Natalie and I went back on the road this weekend to check out some new
birding locations and revisit some others, and our trip had us swing east
over the Cascade Mountains on Hwy. 12, south through the Yakima River
valley to Prosser where we veered south over the Horse Heaven Hills to
reach the Umatilla National Wildlife Refuge.

The main highlight of our drive to reach the town of Patterson and the
Umatilla NWR was watching dozens of raptors - mostly Red-tailed Hawks -
migrating and hunting over the fields on the high plateau between Prosser
and Patterson. If you want to see a vast volume of raptors and how they
interact with each other while hunting, this is a great spot, and the
road is wide enough to safely pull over and watch the birds. Along with
the Red-tails, we saw one rufous morph as well as a couple of Swainson's
Hawks moving south.

There isn't a lot going on at Umatilla yet. The large numbers of
migrating waterfowl are a few weeks away, but we still managed to see a
handful of Rock Wren in the rocky habitat and three White Pelican out
near mid-stream in the Columbia River. Other sightings included:

- Meadowlark singing from the top of a pole at the Whitcomb Unit
- large flocks of mixed Brewers' Blackbird, European Starling, and Red-
winged Blackbird
- 10 American Wigeon in the inner pond on the drive to Crow Butte State Park
- American Coot

It should be noted that Crow Butte State Park is closed indefinitely due
to budget restrictions. It closed on Oct. 1. This is the third state park
in SE Washington that we have seen closed due to budget problems, this
despite the new $5 parking fee that is soon to be required at all state
parks. Interesting that the parks folks closed the parks in SE
Washington, where parks are few and far between...

We made our way west along the Columbia Gorge Saturday night and camped
in gusting winds at Maryhill State Park. In the morning we saw a few good
birds here, including a Golden Eagle soaring in the distance over the
basalt columns to the north of the park, a Peregrine Falcon sitting on
the top of a telephone pole in the same area, and a number of Yellow-
rumped Warblers in the brush along the exit to the park.

Our best birding of the day yesterday was along Balch Road near Lyle,
where we stopped to get a look at the Acorn Woodpecker that we missed
earlier this year when visiting Klickitat County. Northern Flicker were
everywhere, and we could hear the occassional call of Acorn Woodpecker,
but we didn't see one until it flew overhead as we sat alongside the road
above a pond that held Pied-billed Grebe, Wood Duck, and Mallard. Other
highlights along Balch Road included watching two Belted Kingfisher
chasing each other and calling loudly as they weaved in and out of the
oak trees along a hillside and watching a Merlin in hot pursuit of a
smaller prey bird that it lost in the trees before landing in a treetop
near the cemetary.

Other Balch Road birds:

- numerous and loud Scrub Jay
- Stellar's Jay
- Song Sparrow
- numerous Spotted Towhee

We wrapped up our weekend by driving FS 23 from Trout Lake up past Mt.
Adams and down the Cispus River watershed to Randle before returning to
Tacoma. We made stops at Takhlakh Lake, Chain of Lakes, and Olallie Lake
where we heard numerous Chickadee and Dark-eyed Junco, as well as a
Pileated Woodpecker. I also spotted a Clark's Nutcracker in the treetops
at Takhlakh Lake as we saw Wood Duck and Red-breasted Nuthatch throughout
the area. There was a small group of what appeared to be Goldeneye on
Olallie Lake, though they were too far away to ensure they were late-to-
leave Barrow's Goldeneye.

Great birding and great scenery for a fall weekend. Our views of Mt.
Adams reflecting in the waters of Tahklakh Lake were priceless!

On a final note, not surprisingly the numbers of butterfly species on the
wing are dwindling. I did snap of closeup photo of a California
Tortoiseshell on the gravel along Balch Road, and we saw more
tortoiseshell along FS 23 near Mt. Adams. There were also a diminished
number of Orange Sulphur butterflies on the wing near Mabton on Hwy. 22.
--
Rob McNair-Huff <mailto:rob at whiterabbits.com>
White Rabbit Publishing <http://www.whiterabbits.com>
Publisher of Mac Net Journal <http://www.whiterabbits.com/MacNetJournal>
The Equinox Project <http://www.whiterabbits.com/weblog.html>
Co-author of Insiders Guide to the Olympic Peninsula