Sedona is a city in the northern Verde Valley region of Arizona. The first documented human presence in the Sedona area is dated between 11,500 and 9000 B.C. Its current population is about 10,000.

Oak Creek is the largest stream flowing south from the Mogollon Rim. From its origin at springs gushing from Sterling Canyon, Oak Creek flows 50 miles to its confluence with the Verde River.

Narrow-headed gartersnakes (Thamnophis rufipunctatus) live among the leaf litter and rocks beside Oak Creek.

Black hawks (Buteogallus anthracinus) depend on nesting sites along streams in Arizona during the summer before they fly south to Mexico each winter.

We slept in the village of Luxan, which is a small place surrounded by gardens, and forms the most southern cultivated district in the Province of Mendoza; it is five leagues south of the capital. At night I experienced an attack (for it deserves no less a name) of the Benchuca, a species of Reduvius, the great black bug of the Pampas. It is most disgusting to feel soft wingless insects, about an inch long, crawling over one's body. Before sucking they are quite thin, but afterwards they become round and bloated with blood, and in this state are easily crushed. One which I caught at Iquique, (for they are also found in Chile and in Peru,) was very empty. When placed on the table, and though surrounded by people, if a finger was presented, the bold insect would immediately protrude its sucker, make a charge, and if allowed, draw blood. No pain was caused by the wound. It was curious to watch its body during the act of sucking, as in less than ten minutes it changed from being as flat as a wafer to a globular form. This one feast, for which the benchuca was indebted to one of the officers, kept it fat during four whole months; but, after the first fortnight, the insect was quite ready to have another suck.

Charles Darwin The Voyage of the Beagle
March 25, 1835