Sauvie Island

March 13, 2025

It’s a good thing Rachael and I got outside as often as we did after returning to Portland, because days of early spring we were blessed to fly home to came to an abrupt end and now it looks like we’re facing a string of wet and cold ones as chilling as when we flew south to Tucson in January. It’s time to turn to indoor tasks and activities - the gym for Rachael, income taxes and the storage unit for myself.

First though, there’s an unexpected break of maybe three or four hours this morning, if I jump on it. And I do, because I’m getting concerned that I’ll miss my chance to see the sandhill cranes on Sauvie Island before they fly north for their breeding season. It could happen any day now, if it hasn’t already.

It won’t be light enough for me to drive out to the island until around eight, but I’m fine for the few blocks to the Stepping Stone Cafe where I fill up on a country omelet and coffee while I wait for daybreak. By the time I make my first stop on the island at Raccoon Point conditions are ideal other than for the chill in the air - it’s not much above 40F, and never will get much past that today. It’s partly sunny, there’s an interesting sky, and visibility is excellent. There aren’t many birds to be seen at first though - some wigeons, a few swans far in the distance that with my new camera I can pull in close enough to identify as tundras rather than trumpeters, and two large, dark silhouettes in a tall tree at the end of the berm. That’s about it though, until I hear the sound I’ve been hoping for: three cranes fly in and settle not far below, putting me at ease - I’ve been afraid they’d all gone north for the summer already.

The view north across Sturgeon Lake. Not much to be seen out that way today except for those distant white specks.

Immatures, the first of around a half dozen eagles I’ll see here today.

I loaded the Rodriguez in the back, thinking that I’d bike from here out to pavement’s end of Sauvie Island Road, but now that I’m here I’m here I have a second think and decide I want to use the car and make it to all of the best birding spots on the island, something I’d be unable to do in the time I’m likely to have available before the rains return. So next I drive up the east side of the island to the bird blind on Reeder Road. And I do find a few more birds here, or rather a few thousand. Huge clouds of snow geese and cacklers will erupt into the sky periodically, swirl around and then resettle and reform a brown and white ribbon a few hundred yards wide. In other spots upright gray figures dwarf them - Sandhill cranes, maybe about a dozen in all. And on the pond a variety of waterfowl drift and dabble by - more swans, but also shovelers, canvasbacks, ring-billed ducks, teals, buffleheads, even a single redhead.

On Reeder Road. I’d better get my last shots of the Raven in before he heads east and out of our lives next month.

It’s really a strikingly fine morning. I’m lucky to have gotten this window, which won’t last much past noon.

One of my favorite structures along Reeder Road.

Afterwards I drive further north to Rentenaar Road, an unpaved spur out to another dead-end viewpoint. It’s narrow, filled here and there nearly to the margins with large puddles that make me hope I’ve got enough clearance as I carefully skirt as far to the edge of the road as I can without risking getting mired in the muck. Along the way new birds keep getting added to the list - a scrub jay and flocks of sparrows, and yet another eagle. And after that I climb atop the berm to look across the main channel of the river, earning some nice views but nothing else new to add to the day’s catch.

An adult this time. I lost count, but I saw at least a half dozen eagles this morning. In a good morning for raptors, I also saw a red tailed hawk, a pair of kestrels, and possibly even a pair of peregrine falcons.

No birds on the water today, but still worth it for the views.

A drive up the west side of the island next nets a few more new birds for the day, plus a look at the lambs Rachael told me I’d find if I made it out this far. It’s not like the east side with its great goose clouds though. I definitely did the right thing sticking with the car the whole way so I could cover both sides of the island.

And finally on the way back I stop in at Howell-Bybee Farm, hoping I might get lucky and pick up some woodpeckers or chickadees or even a sapsucker; but it’s not the day for that either.

It’s lambing season at the north end of Sauvie Island Road.

I’ve maximized my window this morning. By the time I leave the island the first showers will arrive.

I’ve been home for a few hours and am sitting at the table scanning though the photos I’ve brought home when Rachael suggests I look outside. It’s a shock - it’s raining hard, or it’s rain mixed with snow, or it’s hail. We watch in amazement as the deluge grows even denser, and soon the street below turns white in a blanket of hail. There are intermittent rumbles of thunder, and then it ends as abruptly as it started and the sun comes out. Amazing.

I feel so lucky to have gotten this morning in, but that looks like it for awhile. Looking ahead, the coming days look as cold and wet as they did back in January when we were hoping we could escape to Tucson. We’ll take a short blog break here then while Rachael checks out the cycling classes at LA Fitness and I turn to the indoor tasks that have been waiting for a rainy day. We’ll be back when there’s something to be shared or worth remembering.

Remarkable. It hasn’t been ten minutes since the storm passed.

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Today’s list: Mallard, Green-winged teal, Northern pintail, American coot, Common merganser, California scrub jay , Snow goose, Golden-crowned sparrow, White-crowned sparrow, American kestrel, Red-tailed hawk, Bald eagle, Ring-billed duck, Canvasback, Canada goose, Cackling goose, Sandhill crane, Bufflehead, European starling, American robin, Rock pigeon, Great egret,Tundra swan, American crow, American wigeon, Redhead (26)

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