Lots of butterflies this year...

Painted Lady butterfly on the lavender....

Elk babes...

5 elk calves cooling off.

So darned cute!

Oregon Sunshine...

Oregon Sunshine 

attracts a lot of butterflies.

Yesterday we saw a monarch, swallowtails and others 

flitting from Sunshine to Yarrow and back again.

From 4 small Sunshine starts 

provided by local Soil and Water Conservation District 

a couple of years ago

to this.......

spring????

Beautiful,

Unbelievable,

February,

Spring Weather.

Couldn't resist these orange primroses.

Miniature iris.
At first glance, they look like a purple crocus.
No more than 4 inches tall.
First blooms of spring....in February.

White tailed kite...

Watching this raptor for the last week or so....
Yesterday morning got a good enough view to identify it as a white tail kite.

White Tailed Kite (not my photo)

Always fun to make a positive identification on a bird.  

Especially one seen for the first time.

From the Audubon Society:  The tame, elegant White-tailed Kite was formerly shot in large numbers by farmers who thought it threatened their chickens, although the birds feed almost entirely on insects and a few small rodents. The North American population was reduced to a pitiful remnant, and it was feared that the species might become extinct here. White-tailed Kites have since made a spectacular comeback in California and Texas and are now common in suitable lowland habitats. Like other kites, they are sociable outside the breeding season, congregating at roosts in groups of a dozen or more. They feed mainly on small rodents and insects, which they locate by hovering kestrel-like high in the air. These kites prefer to rest on treetops or other high lookouts.

(A very interesting piece on the Cornucopia site. Don't Ask How to Feed the 9 Billion....link at left.  Definitely worth reading to debunk Monsanto's claim that we need genetically modified crops and bundles of chemical pesticides in order to  end world hunger.)

Still fighting the damn dump...

Still fighting the expansion of Riverbend Dumpfill on the banks of the Yamhill River.
Waste Management Inc, the largest garbage company in the whole wide world, has an expansion application in front of the Yamhill County Commissioners.  During this application process Waste Management is spreading $500,000 around the area, $150,000 here in Yamhill County.

I guess they think that we are just local yokels and won't notice the connection between their application to expand the noxious unsorted-anything-can-be-disposed-of-here garbage dump in a flood plain and the greasing of palms.

Waste Management's arrogance and lack of concern for the environment and the surrounding farms and vineyards is crazy making.  Three letters to the local paper this week opposed to the dump's 37 acre expansion.  One of them mine.

A little too chummy?

Thank you, Jeb Bladine, for your Oct. 31 column, “Awkward time for county partnership.”

And thanks also for the News-Register editorial board’s Nov. 14 opinion piece on the local landfill debate. Reading these two pieces, I couldn’t help but consider the term “quid pro quo” in relationship to the county’s partnership with Waste Management. Waste Management/Riverbend Landfill gives $150,000 each to Yamhill County and its municipalities while soliciting an affirmative vote on Riverbend expansion.

Could the county’s acceptance of $150,000 from an out-of-state corporation with a pending land-use application be more than bad form or a conflict of interest?

Oregon state law says a person (corporation) commits the crime of bribery if the person offers, confers or agrees to confer any pecuniary benefit upon a public servant with the intent to influence the public servant’s vote, opinion, judgment, action, decision or exercise of discretion in an official capacity.

The federal bribery statute provides for a hefty fine and/up to 10 years imprisonment for persons corruptly offering or accepting benefits/dollars with the intent to influence official decision-making. The federal law applies at the local level when the offending official represents an entity that receives at least $10,000 from the federal government.

Partnership? Grant? Donation? Bribe? Quid pro quo? Sure seems like it is worth thought and good discussion at both the city and county levels

http://stopthedumpcoalition.org/TheDump.cshtml

A couple of good youtube videos at this link.

http://leakyland.com/?p=908

On Veteran's Day

Thank you, Dad.

Harry William Walster

1924-2014

Fly Fishing Moose Creek in Montana