April 2025

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The Big Bend Chapter of the Native Plant Society of Texas will hold its annual plant sale on April 26 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Forever West Texas 308 West Avenue E in Alpine. There will be native plants including desert-adapted, flowering plants, perennials as well as shrubs available. Experts will be on hand to answer your native plant questions. Plant sale information can be found here: https://www.npsot. org/chapters/big-bend/ plant-sales/ You can also donate plants to the Patty Manning Pollinator Garden being developed at the Alpine Public Library.

In March, students from the Sul Ross State University Geology program visited Big Bend National Park on a research mission to retrieve dinosaur bones belonging to Alamosaurus. Led by Dr. Jesse Kelsch, an assistant professor, and Dr. Thomas Shiller, an associate professor, participants included students in Stratigraphic Analysis and Structural Geology courses. The goals of the trip included conducting structural and stratigraphic analyses of Cretaceous—Eocene rocks and to retrieve a large vertebra belonging to Alamosaurus, a long-necked dinosaur that lived in North America during the Cretaceous Period. Alamosaurus is the largest known land-dwelling animal to have lived in North America. Fossils from the giant sauropod are known in the Big Bend but are usually fragmentary and poorly preserved. The specimen collected by SRSU belongs to one of the most complete skeletons in the area, originally collected and described by researchers from the University of Texas in the 1970s. Associated vertebrae were previously collected from the same quarry by Dr. Shiller and his students and are currently being studied in the SRSU paleontology lab.

Texas version of DOGE heads to Abbott’s desk If signed, the first bill headed to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk would create the “Texas Regulatory Efficiency Office,” the Statesman reported.

Send your community events to kara.gerbert@alpineavalanche. com Upcoming Events April 18-20 34th Annual Gem and Mineral Show, 9 a.m.

Meet CeCe! CeCe, or Cecile, was originally found stray and pregnant in late 2023. She gave birth in the shelter, weaned her puppies there, and was adopted into a loving home.

The Alpine Runnin’ Bucks, repeating their district win, won the Area Championship in Denver City last Thursday. The boys’ and girls’ teams collected enough points to bring home the win.

The 2023 Sul Ross graduate and former rodeo team member Tristen Hutchings has done it again. After recently taking the title at the Houston Rodeo, Hutchings added the American Rodeo to his list of titles after his ride on Saturday.

Alpine Avalanche Photos from the Alpine Avalanche Archives at Archives of the Big Bend, Bryan Wildenthal Memorial Library and Portal of Texas. .

Dear Neil, I received two angel trumpet plants, but I’ve read articles about their being poisonous. What information can you give me? I can confirm that both closely related plants, daturas and brugmansias, are toxic if ingested.