Today Sherry and I ventured over to the east side of Mt. St. Helens. On our way to Windy Ridge, we had an adult GOLDEN EAGLE flying. This was on the left side just past Clearwater Creek on FR99. We started our hike from Windy Ridge and headed for Loowit Falls out in the middle of the blast plain. On our way down the trail we had 3 MOUNTAIN BLUEBIRDS. When we came around the corner to where we could see the blast plain, we saw a sea of blue. This turned out to be some of the best Lupine patches that we have ever seen. HORNED LARKS were very common in and around the Lupine areas. Also, we had about 50 RAVENS, the most we have ever seen in one place. At the falls, we had our lunch and rested for awhile, since we had it all to ourselves. During that time, an immature GRAY-CROWNED ROSY FINCH flew in and landed on a rock 10ft away. It sat and posed nicely for a few minutes before flying across and down into a rock crevass. I think there were a couple more flitting around higher up above the falls. On our way back, we found an ANNA'S HUMMINGBIRD perched in the willows. Butterflies were very numerous, especially the checkerspots and blues.

Here is a list of birds seen.

Golden Eagle
Red-tailed Hawk
Anna's Hummingbird
Rufous Hummingbird
Willow Flycatcher
Raven
Horned Lark
Violet-green Swallow
Barn Swallow
Mountain Bluebird
Townsend's Solitaire
Cedar Waxwing
Yellow Warbler
White-crowned Sparrow
Dark-eyed Junco
Gray-crowned Rosy Finch


Dave Hayden
dtvhm AT nwrain.com
Centralia, WA