Susan and I headed up the Columbia Gorge in hopes of finding some birds despite the 30mph winds blowing at the west-end of this pathway through the Cascade Mountains. We started on the Clark-Skamania County line at the intersection of Marble and Fitzgerald Roads where we had a WILSON'S SNIPE in the small wetland there. It was too windy to hear White-breasted Nuthatch in the oaks or any other passerines. At Skamania Landing we drove around the lake, which is now drained prior to the return of Chum Salmon to the spawning grounds on the creek. There were four GREAT EGRETS on the mudflats and one GREATER YELLOWLEGS, both difficult species to find in this county. A PEREGRINE FALCON was kiting in the wind above Beacon Rock but no Canyon Wren responded to my tapes there. I should have walked around to the leeward side of the rock as any small bird would have had the sense to seek cover from the winds. At the wetland on Red Bluff Road a VIRGINIA RAIL was the only bird that responded to my Marsh Wren tape. Just below the fish hatchery on the Little White Salmon River, a sandbar was littered with spawned out salmon and a couple of dozen gulls including a WESTERN and a THAYER"S GULL. By the time we had reached the Klickitat County line the winds had substantially decreased. There appears to be a good crop of acorns this year, judging from the Garry (Oregon White) Oaks that we saw at the Spring Creek Fish Hatchery . Wilson Cady
Skamania County, WA