Summer Sketches

 Here is a series of sketches I painted over the past summer.  The first, the full moon, mentions smoke but it was smoke coming all the way from Siberia!  They must have also have had a bad fire season.  Our fires have stopped growing.  We’ve had enough rain greatly reduce the threat, but they won’t be totally out until more fall rains come.   At least for now and our air quality has been wonderful and I doubt many more Oregon acres will burn this season.  California is still too dry.

The next three little paintings were painted while watching the osprey nest (I blogged about the osprey several times).  This is the farm house to the south.  

Orange Sulphur butteries are as bright and sunny as a summer day. They didn’t make an appearance until our osprey nestling had nearly fledged.  

The unexpected is often as interesting as the expected.  On Aug 19 we were quietly waiting for an adult osprey to return to the nest when this little family of California Quail scurried across the road.  During all our sitting we’d heard them a few times but only had one good look.  Members of the grouse family are unusual in that even at this tiny size they can fly.  Most birds are nearly full grown before taking to the air. 

Grasses turn gold by the end of June in Oregon and stay golden until the fall rains come.  These swallows there zooming low over the tall grasses, catching bugs.  

... and finally here is one of my favorite flower combinations:  Queen Anne’s Lace and chickory – also painted at the osprey nest. I knew both were there, but when I went to paint them, I couldn’t find the chickory.  Much to my surprise I discovered chickery close their blossoms in the early afternoon.  Next morning they are open bright and early.  

Wildfire Update: September 16

 

I hadn’t planned on blogging about the wildfires near me in western Oregon – I like to think my blog is a pleasant place where readers get a whiff of nature; but now that things are improving, I’m motivated. I won’t dwell on the misery, instead I want to focus on a few observations … a different focus other than our media coverage.  Other than a brief introduction, I don’t need to repeat information readily available on the news.  

 

The fires started September 8.   Very unusual winds came from the east, bringing hot, dry air from the high desert.  The dry winds slipped over the Cascade Mountains and suddenly we had several large fires in the Cascades.  Our Governor Brown says in 72 hours 900,000 acres of Oregon burned.  Our yearly average is only 500,000.  National news made the mistake of saying 500,000 people were evacuated.  Actually the number is around 40,000 and the rest were put on alert.  

My journal page pretty much says what happened from my perspective:  

Today was supposed to be just another hot day … too hot to go ‘bugging’ (we photograph insects a lot).  I had just started eating lunch when I noticed a dark cloud hugging the western horizon.  With a sinking heart I knew it was wildfire. 

A big, thick pancake of smoke eased over all of Roseburg.  I got on the internet and found three fresh fires.  Not only that, but Lane County to the north is erupting and Insterstate 5 has had to close south of us.”  

 

At 3:50 PM I couldn’t even take a picture with my camera set on automatic.  I had to set manually.  I turned the lights off in the living room and couldn’t read.   Really hot weather was predicted.  I worried. Is it going to be like sitting in a hot car.  Just how hot we would get with all our windows closed up tight?  We don’t have air conditioning.  I assumed we fry.  Big surprise.  The heavy smoke shielded us from the sun.  Instead of roasting, on two of the days we turned the furnace on!  Plus, the air quality in the house stayed pretty good.

 

Even though we have felt reasonably safe from the fires, I feel a little as though we have been thrown into a COVID-19 quarantine – only with bad air.  Other than quick trips to the mail box and to wet down some shrubbery we have stayed indoors … nine days of indoors and we’ll probably have more as the wind shifts back and forth. My planned grocery trip was for a week ago.  We’ve held off, not wanting to stand around the parking lot waiting for the wonderful store near us to bring our groceries out.  I look forward to finally placing an order tomorrow.  

 

Meanwhile its tinder dry around here. Two years ago we took ‘defensible space’ seriously and took 70 cans full of blackberries and brush to the mulcher.  Even though we already have done a pretty good job of removing burnable vegetation from around the house, Dale decided to wet down whatever is near the house.  He fooled the termites!   Usually a big emergence happens when the fall rains come, but, all of a sudden, the yard was full of flying termites.  They had a horrid surprise when they emerged – bone dry and smoky.

Stellar's Jay -- taken up in the mountains

Most insects disappear when it gets smoky – that’s why bee keepers use smoke to calm their bees. Meanwhile our bird feeder birds seem to be gobbling down our offerings.  Perhaps there are getting fewer insects than usual and eager for our food.  We even had a Stellar’s jay in the yard today.  I think that is the first one in all the thirty plus years we have lived here.  They are common in the mountains and wooded areas, but not in town.  He probably is wandering about looking for a new home. 

