[birding] Hot miracle on the Willamette Greenway (long and wordy)

[howard bruner]

I took Joel’s advice and got out to see what was happening
on a brilliant morning (although I did not quite make it out at 4:30 AM – more like 9:30 AM).  I parked
off of Buena Vista rd and biked out to the Willamette
 River in pleasant heat, crossing
fields of tawny grass, remnant gallery forest (old meander) and beaucoup
herbaceous invaders.  The access is all
dry and firm and great biking.  Hutton’s
vireo surprised me with continuous repetitions of its call.  Yellow warbler, cedar waxwing and bushtit
livened up the mixed forest. 
White-breasted nuthatch and w wood peewee were in several locations
along the access road.  Swainson’s thrush
never get old – the ethereal sound of shady groves.  The River was calm and stately with a flavor
of the deep south.  Barn swallows,
violet-green swallows and swallowtail butterflies passed over and across the
water and an adult bald eagle dropped from the opposite canopy and leveled just
at the water surface then banked and flew upriver where it was engaged by a
feisty osprey.  The osprey swooped from
above and as it pulled out of the dive right above the eagle the eagle would
complain with sharp chattering.  This
kept up until the eagle passed an invisible (to me) boundary and the osprey
broke off and returned downriver to land out of sight.  I had been riding over some rough ground and
mixtures of blackberries and thistles (and hawksbeard, queen Anne,s lace,  pimpernel, burdock, bindweed, and even some feral
grapes) at the terminus of the road and was happy with the performance of the
BiMart tire and tubes on my bike (these were the cheapest available – no
instant patch goo inside or other enhancements).  After I had fed enough mosquitoes and black
flies I turned and punched my way back towards the pond that no shorebird
used.  I did not get far before the rear
tire went flat and some dragonflies diverted me from despair (monstrous large
common green darner working over the hot dried grass).  It was getting hot and I walked to the shade
of a friendly oak and tore down the tire. 
Yep- blackberry thorn.  My repair
kit had aged to uselessness so I put the tire back together and decided to try
pumping the tube up and seeing how far I could get down the road before I had
to resort to walking.  Not far.  But I tried again and got a bit farther.  And again and got all the way back to the
fork in the road that goes either north to the fishing pond or on out to the
parking area.  I decided to risk it (I
don’t know why – it was hot, the birds had pretty much hunkered down to try and
keep cool but I was not ready to leave) 
I got to the pond and it was host to a single GBH and a powerline
gathering of mixed-species swallows (barn, v-g).  I went to the north end and was surprised
when I checked the tire and it was still tight and right.  I dropped the bike and went down to the shore.

 

I entered a glory of frenetic movement and color.  Dragonflies darted and wheeled - big ones
with blazed white wing patches, dark giants with wings smudged at the base,
powder blue racers streaking everywhere and dainty damselfies moving sedately
in masses in the shore vegetation and emergent plants at waters edge.  Everywhere I looked along that shore the air
was thick with them.  Mating occurred
throughout and the black saddlebags (with the smudged wing bases) kept breaking
apart then immediately reconnecting (described as normal in Gordon and Kerst
2005).  Fisticuffs were abundant and when
the larger species (b. saddlebags, widow skimmer, and eight-spotted skimmer)
fought it sounded as if someone was crumpling a large ball of cellophane.  The entire spectacle was made more surreal by
the giant carp that were wrestling with the air in the shallows right below the
parade (actually doing their damaging feeding -  rooting in the mud along the shore).

 

The sun beat down and I was wilting, itchy, and bedazzled by
such visual largess.  I turned to go –
but not before I mentally acknowledged that I had reconnected with an animal
that I had previously decided was a powerful ally - a totem that had succored
me in high mountain marsh years ago during an extreme situation concerning dehydration
and blood loss from insect attack.  At
one point in the day-long traverse across the extent of Big Marsh (a Deschutes
River headwater) I ran out of water and was hours from potable drinking
water.  The mosquitoes were in angry
dense clouds and I was faltering (it is a much more rigorous walk when you are
pushing calf high vegetation and water with every step and losing appreciable
amounts of blood) then the buzzing clouds dissipated and the stinging decreased
and I realized I was surrounded by a whirlwind of dragonflies.  They escorted me back to my camp and on my subsequent
forays into the marsh they guarded me for the rest of the field session.  Of course the logical explanation is that I
had provided an unparalleled food density and it was nothing more than an opportunistic
reaction.  But I grew a very deep
fondness for my animal helpers and became known as one who practices dragonfly
love.  I have shirts, cups, and even a dragonfly sink stopper – all given to me by friends and
family.  When I got back on my bike and
rode out I really was not all that surprised that my tire was still full of
air.

 

H

 

Species of dragonfly ID’d: dot-tailed whiteface, widow
skimmer, black saddlebags, blue dasher, common green darner, western pondhawk,
tule bluet, eight-spotted skimmer and I am SURE that I missed a few.


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