Turned out the wind that may have kept many birds closer to the
ground, also gave a lot of new flyers a big lift and may have made
"hanging around" easier and a lot more fun (at least for us
observers). The boost obviously helped 4 Swainson's Hawk youngsters
(near Selah) get aloft, possibly for the first time - the 2 parent
hawks helicoptered protectively nearby. At the end of this early
evening session, all 4 took a rest-perch on nearby power poles, apple-
tree supports and trees from which they'd been launching (Ron took
some nice perching and flight photos of these SWHA which I or he can
send in an email - just drop me a note offlist and we'll send you a
few) .

A magnificent ending to a fantastic raptor afternoon, or so friend Ron
& I thought. But 3 hours later we were to have another eye-widening
encounter, as the wind ceased and the sun was setting along Umtanum
Road - 2 or 3 juvenile Great Horned Owls gave us the perfect grand
finale to a day which started out just basically nice because we were
in the sun! The last word was had by an adult GHOW, whose whooty
hoots summarized our feelings - all was right in that little corner of
the world.

The first raptor we observed fledging earlier in the day was an Osprey
chick in that platform nest near I-90 at the Cle Elum Ponds. The kid
was visibly helped by the wind. The other 2 chicks just watched, but
they clearly cheered when their nestmate flapped and managed to hang
in the air for some seconds - oh, wait, that was us (who cheered!).

At the ponds there were many fledglings, from Song Sparrow (needed
song practice) to Western Wood Pewee to Red-winged Blackbird to Cedar
Waxwing to Goldfinch to, well, umpteen others. The winning species
for excitement (but not for fledging) at the ponds, were Gray Catbird
and Cassin's Vireo.

Our mid-late afternoon walk up a mile or so into Lower Umtanum Canyon
was unexpectedly exhilarating, due to several special sightings and
events. The man with the Bostonhuahua and the pistol (for shooting
snakes?) was nothing compared with the Prairie Falcons (2) and the 4
Red-tailed Hawk juveniles who were playing "Pass-the-Snake" and other
games for an hour or so up over the cliffs on the south side of the
creek. A Redtail made a PRFA drop the large snake it had caught - Ron
watched it wriggle as it fell a long way to the ground, where one of
the Redtails picked it up and flew up with it. The PRFA did a pseudo
attack on one of the RTHA which had perched in a tree, but the PRFA
couldn't get the RTHA to fly off (or release the snake?) and flew off
to join another PRFA and play a bit above one of the cliffs - they
hung in the air in a sort of formation. Later, we saw 4 of the 6 RTHA
we'd seen early on, flying over the cliffs to the west, and one
Prairie Falcon sat at the top of a cliff on the north side of Umtanum
Creek. While scanning the cliff tops for raptors, Ron then spotted a
couple of what we soon counted to be 6 Bighorn (?) Sheep, just to the
right of where the PRFA sat for at least a half hour on that cliff.

One more raptor scenario awaited us. This time, a female Northern
Harrier, with a dangling snake in her grip, dropped the snake,
seemingly on purpose, to another harrier, a juvenile, who was behind a
bush up lower on the slope that the sheep were on top of. We never
saw the harrier behind the bush come out.

Another interesting raptor something we noticed in 3 Red-tailed Hawks
- we would see them hanging in the air with their legs hanging down,
sort of like airplanes with landing gear in position - they didn't
seem to be actually aiming to pick up some sort of prey, nor was there
anything in their talons. Juveniles playing or practicing?

Lazuli Buntings, young and older, were absolutely everywhere in that
canyon. Finally, as we were on our way back down the trail, with the
sun in a better place, we were dazzled by the male brilliant blue and
orange and even the white. Unending Cedar Waxwings as well. W.W.
Pewees - no Common Nighthawks - they came later as we were driving
along Wenas and Umtanum Roads - one here, one there - we couldn't tell
if we were hearing them or if it was pewees doing their reverse calls
(down-to-up instead of up-to-down pee-wees). The sweetest call of the
day, was the soft attempt at a "dee-dee" by a little fledgling Black-
capped Chickadee.

Plant and other questions and asides - could we really have walked
past poison ivy? In mid-afternoon, are rattlesnakes more likely to be
"snakes in the grass" or under bushes? Do the apricot tree, black
locust trees, and old wooden posts in one area along the trail,
indicate someone once lived there? What lives in or makes the many
1-1 1/4 " holes in the dirt along the path? What do badgers eat?
Which kind of Clematis is wrapped around and through many of the
bushes along this trail? And is there a native bush like a highbush
cranberry, that sports bright red berries? By the way, the
serviceberries along this trail are ripe and ripening as I rite, in
case you are interested and like dense, mealy, sorta sweet, blueberry-
looking berries! BTW, it's still pretty verdant over in Kittitas and
Yakima Counties, though there were patches of drying grass doing the
wavy thing, indicating that perhaps, things may yet heat up and dry up
over there this year!

After the Swainson's Hawk show, we headed to Wenas Lake and dined at
and on a rock - saw Eastern Kingbirds, Bullock's Oriole, Killdeer, a
Spotted Sandpiper, a fly-by American Kestrel and mooing cattle near
the water and on the surrounding hills. The wind picked up as the sun
was heading down and 80's quickly turned to 60's so we added a jacket
layer. Stayed for the technicolor sunset as it played itself out on
the grassy hillsides in various shades of orange, gold, green, blue-
green, tan, off-white, black and blue. A stunning scene.

Too late to head toward the Audubon Campground, we continued along
Wenas/Umtanum Road, stopping briefly to watch a few nighthawks and
deer with black tails and big ears (mule deer?) before finding the
Great Horned Owls perched right along the road on short posts, giving
strange screeches. It was 9:30 by then and too dark to see anything
sitting atop the utility poles, so we moseyed back into Ellensburg and
on to I-90 and homeward (Seattle) The return drive wasn't marred by
any destruction or construction stoppage, just a few harshly bright
lights where debris was being piled into trucks in some blast zones.
Guess we missed the evening road closure.

A warm, wonderful, welcome day on the east side. We did see 59
species of birds but more than the number, it was the special sights
and sounds and interesting behaviors that made the most impact. Seems
it's always worth a trip to Central Washington.

Barb Deihl

North Matthews Beach - NE Seattle

barbdeihl at comcast.net