 

At noon today (Wednesday, Sept 16) we saw a change coming.  The air quality finally dropped out of ‘hazardous’.  When I painted the red sun midday (at the top of this blog), I was already excited. The local internet was full of friends heaving a sigh of relief.   Then, late Wednesday, did you hear a big cheer coming from Roseburg?  Oh my gosh!  Our air quality actually dropped from hazardous to green in about eight hours thanks to a shift in the winds.  Emotionally it feels as if the fires are under control. They aren’t, and won’t be for weeks, but they are slowed way down  … and what did I do?  I grabbed my vacuum cleaner and started vacuuming.   After the news telling me not to vacuum for days, I figured I finally had a window of opportunity.  I never knew I was that domestic.

 

My last observation also reflects on my domesticity.  We’ve been running an air filter in our dining room.  It sucks in air and whooshes it up and away – up towards the ceiling.  I had no idea I had so many cobwebs up there.  They all got dusted with tiny particles and now I can see them.  Guess I know what I’ll be doing tomorrow.  

... and just to make you smile, here is a little barn owlet.

More Osprey Watching: Near Catastrophie!

 When I ended my last osprey blog, the remaining two youngsters were just beginning to flap hard enough to briefly lift off the nest.  That was July 22.   I can’t help but hold my breath when their nesting platform seems so small and so high up in the air.  I wonder if a miscalculation when they were practice flying resulted in the death of the one chick (see my last blog). 

 

During the following ten days we hit a hot spell here and so we didn’t spend much time at the nest, but every time we checked, the remaining two chicks were on the nest and doing just fine. 

 

Aug 2:  We arrive about 4 PM – two on the nest and one on a nearby pole.  Suddenly I realize one of the birds on the nest is an adult – and the bird on the telephone pole is a youngster.  They are really flying!  And to make matters even better, the second youngster, the male, flies over to the telephone pole to join the first.  He is a klutz.  He tries to land on some bulky hardware, rather than the cross arm – not a good perch for an osprey.  It a learning process. 

Oh no!  The female youngster takes off.  Behind her drags three feet of tangled fishline and junk.  She loops around and returns to the pole.  I walk closer for a better look.  This is a disaster waiting to happen.  She has a tangle of fish line, a small stick, and possibly fish skin dangling from her left foot.  She doesn’t like me so close and flies off again. 

 

She makes it safely to the nest platform.  Soon the adult male comes in with part of a fish.  They’ll be busy for awhile.

 

Aug 3:  As we drive down the two miles of blacktop towards the nest I dread what I fear we shall find.  Will she be hung up and dangling form the nest?  If she is still alive, will Pacific Power be willing to come and rescue her? 

So far so good.  Both youngsters are on the nest.  The young male soon takes off and tries a couple of clumsy landings on a green cotton wood tree and then on a snag.  The young female stays on the nest. The tangle of fish line dangles from the edge of the nest, probably still attached to her foot.  We’re hoping she’ll fly too, but instead the male brings in a nice bass.  That’ll keep them busy for quite a while. 

While we wait, twice the adult female flies in with a fist full of dried grasses.  Here the chicks are flying and she still brings in nesting material!  I supposed it helps keep the nest clean.  It must get to be a mess up there.  Sometimes I can see yellowjackets buzzing about, attracted to fish remains. 

 

We stay until it is obvious the chicks and adult female are settling in for the night.  We don’t know if the young female is still tied to that dang tangle of fish line.

 

Aug 4:  We arrive midmorning.  How is the young female doing?  Both chicks are up there and while we watch the male comes in with a small fish.  Big  squabble!  The female chick is an aggressive monster – MINE!  She seems to get the hog’s share of food up there.  It doesn’t take her long to eat the little fish. 

 

Off she goes!  The young female is flying, and without a long tangle of fish line!  My heart sings.  Our photos show she still has line wrapped around her foot and about three inches dangling, but I doubt very much that tid bit will tangle her.  Most important, she appears to use her foot in a normal fashion.  Eventually that bit of line will rot off. 

 

Aug 28: We’ve stopped at the nest several times since we first found the youngsters have started really flying (Aug 2).  Each time we see at least one bird up there for at least part of the time.  Today the young male perched on the nest by himeself and begged for a good half hour.  He finally flew off.  I feel pretty much the same way.   Time to move on.  Part of me wants to spend hours watching to see how long the adults feed their youngsters, but recent watching has been pretty dull.  I think the youngsters are close to independence and I’m ready to move on too.

One last note.  We must have brewed good osprey karma during all this osprey watching.  This photo is of a different osprey, but also a young one.  Dale was sitting quietly on a log on the edge of a small pond.  Suddenly this osprey dipped down and landed about 45 feet from him!  … and sat for several minutes.  The osprey seemed concerned about watching the sky.  When it flew, a red-shoulder hawk took off, hot on its heels.  The red-shoulder is a much smaller hawk.  Hardly a threat, but birds often harass each other.  Fun to watch.