Greetings All,

Today I posted a short piece about the endangered "Streaked" Horned Lark (A.. a. strigata)
to our BirdFellow.com journal. Streaked Horned Larks were formerly a widespread breeder in western Washington, particularly around the Puget Trough, where they are now considered extirpated. Only a few scattered pairs continue to nest in Washington. The focal point of current research on
this rare subspecies is Oregon's Mid-Willamette Valley. Corvallis area
residents Bob Altman, Randy Moore and Doug Robinson are monitoring and
studying the remaining breeding populations, the bulk of which nest in
the Willamette Valley. These are very striking birds when seen
close-up. They are much more colorful than most other subspecies of
Horned Lark. There are several excellent online publications including
Pearson and Altman 2005 (see citation at the bottom of the BirdFellow
piece) that discuss the plight of this fragile population. Bob Altman's
excellent species account in Birds of Oregon: A General Reference
(Marshall et al. Eds. 2003) is also recommended reading for those
interested in these birds.

Last summer I volunteered with the
Oregon Dept. of Fish and Wildlife doing driving and walking transects
originally set up by Bob Altman in the 1990's. Hopefully, this project
will be funded again this summer. It is an important study that is
monitoring the status of several bellweather grassland species (Horned
Lark, Western Meadowlark, Grasshopper Sparrow, and Vesper Sparrow) in
the Willamette Valley. According to the recently released U.S. State of
the Birds report, short-grass prairie ecosystems and the birds that
reside in them are in rapid decline.?

Dave Irons
BirdFellow.com