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Birds of River, Forest and Sky 
By Florence Merriam Bailed 
In recalling some delightful hours once spent among the birds 
of McKenzie Bridge in the heart of the Cascade range, pictures of 
three birds, the water ouzel, the nighthawk, and the winter wren, 
come most vividly to mind; for they are creatures of the roaring, 
sparkling, glacial river, of the still, dark, coniferous forest, and above 
the encircling mountains, of the peaceful sunset sky. 
An Hour with the Dipper 
What rare memories of the Sierra Nevada and Rocky Mountains 
the name of dipper or water ouzel recalls! Memories of moving 
shadows along the dusky banks of cascaded forest brooks; memories 
of a gray, short-tailed bird standing alertly, questioningly, on a rock 
in the river as your pack train appears, and at your advance, with short¬ 
winged flight buzzing over the dashing spray to another rock farther 
down the river; memories of a small gray figure on the edge of a quiet 
lake in a lofty glacial amphitheater. 
Good hunting grounds are offered the dippers by the McKenzie 
river when, after rushing down from the glaciers of the Three Sisters to 
the middle reaches of the Cascades, it has lost most of the glacial silt 
that made it milky above, and after plunging headlong over rapids, 
spreads out green in the level stretches where jutting rocks rise above 
the surface and shingly bars lie along the shoals. Here, unlike the river 
at the foot of the glaciers where the birds are found in summer, the 
ouzels’ hunting grounds are never closed to them, for although the water 
from the icy peaks warms very slowly—giving a record of 41° in June— 
between rapids the current is too swift to admit of its ever freezing over. 
A familiar chattering call and glimpses of a small gray form disap¬ 
pearing over the water now up and now down stream, together with an 
occasional whitewashed rock along the bank, had told us of the presence 
of this lovely bird which adds a charming touch of life to the wild 
mountain torrents of the west. A devoted habitue of the river who had 
wandered in happy exploration far up its forested banks told of re¬ 
peatedly finding the ouzel near a cabin overlooking the river, and led 
me up along a woods trail to the spot. A long bar at a turn of the 
river was said by the friendly observers on the high bank above to 
be the favorite feeding ground of a pair of the birds, and whitened 
stones at the end of the shingle attested the fact. So, sitting down 
in sight of the spot, we prepared to watch the birds dine. 
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