The road to Steens Mountain in Oregon may appear Spare , but there is an abundance of beautiful sights, sounds, and scents in the high desert.
Spare: Daily Post Photography Challenge
Month: May 2016
Optimism in a single flower – Inspiration
Some put everything they have into making the world a better place.
May Showers, High Desert Flowers
Purple sage and paintbrush
A desert can be desolate
Arid and barren
Spring showers
Splash colors
Of brilliant hues
Amidst the sand
Painting with a delicate brush
From a palette of rainbows
Balsamroot 
Who Times Two: A pair of burrowing owls
Who times two is a portrait of two burrowing owls, Athene cunicularia. Observed at the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon.
Purple Mountain Majesties: Wordless Wednesday
Wordless Wednesday
Look closer to find the unexpected
Looks like an old homestead, right?
Look closer.
Go on…zoom in.
If we learn to focus in on things and look closer, we sometimes find the unexpected.
In this case, it’s a double-crested cormorant and great blue heron rookery. These birds look and act so differently yet they manage to get along.
This rookery is located at the Sod House Ranch at Malheur NWR. It was built by cattle-baron Peter French in the late 1800’s. The ranch was the headquarters of the French-Glenn Livestock Company that at one time covered 140,000 acres.
Mt Hood peek on a sunny April day
If I have to travel to the west side of the state, at least I get to peek at this peak.
Here is a link to a site with all kinds of interesting info about Mt Hood AKA Wy’East.
Spring Night Songs of Pacific Treefrogs
Pacific treefrog, Pseudacris regilla, serenade from our small backyard pond.
First with a couple backup singers, then the solo artist, and finally, the chorus joins in.
Hope you enjoy this short recording of the spring night songs of Pacific treefrogs.