Allen’s Hummingbird
This character has set up shop in our ‘front yard’ (the slope in front of our house that faces the lake). It’s there most of the time and we often hear the buzzing wings and peculiar noise made when it dives. As with many hummingbirds, it has beautiful colors, an iridescent winking flying jewel in the sunlight.
American Coot
Sherri snapped this picture from our boat while we were traversing the canal from North Lake to South Lake. These coal black water birds are often seen hanging out close to ducks, which they are a bit smaller than. They seem pretty low key and don’t make much noise. They’re related to rails rather than ducks. Apparently they have the largest Oregon breeding population of any waterfowl.
American Robin
These plump-looking birds with bright orange breasts are everywhere in the spring, and probably some of the most recognizable birds in North America. We see them all over the green lawns of our marina, hunting for worms and other invertebrates, in groups or on their own. We see them around our home as well, but they are not as numerous there.
Bald Eagle
The picture is not great (we definitely put the ‘aspiring’ in ‘aspiring photographers’) but the white head is distinctive. We see and hear these magnificent raptors occasionally, and have seen them grab fish out of the lake right in front of our house. One time we were headed down the steps to the boathouse and one came screaming down right over our heads – I almost hit the deck because it sounded for all the world like an incoming missile.
Barn Swallow
Last year, a pair of barn swallows built a nest on one of our outdoor deck speakers, and raised three babies in it. We left the nest there, and they were back this year to raise the four chicks shown in the picture above. It was quite charming to see the four of them perched on the edge of the nest observing us as we passed by. These are extremely active birds that fly quickly and acrobatically.
Canada Goose
These large birds are everywhere on the lake in the spring, flying in V-shaped squadrons and honking loudly. This particular one was perched on our boathouse breakwater logs. It’s been a bit of a battle to keep them out of our boathouse – when they’re inside they make a mess on the decking.
Chesnut-Backed Chickadee
Tiny, active little birds, these guys are often flitting about in the trees but are easy to miss. They have a very low key call that fades into the background noise. I observed this one just 30 feet from our back door. It was busy hanging from branch tips (sometimes upside down) while foraging.
Common Raven
We see these often at our marina, looking for an opportunity for food. Last summer, we had left several garbage bags in our boat moored at the marina (we were in a rush and were going to bring the bags to the dumpster upon returning to the boat) and found the garbage bags torn open and the garbage strewn about. It could have been gulls, but we’re fairly sure it was these guys. Fortunately none of the garbage ended up in the lake.
Double-Crested Cormorant
I snapped this picture on 2/25/24. It was near sunset and the bird was backlit, so it’s not a fantastic picture. However, the crests are plainly visible. This is the first time I’ve seen this bird on our lake. It had settled on a piling by our boathouse, and even though I got within 15 feet (on our barge), it was completely unphased by my presence. I made some loud noises near it later doing something else, and the bird was not startled. Very chill.
Great Blue Heron
These are a common sight along the shores of Tenmile Lakes. Standing up to four feet tall, they wait motionless until some unlucky fish, amphibian, or aquatic invertebrate ventures too close. With their billowy feathers they look a bit unkempt.
Great Egret
A little harder to locate than the Great Blue Heron, these birds are almost as large and a dazzling sight with their stark white plumage. They hunt by standing immobile and ambushing or wading slowly through the shallows, but have been observed to swim. Note that this bird is the symbol of the National Audubon Society. They were almost hunted to extinction for their plumes in the late nineteenth century. We see them most frequently at our marina, and along the canal that connects North and South Tenmile Lakes.
Killdeer
These are small, cautious birds that we see around our marina on South Tenmile Lake. They blend in quite well and it’s hard to see details with the naked eye, but upon zooming in with our camera for these photos we were surprised at the coloration and eye color. They have a very distinctive call and are quite common in the US. They nest on the ground and reportedly will fake a broken wing to lure predators away from their nests.
Mallard Duck
In the early to mid summer we frequently see a pair of mallards with a flotilla of ducklings accompanying them. If you click on the picture above, you’ll see eight ducklings with Mom and Dad. The ducklings flit about here and there, while the adults maintain a watchful eye and occasionally duck their heads under the water for a bite to eat. When there’s no ducklings, often all you see of the ducks is their posterior sticking out of the water as they forage.
Osprey
I was working near the lake shore and heard a splash. This osprey was in the the water about 20 ft from shore and trying to lift off again, but couldn’t. It turns out it had landed a fish too big to fly with. As I watched, it swam/splashed to our old dock, and proceeded to feast on the fish. We have at least one pair of these birds who nest near our home. They’re migratory and are only here for the spring and summer.
Song Sparrow
These small birds are easy to miss as they hop in and out of foliage on the ground, looking for food. We see them often in our back yard, and apparently they are widespread throughout much of western Oregon. Their song is quite beautiful.
