After hearing about this place for years I finally went out to Catherine Creek yesterday with my friend to check out the wildflowers and everything else. The hype is well-deserved. We found fun trails, amazing views, piles and piles of wildflowers, plus birds and other critters. As expected on an 80 degree Sunday, there were lots of people but only the first half mile or so of the trail felt crowded.
We did the Arches Loop trail, but also followed a random road to the powerlines and up to a poison oak highway. I have way too much to show you.
Bicolored custer lily
Propertius Duskywing
Coastal manroot (Oregon bigroot, wild cucumber, etc.)
Fiddleneck by the collapsed building
Chipping Sparrow
Lupine
Pollinator on nineleaf biscuitroot
Racer
Clover
California ground squirrel
Western skink peeking out
Nashville Warbler
?
Cryptantha
Western fence lizard
Western fence lizard
* I assume these are fence lizards, though I found at least one report of sagebrush lizard here and they're hard to tell apart.
Turkey Vulture
Vultures in dipper formation
Some of the only white camas we found
Camas
Columbia River Gorge views
Bitterroot
?
California poppy
Bachelor's button
Definitely a beautiful hike with plenty left to explore in the future! Good times!!
We did the Arches Loop trail, but also followed a random road to the powerlines and up to a poison oak highway. I have way too much to show you.
Bicolored custer lily
Propertius Duskywing
Coastal manroot (Oregon bigroot, wild cucumber, etc.)
Fiddleneck by the collapsed building
Chipping Sparrow
Lupine
Pollinator on nineleaf biscuitroot
Racer
Clover
California ground squirrel
Western skink peeking out
Nashville Warbler
?
Cryptantha
Western fence lizard
Western fence lizard
* I assume these are fence lizards, though I found at least one report of sagebrush lizard here and they're hard to tell apart.
Turkey Vulture
Vultures in dipper formation
Some of the only white camas we found
Camas
Columbia River Gorge views
Bitterroot
?
California poppy
Bachelor's button
Definitely a beautiful hike with plenty left to explore in the future! Good times!!
I recommend this place to people all the time, especially for Lewis' Woodpecker, but have I been there? Nope. Maybe your post will change a life...
ReplyDeleteYes! You should go and then tell me where the heck the Lewis's Woodpeckers hang out. We only found flickers.
DeleteAh, lovely. Great stuff, and that bitterroot is enchanting! Wow. Spring is such a heavenly time.
ReplyDeleteThe bitterroot was definitely a highlight.
DeleteYou are getting awfully good with that camera. Those are gorgeous flowers and views!
ReplyDeleteThanks, though I'm pretty sure nature did most of the work.
DeleteUp on Catherine Creek, she sends me, if I sprang a leak...
ReplyDeleteThem is some nice flowers. There wasn't any dead stuff up there? You're not losing your edge, are you Jen?
The Bitterroots are gorgeous, as is the bachelor's belly-button.
Everything at Catherine Creek lives forever, apparently.
DeleteThat first photo, and the one of the river gorge, are great!
ReplyDeleteHow perfectly lovely! We've spent no time at all in the Columbia River Gorge so far, although this is good motivation to change that. Actually, we did just sign up for a trip to see Pika in July, so there's that. We definitely have to visit wildflower spots this spring and pick up some Leps.
ReplyDeleteWhen you say that you've seen a report for Sagebrush Lizard, what site were you checking?
That's a good question. I had been sucked into the land of google trying to verify my guess of fence lizard as the ID, and somewhere somehow found someone who mentioned they saw a sagebrush lizard at Catherine Creek. Perhaps it was a personal blog. It was most definitely not eReptile.
DeleteAwesome wildflowers, that bitterroot is a beauty!
ReplyDeleteHow did you get the vultures to pose like that?
ReplyDelete