Join Andy and Ellen Stepniewski, both birders and naturalists, for this program for the ABC Club on Sunday, April 10 in Ellensburg at 6:30 am.   Andy authored “The Birds of Yakima County, Washington” and writes a monthly nature column called Wildlife Moment for the Yakima Herald-Republic. Both Andy and Ellen are active in the Yakima Valley Audubon Society.

It’s easy for folks living in the cool and moist west side of the Pacific Northwest to be unaware of the opposite world on the other side of the Cascades in the Columbia Basin. In the west, one is seldom far from water and the Evergreen State does seem apt.  East of the Cascades, water is scarce and precious and the countryside is often more gray than green. Trees are replaced by a cover of shrubs and grasses. This ecosystem is called the shrub-steppe. Think of eastern Washington’s Columbia Basin as high desert with sagebrush and grasses. Ecologically, it is a part of the Great Basin, that vast region of the American West lying in the rain-shadow of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada Mountains. The shrub-steppe landscape is indeed very different from western Washington’s moist conifer forests.

Andy spoke to ABC a year ago about this area.  A short report can be found on our website at:

Meet at 6:30 am at the Buzz Inn Steakhouse at Exit 109, just south of I-90, and north of the truck stop. From there we caravan out on I-90 to Exit 115 and head south, first touring ag fields for curlews and hawks. Then, we head east along the Old Vantage Hwy, stopping in the Quilomene WA to view and hear shrub-steppe birds such as Sage and Brewer’s Sparrows and Sage Thrashers.

We press on east and down the old highway to Vantage, perhaps stopping a few times to search for owls and shrikes.

At Vantage, we’ll gather at the Gingko Interpretive Center overlook and search for Rock Wrens and Say’s Phoebes, as well loons, grebes, and diving ducks on the waters below.

From Vantage, we tour south along Huntzinger Rd., searching for Great Horned Owl, swallows, Canyon Wrens, and White-throated Swifts. We’ll also admire the stupendous cliffs at Sentinel Gap, where a Peregrine might rocket by.

From Vantage we head across the Columbia River and go east along Crab Creek below the magnificent Saddle Mountains, amidst a landscape very similar to many mountain ranges to the south in the Great Basin. Raptors, shorebirds, and huge flocks of Sandhill Cranes are possibilities.

Return to Seattle via SR-26 to I-90 and thence west over the pass.

Field Trip limited to 5 cars total 20 people including trip leaders. 18 spaces available.

6:30 am meeting at

Buzz Inn Steakhouse

2202 Canyon Road

Ellensburg, WA 98926

Call or email Diane to sign up, Avosetta@hotmail.com, (253) 857-3367.