Wallowa County Raptoring

My wife and spent the Labor Day Holiday weekend exploring as much of Eastern Oregon as we could in four days.  On Friday the 4th we started out at 8:30a.m. and head up I-5 toward I-84 for our first night spending it in Pendelton.  I-5 was teeming with Turkey Vultures, some dead trees having every limb with it's own bird. There were the usual Red Tails and Kestrals but no Eagles that day.  The gorge was barren except for a couple of Osprey near Bonneville.  The real fun came when we got bored with I-84 going headed south and east or Highway 74 (the Heppner Highway).  We traveled through some beautiful territory, visiting the towns of Cecil, Ione, Lexington and to Heppner.  Lexington is straight out of a Rockwell painting.  Complete with large grain mill and steam tractor/combine on display in the town square.  Sadly, we saw few birds even as we went from Heppner to Pendelton.  The next days travels north to Tollgate, Elgin and on to Joseph were not much better for birding. 

The excitement for me, came on Sunday when we took the advise of former Joseph resident and fellow OBOLer Kyle Bratcher.  His advise search east into the farmland eventually taking us to the booming metropolis of Imnaha.  Along the way and on the return trip, we spotted twenty plus hawks, Magpies a plenty and even a screech owl.  Much to my wife's disgust I had stopped along the road the previous day and inspected the remains of a road kill Screech owl near Elgin (I can't be the only one who stop and examines dead birds! ) Most of the hawks were Red Tails, with some very brilliant coloring. we saw what we are assuming were 7 different Dark Morph Red Tails east of Joseph and over 14 west into the slopes between Joseph and Enterprise.

 

We ended our trip taking every back road  we could, traveling through Ukiah, Longcreek, Kimberly, Monument and Mitchell.  it was a wonderful drive with breathtaking scenery and lots things to see.  If you are ever in Spray, stop and have a beer & a burger at the RB Band Grill.  They are nice folks and have good food (no bad after effects if you know what I mean).  A couple things we saw along the homeward route were this little coyote,
 

and this rough legged  hawk having lunch.  We hope to get back to the east side soon, there is far too much territory to cover it all in such a short time.   Thanks again to Kyle Bratcher for the great tip on f\where to find the raptors.  You were spot on and I appreciate it greatly!  I could also use some help in identifying this buteo.

 

Thanks for looking!