Nature – Page 6

July 27, 2025July 25, 2025

High Desert Mornings

Early morning light glitters across this expanse of river

The pace of our lives is not brisk and our days of multitasking projects is long past.

That’s not to say we’re idle. Quite the opposite, as summer gets up to full blast our weekly schedule fills up.

Along with more excursions, come early starts. It’s all part of getting into summer.

The High Desert in this season can be oppressively hot from noon to sun down. To counter this, we are out the door at first light . . . conversely, back in the house by mid-afternoon.

A young Western Kingbird sports a mix of juvenile plumage and adult feathers

This week’s trip to the river was highlighted not by fishing, though that was good, but by a proliferation of fledgling sightings.

A Magpie flock harassed this juvenile Osprey trying to enjoy his catch.

A young Osprey was getting a lesson in Magpie gang warfare.

There were moments when we thought the Magpies would succeed in getting the young Osprey’s meal.

In the end, he finished the fish and brought back another.

A Western Tanager dives down to catch insects mid-air

A group of Western Tanagers were also spotted. Likely a stop on their migration to either the Cascades or Ochoco range.

The sighting is a rare treat, not only because of their brilliant colors, but also they only spend a few days in the canyon on their summer jaunt to the mountains.

Black-billed Magpie

We also got treated to a family of Redwing Blackbirds.

It appeared to be flight practice. We observed the family hopping along the tops of willow bushes at the river’s edge.

Often these trips are filled with long stretches of sitting quietly, watching the natural world move around us. Morning hours seem to be a good time to get the most of that activity.

July 13, 2025July 12, 2025

Back on the Crooked

We headed back up to the Crooked River this week. We lucked out and found our favorite campground . . . completely empty.

That’s unusual this time of year. But as they say, “don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”

For now, mornings remain almost cold. All too soon summer’s sun will beat back the chill.

For the present, we set up chairs along the river and settled in to enjoy our good fortune.

Fishing was good, I brought a few to the net. The willows nearly overpower the rivers edge, making it difficult for Tip to keep an eye on me or get a drink.

Checkered White Butterfly floats among flowering wildflowers

An abundance of butterflies danced across the leaves in the still lush riparian.

An Osprey surveys it’s surroundings from a very high perch.

Around noon we moved downstream to a new piece of shade and a different stretch of river. At this spot we found the kestrel’s tree occupied by an Osprey.

A lack of defensive efforts (on the kestrels part) suggested the brood has moved on. The osprey seems content in getting his perch back.

It’s already the second week in July, and summer is slipping away. We’ve not had to endure wildfire smoke . . . yet.

So these peaceful excursions are treasured times.

A shaded vantage point to keep track of everyone

All too soon the dog days of August will require more careful planning on where we might find patches of shade. We do have a few places in mind.

June 22, 2025June 21, 2025

Pockets full of Rocks

Rockhounding usually involves scrambling up hills

While many of our posts are about fishing, that’s not the only thing we enjoy. We usually have a small menu of activities to choose from, while out on an adventure.

Wandering the high desert of Central Oregon, it’s impossible NOT to marvel at its geological features. The streams we sit along, spent the last millennia cutting out those basalt-rimmed canyons.

High cliffs of Sutton Mountain, near Painted Hills, Oregon

The Cascade Range to the west and the sage steppe to the east of us is a landscape of volcanic oddities.

Central Oregon’s northern expanse of the Great Basin took shape about three million years ago (Pliocene epoch).

Volcanic eruptions and the formation of shallow lakes deposited the material that is fodder for rock hounders today.

We’ve been picking over rock formations, digging pits and screening gravel beds for years.

It’s rare that we’ll come back from an outing without some samples in the back of the car.

This week the focus of our trip was on rockhounding.

These June days are still cool enough to make scraping back layers of dirt and shifting through buckets of gravel bearable.

The journey was pulled from one many geology related books occupying space on our shelves.

