Reason No. 4

Reason No. 4
of 55 Reasons to Take Care of Mother Earth:

photo copyright 2010 Susan Faye

Duck Moms in Camouflage

(There are two more ducklings hidden somewhere under her wings!)

The Lower Mississippi Valley is the largest wintering ground in the world for mallard ducks. To find out what the Nature Conservancy is doing to preserve this vital ecosystem, click here: Freshwater Conservation

Over the next few weeks I will be posting photos or artwork of 55 reasons why I think it's a good idea to take care of Mother Earth. If you find any of my 55 reasons compelling, please consider making a small donation if you can: 55 cents, $1.55, 5.50, or $55.00 (you get the drift...) to the Susan Faye Double Nickel Birthday Fund for Mother Nature to benefit the Nature Conservancy

Your donation will support the many programs of the Nature Conservancy, an efficient and effective organization that has been working around the world for 60 years to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people. My goal is to raise $550 to help with their important work.

If you would like to donate, please click here:
Double Nickel Fund

Thanks for visiting!

Flora and Fauna on the Canyon Creek Meadows Loop

On Monday I had the pleasure of visiting the lower meadows of Canyon Creek near Sisters, Oregon, thanks to my intrepid personal hiking guide--Globe Trekker Mary.

This moderate 4.5-mile loop takes you on a tour of a high alpine meadow of wildflowers, with bubbling Canyon Creek flowing through it. In addition, there are spectacular views of the jagged spires of Three Fingered Jack.

The wildflowers were a few weeks behind schedule but we still saw plenty of flora and some fauna too:

A fuzzy Cat's Ear flower...

A male Oregon Junco...

Indian Paintbrush...

Mountain Heather...

A tiny Silvery Blue butterfly...

And Bear Grass--something I had never seen before! It was EVERYWHERE and looked like giant fairy wands :

At first we thought this was a female Northern Flicker, but upon closer inspection we think it is a female Williamson's Sapsucker...

There was a merry band of Gray Jays...

And lots of lupine, paired here with manzanita...

Possibly the prettiest of all were the Shooting Star flowers!

At the highest points of the trail there were patches of snow! In July! Can you believe it? Here is my artistic interpretation of a snow shelf melting over a creek:

Thanks for visiting!

Directions to the trail: Drive Highway 20 east of Santiam Pass 8 miles. At a "Wilderness Trailheads" sign near milepost 88 (1 mile east of Suttle Lake or 12 miles west of Sisters), turn north on paved Jack Lake Road 12 for 4.4 miles. Then turn left on one-lane Road 1230 for 1.6 miles to the end of pavement, and finally turn left onto Road 1234, climbing 6 miles to the trailhead at the primitive Jack Lake campground.

Illustration Friday..."Hollow"

Illustration Friday (theme: "hollow")

What a pleasure to spot this handsome fellow as he hopped along a hollow log in search of bugs and grubs just two days before spring, signaling the end of a particularly chilly winter...
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Hooray! I'm excited to announce that this original watercolor painting has just found a new home with a lovely Oregon art collector.

A Beautiful Day

I had the pleasure of hiking up the Cascade Head trail for the first time on Friday with Dave, Mary, and Scott. It was one of those perfect, windswept, shining, glorious days along the Oregon coast. God bless the Nature Conservancy for preserving, developing and maintaining a beautiful trail winding upward through a fairy garden forest.

We enjoyed flora...

and fauna...

and the VIEW!

For more information about Cascade Head visit this link: Cascade Head
Enjoy!

Twittering Tweeters...The Real Deal

(File under: Be Careful What You Wish For...)

For several weeks, I have been looking forward with great anticipation to seeing my first goldfinch of the spring. My wish was fulfilled today. I saw my first goldfinch, plus at least 40 of his closest friends at our bird feeders...As we say here in the Pacific Northwest, "When it rains, it pours". Enjoy!

IF: Intricate

My entry for Illustration Friday is a watercolor study of a little song sparrow that I painted last year.

I love the INTRICATE pattern of banding that he had on this throat and chest...it was a fun challenge to paint. He had a favorite fence post and would appear every late afternoon and serenade us with his beautiful song after eating his fill of seeds spilled on the ground by the feeder birds.

I just put this painting up for sale in my Etsy Shop:

Song Sparrow Watercolor

Illustration Friday is a wonderful website that presents a different theme each week, then encourages illustrators to submit an illustration about that theme.

Enjoy!

Let Your Dreams Take Wing

"Breezy" is this week's theme for Illustration Friday. My entry is my watercolor of a hawk dancing on the wind. We have a wonderful array of hawks, eagles and vultures in the Willamette Valley and Coastal Hills of Oregon, and I always find inspiration when I see one of these splendid birds floating through the sky.

This image is available on my line of Mother Nature giftware at my Cafepress shop: Susan Faye For Nature Lovers

Illustration Friday is a wonderful website that presents a different theme each week, then encourages illustrators to submit an illustration about that theme.

Thanks for visiting!

Count Your Blessings And Your Birds

It's that time again folks--

The Great Backyard Bird Count begins across North America on Friday, February 13th. It's simple and it's fun. It spans four days, but you can participate for as little as 30 minutes during one day of your choice.

For more information, visit the wonderful interactive site: Great Backyard Bird Count

These two paintings feature goldfinch pairs that are regular visitors to our feeders in the spring and summer--haven't seen any of these pretty little chirpers yet this year but Dave spotted a gorgeous varied thrush a few days ago, along with the juncos and chickadees...

I'll be counting birds most of the weekend, but I'll also be demonstrating watercolor painting techniques at
Lawrence Gallery Sheridan
in Oregon on Sunday, Feb. 15, from 1 to 4-ish p.m. in the gallery's Wine Shop.

Both of these watercolor paintings that are part of the exhibit which includes about a dozen more nature studies in watercolor. To see the whole collection, visit this link:

Watercolors at Lawrence Gallery

Thanks for visiting!

Featured Artwork: HALFWAY DOWN THE KAIBAB TRAIL

It's summertime which means thousands of vacationers will be heading to the Grand Canyon. If they venture over the side and hike down into the canyon, they might just meet this old fellow who welcomed my friend Mary and me several years ago about halfway down the Kaibab Trail. We had stopped to enjoy our first glimpse of our destination: the Colorado River (still half a mile straight down), and this curious and sociable raven stopped on a nearby boulder to peruse the breathtaking and windy vista with us...

The original artwork is not for sale at this time, however, the image can be found on a variety of gift items at my CafePress website: Susan Faye For Nature Lovers


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Featured Photo: WHO'S THE NEW GUY

The birds are back in full force and large numbers this year at Pumpkinseed Acres in the coastal hills northwest of Willamina. This is one of my favorite photos from last year, of a goldfinch and a pine siskin checking out the chubby and rather stony "new guy" at the feeder.

Although we currently have a very large contingent of goldfinches at the feeders, we have not seen a single pine siskin yet--last year we had quite a few by this time.

For more information on back yard birdwatching visit this site: http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc

Featured Photo...GOODBYE DUSKY GEESE

Honk if you love geese! The weather is finally warming up, so it's time to say goodbye to the thousands of Dusky Geese (a subspecies of the Canadian Goose) who winter here in the Willamette Valley. The skies are filled every day with great V's of happily honking geese as they make their way north to their summer homes.

To find out more information about the Baskett Slough, a wildlife preserve designed with the Dusky Goose in mind (whose specialized winter habitat had been shrinking down to nothing), please visit this link: Baskett Slough National Wildlife Preserve

Thanks for visiting!