We have just returned from a four night stay at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge in central Oregon and it is hard to know where to begin. In any ordinary year I would just post a bunch of amateur pictures of waterbirds with fabulous names: avocets and willets, ibises, bitterns, and stilts. Then cliff swallows. Yellow-headed blackbirds. Golden eagles. This year the group collectively saw 72 species of birds, which is quite a lot for 5 days of laid-back bird-watching.
But this is not any old year for the Malheur, and anything that I may say about what I saw is colored by what I felt.
 |
| Photo by my husband, John. |
Say. Saw. Felt. Confusing. What is the difference.
How do you enjoy a place like this?
Well. It is helpful to accept small beauties in a great landscape.
Conversely, there are great beauties in very small landscapes.
It is possible to love them both, two opposing ideals, and hope for the best. May Malheur heal, and Burns, OR, become a viable community once again.
There are more pictures and I can't help but share them. But I had to start with this.
ReplyDeleteYou put it to a better use.
ReplyDeleteThanks AC. I did have a great time.
DeleteI agree with AC. Nature's beauty has to override the darker side. It has a way of healing over time.
ReplyDeleteI love the creature (coyote? wolf? fox?) in an otherwise plain landscape. It's a beauty of a shot. As is the glimpse of the enduring rainbow in the first image.
Thanks Hilary. That is a coyote out there hunting for mice midday. :) Pretty far away,but somehow still identifiable.
DeleteOn my bucket list.
ReplyDeleteYou should come out this way! You already have so much bird knowledge, plus you could get great wildlife shots, I'm sure of it. Long drive from the east coast, though.
DeleteIt's horrible what happened here last winter. I do hope for healing in the community.
ReplyDeleteIt's awful. And there are STILL a few armed militia wandering about.
Deletethe land will recover. Burns may not. there may be lasting scars in Burns. beautiful pictures though. the flock in the leafless shrub...yellow headed blackbirds?
ReplyDeleteIn January and February the refuge was closed and the wildlife loved it. There were thousands of empty gun casings though, and it is unsure if birds were shot.
DeleteYes, those are yellow-headed blackbirds, like ornaments in a tree. They are fun to watch, and very noisy, singing and commenting all the time.
it will come full circle, i believe land can recover, refurbish itself. the image of the yellow-headed black birds is amazing, "birds of a feather, flock together, has never been truer!!!
ReplyDeleteYes, the land and animals barely noticed the blip of violence. The birds carry on nicely.
Deletemay nature heal the wounds of man. love those yellow-headed!
ReplyDeleteMay it be so.
DeleteWow, sad. But you are right, start with finding the beauty. The 3rd image is beautiful too.
ReplyDeleteThanks Rebecca!
Delete