Month: May 2013

Common Loons at Wesport

My disappointment that I had cut my Malheur trip short was short-lived because after a day at home unpacking the car, I spent a long Friday at Westport and, later, at Bottle Beach observing the shorebirds Spring migration. Usually I go to Westport after Bottle Beach, but with a 6:00 PM high tide, I reversed my usual pattern.

Westport is my favorite place to observe Common Loons because it’s one of the few places where I can get close enough to get really good photographs. Of course, it’s usually the loons not in breeding colors that are the easiest to get shots of, and Friday was no exception. This loon was waiting for me right off the dock when I entered the marina:

Common Loon in non-breeding plumage

On my walk out to the end of the jetty, the only loon I saw in breeding colors was quite far out:

Common Loon in the Distance

I was beginning to think that the long walk out to the end of the jetty was a waste of time especially since there wasn’t a Brown Pelican in sight. On the way back, though, an Osprey flew over me,

Osprey

and the long walk seemed worthwhile.

On my return, one of the Common Loons in breeding colors had moved closer to the dock and was apparently preening and taking his mid-morning bath,

Loon Bathing

or at least that is how I interpreted it, though there might also have been some showing off for other loons because I didn’t see a mate during the thirty or so minutes I was watching, and this looked a lot more like displaying than washing.

Common Loon in breeding colors

It’s easy to forget how big these birds really are, especially since you seldom see them with their wings spread out like this,

Common Loon in breeding colors

but unfortunately I wasn’t able to fit its entire 4 foot wingspan into the frame.

I was pretty sure that the loon wasn’t showing off for me, but when it finished its morning ritual, it turned and slowly glided past the dock. For a moment I wondered who was watching whom.

Common Loon in breeding colors

A perfect prelude to the rest of the day.

On the Way Home

At two o’clock Wednesday afternoon I decided that instead of spending another night in Malheur at a motel I would start heading toward home, stopping in the Columbia Gorge on the way, with vague intentions of heading out to the ocean to catch the Spring shorebirds migration which was just beginning. Since I wasn’t in any particular rush, I decided to drive home a new way and ended up going through John Day.

Even though I wanted to reach the Gorge during daylight, I found myself stopping by the road several times to take pictures of the surrounding cliffs.

John Day cliffs

I would have loved to get much closer to these green cliffs,

Green Cliffs

but the area was private and threatened a $10,000 fine to trespassers, more than I was willing to pay for a close-up shot.

These kind of ridges

Butte

are fairly common in the West, but they still remind me of all those Westerns I loved as a kid. It’s easyfor me to imagine a tribe of Indians lying in wait at the top to ambush John Wayne’s small cavalry unit.

I found the geology of this area so interesting that I went online after I got home and discovered The Painted Hills Unit of the John Day Fossil Bed National Monument, an area I plan on exploring on my next trip to eastern Oregon.

Planned or not, I ended up right across the river from Goldendale, the area where my grandfather grew up and where I spent a year of my childhood. I never visit that area without stopping at Sam Hill’s Stonehenge,

Sam Hill's Stonehenge

a memorial to local men who died during World War I.

I first visited the site when I was five years old and have always associated it with the rock and sod houses found nearby even though I long ago realized that the rock houses were built much earlier. Fake or not, it’s an integral part of mysterious and mystical childhood memories.

As I drove down the Columbia Gorge I was surprised to see California poppies growing on the cliffs. I would have loved to stop and get some shots, but life is already too short to stop on that twisting, narrow road. Instead, I pulled over at an outlook a quarter-mile down the road and took the shot of these poppies.

poppies

At first the poppies —and the 75° temperature — made me think that summer is nearly upon us, and I’m surely ready for it this year.

Later, though, more melancholy thoughts overcame me, and I recalled parts of â€?”In Flanders Fields” written by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae:

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Although the association of poppies and the graves of WWI soldiers came to me, I had to look the poem up on the internet to recall the whole thing. Though not a personal favorite, it continues to reside in my subconscious, resonating with events in my life.

