Two in the bush

Text: Bill Monroe
Illustrations: René Eisenbart
The OREGONIAN

The Lewis and Clark expedition opened the continent, discovered waterways, named mountains and rivers, established the first good — and a couple of not-so-good — relationships with Native Americans and collected a wealth of new flora. Then, of course, there were the fauna.

Meriwether Lewis, the better naturalist, and William Clark took the time and trouble to collect and observe a natural world they knew would be new to those back east in the United States. So much was collected, it's hard to imagine how they carried it home.

On July 20, 1805, in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Lewis spotted a woodpecker unlike any other he'd seen. It was, he wrote, a dark color that "has a long tail and flys a good deel like the jay bird."

Just a month later, on Aug. 22, as Clark tested the waters in the Salmon River canyon, he reported on another woodpecker-type bird, about the size of a robin.

It wasn't until the return trip the following year, though, that Lewis began shooting and collecting specimens. He penned his first detailed description of Lewis's woodpecker on May 27. The next day, he did the same for Clark's nutcracker. Each was packed, brought home and ultimately examined by one of North America's first ornithologists, Alexander Wilson, who named the birds after the original explorers.

Clark's nutcracker

Latin name: Nucifraga columbiana

Family: Crow, or corvid

Size: 12 to 13 inches long

Description: Mostly white, with black wings carrying a single white patch. Lewis was so meticulous he counted six feathers in the white wing patch of each specimen.

Life cycle: One of the few birds that tends to stay in high country year-round, although may move a little downhill in the heaviest weather. Both parents build nests in February and March, often in the snow. Both also set the eggs, even in blizzards.

Diet: Loves pine and pinyon nuts (can store dozens in its throat), but also will eat flying insects, grubs, snails and even the eggs of small birds. Tends to collect with gray jays in hunting camp as hunters trim scraps from deer and elk.

Also known as: Often called "camp robber" because of its boldness around camp kitchens.

Quirks: Is known to fold wings and hurl downward into canyons, suddenly opening its wings to check flight, like some hummingbirds, except with a much stronger roaring sound. Will occasionally follow coyotes and deer, and comes to the call of a horned owl. Sometimes stores seeds in the ground to eat later, but while it will dig through several inches of snow to reach the stash, the bird doesn't find everything it plants. This behavior is believed responsible for much reforestation.

What Lewis wrote: "This bird feeds on the seed of the pine and also on insects. It resides in the rocky mountains at all seasons of the year, and in many parts is the only bird to be found."

Lewis's woodpecker

Latin name: Melanerpes lewis

Family: Woodpecker

Size: 11 inches

Description: Young birds are very dark at first, later developing a glossy green back, red face patch and gray neck band. Chest of adult is mottled red/pink.

Life cycle: Cavity-nester that mates for life and stays with mate all year. Prefers open areas and logged forests.

Diet: Catches flying insects on the wing and has been seen spending as long as half an hour in the air with swallows, feeding. Also will store acorns like the acorn woodpecker, with which it competes for nuts.

Quirks: Doesn't drum as much as other woodpeckers to announce its territory, relying instead upon vocal calls. Also doesn't dig into bark for insects, preferring to fly for food. Sometimes damages commercial pear and apple orchards in Oregon, dates in California and pomegranates in Arizona.

What Lewis wrote: "The belly and breast is a curious mixture of white and blood red which has much the appearance of having been artificially painted or stained of that colour."

SOURCES: Web site: www.lewis-clark.org, The Audubon Society Encyclopedia of North American Birds

THE LEGACY GROWS reproduced courtesy of the Oregonian.
These stories originally ran May 24, 2001
© 2001 The Oregonian
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