Subject: Sandhill Cranes, et al.
Date: Apr 13 10:56:05 2003
From: Carol Riddell - cariddell at mac.com


Happy Sunday,

Thanks to Randy Hill for the referral to Corfu road for my trip yesterday.
Yes, it was too late, but after firing off my request Friday evening, I read
back through a couple of days worth of digests and found what I needed. My
sister and I headed down to Lower Crab Creek Road from Hwy 26 just east of
Royal City. We followed it east as far as "B" SE and then headed north,
thinking we would try the Royal Lake overlook. We were poking along "B" and
stopped to observe two horned larks along the side of the road and listen to
them sing their little hearts out, when some background noise (besides my
persistent tinnitus) began interfering. Lo and behold! It was the
wonderful noise of a full-fledged discussion in a rather large community of
cranes in the Wildlife Refuge land on either side of "B", just a little
north of our position with the horned larks. So we got our quota of crane
time for this spring. We headed on up to the Royal Lake overlook. It was
difficult to distinguish individual species, even with an 80 mm scope, but
the lake appeared to be just covered with Canada Geese.

Based on other Tweeters communiqu?s we visited Birders Corner for the first
time and thoroughly enjoyed that highly productive pond/marsh. (I don't
think I've seen so many cinnamon teals and black-necked stilts in one place
before.) We even sleuthed around for a while trying to figure out where
the artificial burrows were for the burrowing owls. We walked Dodson Road
with another Wetside Investigator who had a lead and we found two burrow
entrances. Unfortunately, our sleuthing companion left before there was any
activity. Never having seen a burrowing owl before, I wasn't in any hurry
to abandon the effort. Actually, my sister and I only hung around for
another 5 minutes before one of the owls flushed and then spent a good bit
of time perched on a fence post. I couldn't have been more thrilled. That
was my third life owl this winter (Northern Pygmy at Neah Bay and
short-eared at Crockett Lake). Now I'm off to surf the web and learn a
little more about these artificial burrows and the plans of the wildlife
managers. Off course if any Tweeters from the Dryside have some info to
pass on, that would be great.

We did eventually make it as far east as Palouse Falls and got to bask in
the power of the cascade for an hour before dusk and our homeward journey.
Speaking of invasive species, while we enjoyed watching the family of ground
squirrels in the state park, the presence of starlings and rock doves in
this magnificent canyon setting is disappointing. Control? Pigeon pie,
anyone?

Carol Riddell
cariddell at mac.com