reminded fans that it was now closed. Chains and locks prevented passage.  The ticket booth with its “Stop” sign would no longer be in command of the crowd.  Even the snack shack leaned against time, empty and out of sweets, and tall, swaying weeds were the only spectators poking up through the crumbling bleachers. 

 

 

Discarded rubber tires were stacked on the track like tombstones to remind drivers that the “end” was near.   The control tower, long abandoned, stood tall above it all like a lone sentinel watching over his province.  And a rusting van advertised the “Carlsbad Raceway” in faded letters, hidden in tall grass where no passerby would see it.

 

No longer are sleepy Sunday mornings interrupted by the sounds of excitement and fun, of mechanically engineered rumbles and reverberations, and a loud speaker barking out the results.   The covenants which nearby homeowners were required to sign, alerting them to raceway impact issues, no longer applied.  

It is all quiet now, save for the hum of the increased traffic which flows steadily along the airport road, situated above the remains of a past vestige, racing toward new destinations.  The ruins of the old raceway are long gone, replaced by cold, hard concrete and shiny shimmering glass with the symmetry of planned development.  It is progress, they said.

Now, all that’s left is a modern postmark which incorporates a bygone era with a new direction.  It is a sign near the site of the old asphalt track which announces:  Carlsbad Raceway Business Park.

 

  Author's note:  These images were taken in Aug/2008 by the author who used a Rolleicord and Holga film cameras.  The Dragstrip and Motocross divisions of the Carlsbad, CA raceway ceased operations in 2004.