Rockhounding Oregon and Roadside Geology of Oregon are constant references when planning these early summer excursions.

In this case, a land owner allows access to BLM land across their property

This time around . . . our destination is Congleton Hollow and it’s 640 acres of BLM land which is open to rock collecting.

Limb Casts are the target. When a lava flow engulfs a forest the encased tree limbs turn to ash leaving a cavity which is eventually filled with minerals that over millions of years become agates.

Green and pink stones with distinct wood grain and sometimes bark patterns are the prize. But that reward is hard dug and often results only in fragments.

High Desert roads are edged in carpets of Lupine

The South Fork of the Crooked River runs along the lower reaches of Congleton Hollow. The upper slopes, where most of the rock searching takes place, are bare except for a scattered few juniper trees.

There are shade and grassy meadows at the base of the hill, on the banks of a lazy flowing stream.

JQ has just the spot for this ‘boulder’ and she ferried it across a wide expanse to load it in the back of the car

We didn’t find a lot of Limb Casts, though JQ did lug back a large, stratified rock.

There’s no need for buckets of agates, and the point is to explore spaces. However, we always manage to leave with some rocks in our pockets.

June 8, 2025June 6, 2025

June’s first river trip

Summer is in full blaze. The week is getting progressively warmer and we’ve already had a couple of small wildfires.

There are more places to go than days in the week. Plus, we kind of like to have a rest day between excursions.

That means we can do home-based errands when not on the road and in theory, stuff gets done.

Deschutes Canyon upstream from Blue Hole

One of the drives this week was up to Maupin to check out the Lower Deschutes before the rafters take over.

We kind of missed the Salmon Fly hatch this year . . . not sure what else we were up to.

The tail end of the hatch was last week, so we thought I might get some ‘big bug’ action.

There were no large stone flies on the river’s banks, so we resorted to other patterns. Caught a few little guys and had a great hike along the river.

The day was clear with a cooling breeze. We sat out the chairs along the road’s edge and enjoyed the morning.

By noon I’d gotten in plenty of casts and the place was filling up.

This was likely our last trip to the Lower Deschutes until fall . . . when the crowds thin and the rafts are put up for the season.

There are plenty of other spots to wet a line and with far fewer bodies.

June 1, 2025June 6, 2025

Summer Time

Small pools of water, overflow from creeks, fill the meadows along the roadway.

We spent a good deal of the week getting the yard back in shape. Planted some stuff, or should I say replanted, trees, shrubs, and flowers to fill in empty spaces.

We also hung a sunscreen on the pergola just in time for 80 degree days.

One of the 14 lakes accessible by the Cascade Lakes Scenic Byway

It wasn’t all soil and shovels, we did manage to make a trip to the Upper Deschutes River.

During Memorial Day weekend, campgrounds along the Crooked River get full. Folks tend to stick around into the week, so to avoid crowds we head for a different stretch of water.

Winter’s runoff has filled the lakes and reservoirs, but there is no snow left on the ground.

Headwaters to the Deschutes River, from Little Lava Lake to Crane Prairie, is a favorite little stream.

Upper Deschutes River winds leisurely through grassy edges

There are a few miles where the Upper Deschutes meanders through pine forests, meadows and marsh lands dumping into Crane Prairie.

Cascade Lakes Highway parallels the stream offering numerous pull-outs and great picnic sites. Bonus, it’s only half an hour’s drive.

The downside this time of year is mosquito clouds.

These pests get thick in early summer and this year it’s been particularly bad. Likely due to additional water standing in all the low land between the chain of lakes.

Western Skunk Cabbage is found along streams and wet woods

What little skin is exposed gets doused in a generous layer of bug spray. This practice makes it tolerable to hike along the river bank. It will be a week or two before the bug population makes picnicking even a possibility.

The weatherman forecasts more summer-like weather for the high desert in the coming weeks. Yeah, summer is in full swing and we’ve got a long list of places to check out.