Charles Beckendorf Gallery Blog

The Barn Owl at right, is a rarity in that it ranges naturally on every continent except Antarctica. In Texas it likes the warm open lowlands and avoids the colder parts of the state and mountains. Shunning the dense woodlands, it flies low, over prairies, meadows, marshes and the seashore, and preys on small mammals. lt frequently makes its home in barns and out-buildings, and finds deer blinds especially attractive. This owl is more numerous around places inhabited by people, yet it generally goes unnoticed because of its silent flight and nocturnal habits. In winter, several owls may share a barn...

The Red Fox is not a true native Texan, but instead result of several introductions -  in  East and Central Texas -  for the purpose of fox hunting. The native gray fox just quickly ran tree and ended the chase. The red fox is a native of the U.S., however, and is the most widespread -  from the Arctic to the Mexican border. The Texas territory of the red fox is a wide corridor of perhaps 300 miles running from the upper northeast corner down to the Southwest leaving out the Trans-Pecos, West Texas and the Panhandle, and South Texas....

"A year or two ago I stopped near [this scene] and as I walked toward the fence I heard a noise not far down the fence line. I walked over that way and almost stepped on a raccoon lying on its side, stepped back, and it struggled and staggered to a semi-upright position. I thought it could be sick with rabies or something, and stayed at a safe distance. It seemed unable to focus its eyes, and it sounded as though it had hiccups, and it didn't seem to really care what l did. In a little while I realized that...

About the first thing visitors from other parts of Texas notice in East Texas is the trees. The tall pines and beautiful hardwoods represent every variety native to this latitude. Nowhere in Texas is the Fall display so spectacular as here in East Texas. The hardwoods in the northern part of East Texas change first, usually in late October, then with each new cold front the "color change" moves south sometimes lasting until Christmas. Up on the East coast they are called Leaf Peepers, and in East Texas they are called Woods Watchers. They are the folks who go somewhere every...

A legend in the Texas Panhandle, Colonel Charles Goodnight had been a Texas Ranger, guide, scout, freighter, and with Oliver Loving established the Goodnight-Loving Trail, before he came to the Panhandle in 1876. Here he established a partnership with an Englishman, John Adair, and his wife Cornelia, and the JA Ranch was formed in the Palo Duro. In films and novels, cattlemen and sheepmen hate each other, but Charles Goodnight pioneer Texas cattleman, and Casimero Romero, pioneer Texas sheepman, agreed to divide the range: cattlemen in the Palo Duro Canyon and east, and sheepmen in the Canadian River Valley and...