The bowl the birds found.

In Tanzania, the Ngorongoro Crater is a collapsed volcano whose walls hold water, grass and shelter, and so hold an astonishing density of life. Our valley is not a caldera, but it works like a small one. Ridges and national forest close it on three sides. A spring-fed creek and a chain of beaver ponds lie at the bottom. Between them, the acequia waters an orchard of some twenty varieties.

Birds moving along the Rio Chama and Rio Grande find everything in one place: open water, dense willow, insects over the ponds, fruit in late summer, seed on the slopes and cliffs for the raptors. We have mostly stepped back. The beavers rebuilt the wetlands, and we keep the nights dark, which matters to the many songbirds that migrate by starlight.