Mary, thanks for your great description of your field work. It *does*
sound like an exciting area to visit. I have a few comments on your
species list.

>I found a pair of
>Bewick's wrens in one drainage containing predominantly spruce.

This would be cosmic. Bewick's don't occur anywhere near that area, and
they seem to me to be a confirmed lowland species. Any chance this might
have been a house wren?

> Other observations of potential interest: I heard what sounded
>like an orange crowned warbler (clear single note repeated rapidly on same
>pitch 5-10 times and then descending) on multiple occasions. This turned
>out to be a dark eyed junco. I've never heard them terminate their song
>with sharply punctuated descending notes before. Comments?

I've heard junco songs descend. I think what makes an orange-crowned
different is the deceleration as well as the descent at the end. If you're
saying the junco songs both decelerated and descended, then there's just
another problem with birding by ear!

>I was also surprised
>at the number of rodents that I saw. I'm not sure what these were, but I
>found them both in high intensity burn and lush meadow habitats. They were
>approx. 8-10cm long (body length) with a hairless tail. body color was a
>uniform light reddish brown on the back and top of the head and grey brown
>on chest, flanks and abdomen. They tended to hop rather than run and were
>very active during the day.Could these be wood rats?

These sure sound like a perfect description of jumping mice to me. In
Okanogan Co. they are western jumping mice, Zapus princeps. When I don't
see them well, I'm sometimes undecided whether I've seen a frog or a mouse.
By the way, the tail isn't hairless, just looks that way. It's quite
long, which is a field mark too. If you tell me that the tails in fact
were much shorter than the body, I'd change my guess to redback vole,
Clethrionomys. Your color description actually sounds a bit more like that
species than like a jumping mouse, come to think of it.

Thanks again.

Dennis Paulson, Director phone 206-756-3798
Slater Museum of Natural History fax 206-756-3352
University of Puget Sound e-mail dpaulson at ups.edu
Tacoma, WA 98416