Category: Uncategorized
A Thru-Hiker’s Message – Stay Home
An Oregon Desert Trail Thru-hiker Recounts a Decision To Get Off the Trail post by Riley Manning It’s a scary time right now. As the flowers bloom and the days grow long, hikers who had spent months and years preparing for their thru-hikes: quitting jobs, ending leases, selling off furniture, are now canceling their...
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Why We’re Nominating Whychus Creek
The following Wild and Scenic River nomination was written by the Bend Senior High School Environmental Club. Whychus Creek: a Nomination as a Wild and Scenic River We rely on our watershed. It provides unique habitat, gorgeous scenery, historical connections, and gives life to the towns and cities of Oregon. In order for Oregon...
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How to nominate a river for Wild and Scenic protection
Oregon can already claim to be the state with the most Wild and Scenic Rivers, and U.S. Senator Ron Wyden has a not-so-secret goal to make Oregon the state with the Most Designated Miles, too. (Right now, that honor goes to Alaska.) Earlier this fall, Sen. Wyden announced a new effort to protect more...
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Three Amazing High Desert Inhabitants
Oregon’s high desert is a land of many superlatives. You’ll find North America’s fastest land mammal here, as well as its largest fault block mountain. Perhaps most intriguing are the ways that the plants, animals and insects that call the high desert home have evolved over millennia in ways that allow them to survive...
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The Creation Story and the Malheur Cave
For the Paiute of the Great Basin of the American West, winter is storytelling season. Around the fires of Paiute camps and villages, storytellers passed on tribal visions of the animal people and the human people, their origins and values, their spiritual and natural environment, and their culture and daily lives. The book “Legends...
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Special Waters
Julie Weikel, a longtime ONDA member, wrote this essay about the wild waters of the Pueblo Mountains to nominate them for protection under the Wild and Scenic River act. Read her story and nominate your favorite desert river using the form below. Lying like prehistoric claw marks upon the sagebrush breasts of southeast Oregon’s...
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A Gift Appreciated Worldwide
ONDA’s Wild Desert Calendar Goes Abroad Giving a Wild Desert Calendar as a gift has become something of a tradition among a number of ONDA members. So, where do all these calendars go? We asked a few of our longtime calendar givers — members Susie Neubauer, Patty Giffin, Terry Butler, Sidney Henderson and Mark...
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Best Bets for Fall
As the days cool down and our thoughts turn to cozy campfires and the first few flakes of snow, Oregon Desert Trail Coordinator Renee Patrick has rounded up a few best bets for experiencing Oregon’s high desert in fall 2018. Remember, Oregon’s high desert is a dynamic place, so, as always, check current conditions...
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Migratory Birds of the High Desert
Every year, dozens of beloved bird species migrate from their part-time homes around the world back to the high desert of Oregon to breed, feed and raise chicks. These birds can fly many thousands of miles in order to get to the land and water they rely on to survive and thrive as a...
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Ten Winter Adventures in the High Desert
Five for No Snow, Five for Snow. Winter in Oregon’s high desert can look and be quite different from one year to the next. In winter 2017, copious snowfall covered much of the sagebrush sea with feet of fun for skiers and snowshoers. The 2018 winter season lent itself more to hiking than snow...
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