Hiking and Herping through Columbia County
Upcoming Work Parties
The Scappoose Bay Watershed Council and various “Friends of ……” park groups have planned work parties for the following dates. Work parties are a fantastic time to hang out together in nature, get a good workout (to whatever degree you want to do hard work), make connections, and talk with pleasant people. I’ve brought my…
BLM’s proposed Management Plan
On February 19, BLM published new Resource Management Plans for its Western Oregon lands. The new plan quadruples current timber production. To meet this goal, the federal agency will ignore wildlife and old-growth protections that resulted from decades of local input and negotiation. For example, the new plan eliminates the stream buffer compromise worked out…
Turtle And Amphibian Forum via Zoom
Edit: The video of the event can now be viewed here: The Scappoose Bay Watershed Council will be holding an online Turtle and Amphibian Forum on Wednesday, March 11th from 4 pm to 6 pm. You can register here via Zoom. The speakers will be Susan Barnes of ODFW, Jon Hakim of Wild Columbia, and…
Wonders of the Boise Cascade Property
The second conservation priority site we identified was the wilderness portion of the old Boise Cascade property (now coined the St. Helens Industrial Business Park). It made our list as the second-most pristine site for meadow reptiles. The complex supports Rubber Boas, Racers, and one of just three populations of Western Skinks in Columbia County.…
The OPB Interview
So, I did the interview for OPB’s “Think Out Loud” segment and it went fine. I was nervous going in and made a few minor mistakes – the biggest of which was saying we found 3 new invasive species and 3 new native species, when it is actually 2 new invasive and 4 new native.…
The study is published! Part 3: the Carcus Creek/Lava Creek complex
After all that work collecting data and studying habitat associations, we identified five habitats as the greatest conservation priorities for reptiles and amphibians in Columbia County. The first of those is the Carcus Creek / Lava Creek complex. Introduction to the Land The area in question is ~6 miles east of Mist in the center…
The study is published! Part 2: Where are these animals found?
One of our goals was to determine where each species was found. We ended up with much more interesting data than we had expected. The reptiles and amphibians of Columbia County fall into four major distribution patterns, all of which are closely tied to the geographic features of the county. The shaded squares in the…
The study is published! Part 1: What animals did we find?
Our paper is finally published! This was a labor of love, the product of years of research, over a thousand hours of surveying, and months of writing and editing. We deeply thank the hundreds of contributors who provided us with data, the scores of landowners who let us survey on their property, and the dozens…
Scappoose Bay Watershed Council hosting weekly events leading up to October 11th Native Plant Sale
An active outdoorsy Fall season awaits with the Scappoose Bay Watershed Council offering a work party, birding field trips and a mason bee class in the coming weeks leading up to their annual Fall native plant sale on October 11th. Upcoming Events
July Bird Forum with the Scappoose Bay Watershed Council
Have you ever tried to decode bird language? Wondered which birds flock together and which birds squabble over air space? Well this is the forum for you! Scappoose Bay Watershed Council is hosting an online forum for bird lovers on July 9th from 4 – 6 pm via Zoom. The forum will feature talks from…
Something went wrong. Please refresh the page and/or try again.
Would you like to follow the blog?
Get new content emailed directly to your inbox.
Wild Columbia County 