How beautifully
fragile life seems against
ancient cliffs.

My Second Day at Malheur

I got a 5:30 to start my second day at Malheur. I had to drive nearly 40 miles to actually get to the refuge, so my first picture was taken at 6:30 AM while the sun was still low on the horizon. I’m sure the yellow light made it easier for these Sandhill Cranes to blend in with the fields.

Sandhill Cranes

If they weren’t such large birds I might not have even seen them as they were quite a ways in the distance. Still, since I’ve only seen Sand Hill Cranes three or four times in my life, it was a great way to start the day.

Perhaps the best sighting of the trip was this one of a Long-Billed Curlew, taken about thirty minutes later.

Long-Billed Curlew

This was a â€?”first.” It would have been a perfect moment if the sun hadn’t been directly behind the curlew so that most of the body was in shadows. I had expected to see one in the wetlands, but have since discovered that grasslands is their main habitat.

This shot of my first White-Crowned Sparrow of the year

White-Crowned Sparrow

shows just how important the direction of light is in photography. I only wish I’d had the same light exposure on the Long-Billed Curlew.

Luckily, Malheur presents so many photographic opportunities that you can count on the sun cooperating some of the time if you account for it and change your position when you can. It certainly cooperated in this shot of a Yellow-Headed Blackbird at the refuge headquarters

Yellow-Headed Blackbird

and in this shot of a Ring-Necked Pheasant,

Ring-Necked Pheasant

probably the best shot I’ve ever gotten of one.

If the light hadn’t been been shining from behind, this might well have been my all-time favorite shots of a Black-Necked Stilt.

Black-Necked Stilt

Even under less than ideal conditions Malheur National Wildlife Refuge is one of my favorite birding destinations. I can count on seeing birds I would never see in the Puget Sound area, as well as enjoying a very different habitat. I feel blessed to have found such places throughout my lifetime, natural places that inspire and awe me.

It’s Still Cold at Malheur

After last week’s auspicious start to my Malheur trip, I stopped at the visitor’s center and received some distressing news. First, the refuge was unusually dry due to last year’s drought and to the fact that the snow hadn’t melted off the nearby Steens yet. Even worse, for me personally, was that the snow hadn’t started melting because night-time temperatures were still dropping to 18°, well below the forecast that I had read before setting out on my trip.

I instantly revised my plans of sleeping in the car overnight. No matter how much money I could save, I wasn’t going to sleep overnight and get up and make breakfast with those kind of temperatures. Fortunately that meant that I had several more hours to bird my first day since I didn’t have to worry about setting up camp and eating before dark. So, after a short stop to capture the shots of these unusual squirrels,

squirrels in ground

I headed out for some serious birding, thinking it was unlikely I would stay as long as I had planned and certainly wouldn’t be heading over the Steens through the antelope refuge.

On my way out to Ruh Red Road I made a quick stop to see if the grebes I’ve seen at the pond outside Narrows in the past were there this year. They were, both a Clark’s Grebe

Clark's Grebe

and a Western Grebe.

Western Grebe with Carp

With fishing like that, it’s obvious why you can usually count on seeing them in this pond. The grebe seemed to be having trouble figuring out what to do with that much fish.

I’m sure that this White Pelican I saw out on Ruh Red Road wouldn’t have had nearly the problem with the fish that the Western Grebe did.

White Pelican

There wasn’t nearly as much water as there was last Spring when I was there, less than half as much water and less than half as many birds. I was surprised not to see a single Ibis, a bird that was common last year.

Still, I got to see birds I never see on my side of the Cascades, like this Black-Necked Stilt,

Black-Necked Stilt

and this pair of American Avocets who seemed to be flirting,

American Avocets

if not quite ready to tie the knot.

My early start allowed me to get in nearly five hours of birding, not bad after driving 450 miles. Little did I know that I would actually get some of the best lighting of the trip in these early evening hours because it was slightly overcast and the sun was coming from behind me most of the time.