The New ONDA.org
Welcome to the new ONDA website. Well, hello there reader! If this is your first time visiting ONDA’s website, you can skip right past this post and carry on in your exploration of this site. Those of you who have been following ONDA for a few years will have noticed that our website looks...
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365 Days of Beauty
ONDA’s Wild Desert Calendar highlights the beauty of Oregon’s high desert In 2004, a crew of motivated, scrappy and talented Oregon Natural Desert Association supporters dreamed up the idea of creating a photographic collection dedicated solely to the beauty of Oregon’s high desert. Thus, ONDA’s Wild Desert Calendar was born!
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Sage Society: Sustaining Desert Conservation
Retired science teacher Scott Bowler is a proud member of ONDA’s Sage Society, the community of advocates and donors who live their values by sustaining critical conservation efforts year-round with monthly contributions. We recently spoke with Scott about his decades-long commitment to sustaining Oregon conservation efforts through volunteering, advocacy, and the Sage Society. ONDA: Tell...
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Our Take on Sec. Zinke’s Secret Monuments Report
The public finally has access to the Trump administration’s report on the review of 27 national monuments, but only because it was leaked to the press. Astonishingly, Zinke’s memo to the president still fails to provide key details on changes he’s recommending to these jewels of our public lands. Zinke’s report lacks clarity on...
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How to Talk to Your Friends about Public Lands
For most outdoor recreationists, talking about being out in nature comes, well, naturally. We share photos from our trips. We rave about the views we enjoyed and the wildlife we encountered. We invite our friends to join us on our next adventure. But, when it comes to talking about the policies that govern the public...
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Giving Wild Animals Freedom to Roam
Volunteers remove obsolete fence from more than 90,000 acres in the Steens Mountain Wilderness The 97,229 acre cow-free portion of the Steens Mountain Wilderness Area in southeastern Oregon is now completely free of obsolete barbed wire fence, thanks to the work of Oregon Natural Desert Association (ONDA) volunteers who removed the last two miles...
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Zinke undercuts BLM sage grouse conservation plan
Secretary of the Interior Zinke undercuts BLM sage grouse conservation plan. The Department of the Interior recently issued a set of proposed changes for sage grouse conservation that will harm the species rather than help it. ONDA has been a leader in sage-grouse protection efforts by investing decades of effort in habitat monitoring, stakeholder...
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Wilderness Values: A View from Above
Oregon Natural Desert Association employee Jeremy Austin realizes a childhood dream, and takes to the sky across southeastern Oregon with LightHawk. Photos by Jim Davis with aerial support by LightHawk. If you could have any superpower, what would it be? As kids growing up, we used to ask ourselves this question almost daily. For...
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The Oregon Desert Trail (ODT) has made a lot of progress in the past year thanks to the continued support of the hiking community, gateway community partners, ONDA members and the outdoor industry. Highlights include 8 completed thru-hikes of the 750 mile route, 23 Oregon Desert Trail presentations throughout Oregon and Idaho reaching over...
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Owyhee Beckoning
Julie Weikel grew up in ‘ION’ country, the area where Idaho, Oregon and Nevada’s borders meet. She worked for over four decades in the area as a large animal vet, building an intimate, deep knowledge of the Owyhee’s people, history, land, water and wildlife. She’s traveled extensively throughout the Owyhee Canyonlands and explored many...
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