When most of us live in highly urban places, it is a gulp of
fresh air to visit the desert for a week of birding and
photography. Karen and I just returned from Malheur
National Wildlife Refuge in southeastern Oregon where the
skies are clean blue, sage-blanketed plains flow around high
mesas, and the snowy monolith of Steens Mountain sprawls on
the horizon. If you haven't been to this remote remnant of
the old West, don't delay. If you plan to go, Don Baccus
has a fine description of birding the region; check his
website. Burns is the closest town of any size.

I've included a complete list of birds and mammals we
observed, along with notes about our favorite encounters
with wildlife. It is migration season at Malheur, as
elsewhere, and our April 1-9 trip was too early for the
errant warblers and other small birds that are observed
later at Malheur headquarters. But we did see some terrific
sights.

Ross's Goose & Snow Goose: Several flocks in the flooded
fields near Burns, including a flock I estimated to be 5000
birds--about 90% Ross's Geese. On April 3 we watched for
five hours, and several times the entire flock rose at once
to circle in a cacophonous mass before settling down. We've
seen this once before, and I still consider it one of the
most thrilling sights I've seen during my 50 years. April
4th brought tremendous winds, and the geese vacated the
region that afternoon. By late that day, almost none were
left.

Canada Goose
Greater White-fronted Goose (flocks totalling several
hundred)

Clark's Grebe (sitting on water close to Western Grebe for
good comparison)
Western Grebe
Pied-billed Grebe
Eared Grebe

Common Snipe
Killdeer
Long-billed Curlew
Greater Yellowlegs
Black-necked Stilt
American Avocet
White-faced Ibis

California Quail
Chukar
Sage Grouse: we visited the lek along Foster Flats Road on
two mornings, seeing 11 males and one female the first day
and 12 males with one female the second day. We arrived
each morning at 6am (before the break of dawn) and stayed
about four hours (until most or all of the males flew off).
The males strutted and danced virtually the whole time, and
the lone female wandered deliberately through the lek
several times, checking out each male in turn. [If you go,
please make sure you stay in your vehicle until the grouse
leave so that you minimize disturbance to the lek. The
second morning we were there, several people got out of
their vehicles to scope the flock and chat among
themselves--not a good idea. Also, don't drink too much
coffee if you want to stay for four hours--you coffee
drinkers know what I mean!].

Bald Eagle (sitting next to and glaring at the flock of
Ross's Geese)
Golden Eagle
Red-tailed Hawk
Ferruginous Hawk
Rough-legged Hawk
American Kestrel
Northern Harrier (extremely numerous)
Turkey Vulture: the well-known vultures of P Ranch were
roosting in the tall cottonwoods next to the road--rather
than on the fire tower where we normally see them. Maybe
the metal fire tower made their feet cold.

Sandhill Crane: we saw two of the subspecies (greater and
lesser?) and were amazed at the size difference between the
two--the larger looked almost twice as big! I estimate we
saw 400 cranes, 80% of which left with the geese on April 4.
We observed quite a few cranes gracefully dancing, though it
seemed half-hearted and may have been a bit early in the
season.

Great Blue Heron
Belted Kingfisher
Double-crested Cormorant
White Pelican (group of about 25 fishing together on Malheur
Lake)

Great Horned Owl (on nest 15' above ground at headquarters)
Burrowing Owl (early migrant, along OO Ranch Road)
Short-eared Owl: on our last evening at Malheur, we saw
eight short-eared owls hunting along the Central Patrol Road
near P Ranch. Several landed on posts just 50' from us, and
Karen was able to get some great videos. While one owl was
hovering, a second owl flew up unexpectedly and
intentionally bumped into the first one. Other times we
watched Short-ears dive-bombing hawks.

Northern Pintail
Northern Shoveler
Lesser Scaup
Ring-billed Duck
Barrow's Goldeneye
Green-winged Teal
Cinnamon Teal
Gadwall
Canvasback
Ruddy Duck
Bufflehead
Common Merganser
American Wigeon
Swan (probably tundra but we weren't absolutely sure)
American Coot
Mallard

Violet-green Swallow
Tree Swallow
Red-winged Blackbird
Yellow-headed Blackbird
Brewer's Blackbird
Starling
Dark-eyed Junco
American Robin
Western Meadowlark
Horned Lark (scores flew up in the dark along the road to
the Sage Grouse lek)
Savannah Sparrow
Vesper Sparrow
Lincoln's Sparrow
Song Sparrow
White-crowned Sparrow
Northern Flicker
Mourning Dove
Rock Dove
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Cedar Waxwing
Black-billed Magpie
American Crow
Common Raven
Say's Phoebe
Canyon Wren (singing atop cliffs at Page Springs Campground)
Loggerhead Shrike
Dipper
Marsh Wren (a marsh filled with their buzzing songs and
aggressive chasing of others)

Coyote: we saw one sauntering nonchalantly through a herd
of cattle; another ran from us; still another was shot and
hung to dry in the sun on a rancher's barbed wire fence,
presumably as a warning to other coyotes.

Pronghorn (antelope)
Mule Deer
Porcupine (we counted eight feeding in mowed fields near P
Ranch--each with a yellow halo of hair in the setting sun)
Black-tailed Jackrabbit (unfortunately one ran into the side
of our car while we drove along)
Belding's Ground Squirrel
Cottontail Rabbit

Other comments: April 7-9 was a birding festival in Burns,
with a nice wildlife art show and a series of lectures. The
headquarters of Malheur NWR had only a broken down old bird
feeder with no seed. On an AM radio station out of Boise,
we heard a talk show caller saying: "In the early 70's me
and my buddies used to go out in the desert and shoot
squirrels--now you can't shoot nothin'!" Near the Owyhee
River east of Malheur, a ranch had a hand-lettered sign
posted proclaiming that access to their land would cost
$5000 per person per day--we didn't go birding there.

A political comment: Steens Mountain has been repeatedly
proposed as a national monument and may be designated as
such by President Clinton soon. At one time I would have
been an enthusiastic supporter of this; now I'm afraid that
such a designation will bring industrial tourism to this
area, complete with paved roads, fancy campgrounds, visitor
centers, employee housing, more gateway businesses, etc.
I'd prefer to keep it like it is, wild and remote--like it
has been for years.

Lee Rentz
Shelton, WA
lee at leerentz.com