[birding] Crabtree Lake and Santiam Breeding Bird Survey, Linn County (long, with math & photos)

[Joel Geier]

Hi all,

The Santiam Breeding Bird Survey never seems to go smoothly, and this
year kept up the pattern. As they've done every year, the folks at the
Weyerhaueser office in Griggs were kind enough to help us out with a
gate key & access permit for the part of the route that runs through the
company's timberlands, along the Snow Peak Mainline. My daughter Martha
and I picked these up on Thursday, just before the office closed for the
holiday weekend. 

Yesterday afternoon we headed up the road above the Roaring River Fish
Hatchery to check the route in reverse, since usually a few trees are
down across some of the less-often used roads, and a bit of chainsaw
work is required (or handsaw & axe in years when I didn't bring a
chainsaw -- and/or a tow rope to drag downed trees out of the way). Or
(like two years ago in late June) there could be snow blocking the road.

This year's first challenge turned out to be that there was still an old
lock on the BLM road that cuts over the ridge from the Snow Peak
Mainline (Crabtree Creek) to Roaring River above Larwood, whereas the
locks on the Snow Peak mainline had been changed. Which meant that, for
the first time so far, the Snow Peak key didn't work for that gate.

No problem! We timed how long it took to get to the outside of that gate
if we backtracked from the inside of the gate along the BLM road, over
the ridge back to the Snow Peak mainline, out through Lacomb, up
Meridian Road, over the Larwood covered bridge, past Roaring River
County Park and the Fish Hatchery, back to the outside of the gate,
allowing time to slow down for the free-roaming chickens and peafowl on
that road. We figured out that it should only take 25 minutes.

A bit of background here on Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) routes, for those
of you who haven't been involved in one: 

These are bird survey routes administered by the U.S. Geological Survey
(which the National Biological Survey was folded into a few years back
for budgetary/political reasons), mainly staffed by volunteers. Each
route has 50 stops, spaced 0.5 miles apart along a 24.5 mile route. You
count for 3 minutes at each stop (mostly listening, at least 95 out of
100 birds that you record will be identified by ear), write down the
data, then jump back in your car and drive to the next stop. In order to
get usable data, you're supposed to start about half an hour before
sunrise (4:54 AM for the Santiam BBS route), and finish the route by
10:00 AM sharp.

So Martha and I did the math (even though she'd rather not do math
during summer vacation) and figured out that IF we could average 5
minutes per stop for 50 stops, that plus the 25-minute detour would
still allow us to finish the route in 250+25 = 275 minutes or 4 hours
and 35 minutes. So by starting at 4:54 AM we could finish at 9:29 AM,
with more than half an hour to spare -- no problem!!!

On the other hand, if we averaged 6 minutes per stop (which is not hard
to do, especially if you consider that these are mostly logging roads
where 25 mph is a fast speed for covering half a mile between points),
we wouldn't finish the route until about 10:30 AM -- not good! So we
knew that we'd have to hustle all the way.

So we drove on to Crabtree Lake, which is a beautiful spot. I hope I
won't inconvenience any of you by attaching a few photos to show what I
mean. You can also get to this lake via public roads, though the route
is more roundabout (via the upper end of Green Peter Reservoir above
Sweet Home -- I can send directions if anyone's interested).

The first photo shows the lake, which is rimmed by old-growth forest and
rhododendrons. According to Brian Sullivan's book titled "100 Hikes in
the Oregon Cascades" (or something like that), the oldest known trees in
Oregon can be seen here, though the trail that he describes is now
incredibly overgrown and I've never seen the trees myself. The north
side of the lake is dammed by a volcanic plug with a narrow outlet that
you can hop across on a logjam, just above a small waterfall that
cascades into the creek that feeds Dogpatch Meadow, about 200 ft below.

The second photo shows my count assistants, Martha and Heidi, looking
out over Dogpatch Meadow. Or more accurately, Martha is looking at the
meadow while Heidi has her eye on a TOWNSEND'S CHIPMUNK or perhaps a
CHICKAREE. The volcanic outcrop that they're standing on hosts an
incredible rock garden this time of year (as exemplified by the third
photo, I've got lots more of these!).

>From a birding standpoint, Dogpatch Meadow is perhaps the most
interesting part of the habitat. In late summer of 2008 from the same
vantage point as the 4th photo, I thought I saw a Solitary Sandpiper
flying near the creek outlet which you can see in the lower left-hand
quadrant (just above the log) of this photo. Going out into this marsh I
also saw an interesting, cool-toned "Traill's" Flycatcher in the willow
bushes that are just above the stump in this photo, which just might
have been an Alder Flycatcher.

Unfortunately last evening I didn't have a chance to get out into the
meadow (which would have required some serious wading at this point in
the season, not so evident from the photo but from experience I know
that's the case). 

What Martha and I did find around the lake included a booming SOOTY
GROUSE across the lake, and many ROUGH-SKINNED NEWTS hanging in the
shallows. A VARIED THRUSH flew right past us to land farther along the
shoreline, while others of its brethren piped their tin-whistle calls
from across the lake. A TROUT or two leapt and splashed in the
breeze-riffled waters.

In the morning, we got up at 4 AM with plenty of time to prepare for an
on-time start to the count. Only one problem: with first light at 4:47,
I discovered that the left front tire had gone completely flat. But I
had a spare in the back of the van, so we still got going by 5:04, only
10 minutes late. Highlights of the first few stops included a HERMIT
THRUSH (not heard every year) and COMMON NIGHTHAWK, plus a visual on a
NORTHERN PYGMY-OWL that flew right past us within 20 feet, at the first
stop.

>From there it was a steady procession of expected species -- lots of
WINTER WRENS, SWAINSON'S THRUSHES, HERMIT WARBLERS, WARBLING VIREOS, and
PACIFIC-SLOPE FLYCATCHERS throughout the route, with few surprises. We
did the detour, then found YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT from our stop on the
outsid of the impassable gate -- and later a couple along the Snow Peak
connector road near Lacomb.

We rolled into our 50th stop with 6 minutes to spare -- but with a
familar "fwump-fwump-fwump" sound from the left side of the van. Sure
enough, it was another flat tire. But first we finished the 50th point
count of the day, and counted our blessings that we made it all the way
to the end of the route. Then we changed the tire, pausing briefly for a
lady who was being dragged up the road by an enormous pit bull on a
leash, and yelled ahead for us to get Heidi out of the way (which we
did). As she told us in passing, she was walking her dog on that road to
avoid having her dog get into fights with other dogs. 

Just another Santiam BBS! After changing our second tire of the day
(much more leisurely that the first), we made another stop by Crabtree
Creek to see an AMERICAN DIPPER and to watch a few tossed sticks swirl
through the rapids.

Happy birding,
Joel

--
Joel Geier
Camp Adair area north of Corvallis

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