Steller’s Jay
These Steller’s Jays are some of the first non-waterfowl birds we encountered when we moved in, but we’re seeing them much more often since we put up a bird feeder. They’re very active and curious, though we wish they sounded as beautiful as they look. We’ve selected this photo as our site icon, so they’re somewhat our mascots.
Turkey Vulture
We sometimes have a squadron of these birds buzzing our home for some reason, and once one of them went so far as to settle on the deck railing. They can have up to a six-foot wingspan, but only weigh 2-4 lbs. Despite their reputation, vultures in general prefer meat as fresh as possible and won’t eat extremely rotted carcasses. Many more facts about them can be read at https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/turkey-vulture.
In Progress
We will update this as soon as we have good pictures!
European Harvestman
This arachnid had an enormous leg span (maybe 3 to 4 inches across), but as you can see there’s not much to its body. They are not true spiders and are harmless to humans. We found it on the wall one day, but actually are rather grateful to have them around since they’ll eat other insects in the house, including mites.
Pacific Clubtail Dragonfly
We took this picture on our deck. These dragonflies are tough to identify, but we *think* it’s a Pacific Clubtail female.
Sierra Dome Spider
We see these beautiful, domed webs around our home and property. It’s amazing (to us) that these spiders can weave such a masterpiece of symmetry. They often catch more pine needles than food – there must be a lot of false alarms.
Yellow-Faced Bumble Bee
One of the plethora of insects we see around our property, most often these are found on the many flowers that grow here. In the spring they are quite busy.
Yellow Woolly Bear Caterpillar
Some day this dude will grow up to become a moth (which apparently likes to eat our asparagus, among other things). Sources say they are the most common caterpillar in North America.
Oregon Myrtlewood
This is different from the Pacific Wax Myrtle. We have several clusters of these trees growing at the higher elevations away from the lake. They can grow up to 30 feet tall and the ones on our property are close to that.
Pacific Wax Myrtle
We have these evergreen, fast-growing native trees on various parts of our property, including right off our main deck, pictured above. They produce a small purple fruit that birds eat.
Rhododendron
There are Rhododendron trees everywhere on our property, and in late spring / early summer the blooms are magnificent.
Common Sword Fern
These plants are literally almost everywhere on our property. Fortunately they’re beautiful to behold, and interesting when they’re unfurling new fronds – they spool out from a circular structure. I’m constantly having to clip the fronds that they poke into our trails – the free space and light on the trails is like a magnet for them.
Evergreen Violet
We see these small, beautiful flowers in various spots in the woods around the property. They provide a nice splash of bright yellow to augment the brown shades of the forest floor. They have the scientific name Viola sempervirens, and are perennials native to the west coast. They often have flowers throughout the year.
Foxglove
Some time in early to mid June, the flowers on these plants burst into glory. We had a few about the property when we arrived, but have been active about scattering their seeds everywhere. I’ve seen stalks on these plants laden with flowers over eight feet tall. Have a care though – although quite beautiful when in flower, all parts of these plants are poisonous.
Huckleberry
These bushes grow thickly within 100-200 feet of the lake edge, but thin out and disappear as you walk further up the hill away from the water. They grow like weeds and are probably the most successful plant form of life on the property. By late summer most of the larger bushes are laden with small, sweet huckleberries – the above bush has many on the left top branches.
Mountain Spirea
There’s a steep slope in front of our home. When walking up the gangway from the boathouse to the main house, these native bushes cluster thickly on either side at the base of the slope. They’re actually in an area that is submerged when the lake rises in the winter, but they do like to keep their feet wet. They’re aggressive growers and spread by rhizomes. In July they produce these wonderful pink blossoms everywhere, painting the front slope our house with beautiful pastel color.
Salmonberry
We see these bushes / small trees in many spots on our property. This particular one is right up against our back deck. Fast growing with deep green leaves, Salmonberries are some of the first berries to ripen and have a pleasant flavor. Their flowers are deep red and striking. Back further on our property, we have a ravine filled with them, and as part of building up this trail, I’ve had to remove a number of them. Their wood is not strong and they have shallow roots, but the roots are extensively networked.
Spatterdock (Yellow Pond Lily)
These grow in large groups in shallow water along the lake edge. The leaves and large yellow flowers often jut up above the water surface rather than just laying on top of it, unlike the smaller white-flowered lily pads also seen in the lake.
Thimbleberry
This bush gets up to 8′ high, with huge maple-like leaves and canes that are no more than maybe 3/4″ in diameter. They are non-invasive and produce a tasty red berry that has a cup in the middle (hence the name). We have some around the house (this picture was taken off of our back deck). It’s hard to get any of the fruit though – the birds pick it off as soon as it’s ripe. Berries do well here!
Toughleaf Iris
We see these growing here and there about the property. They flower in mid spring to early summer, and as the picture attests, are quite beautiful. The flower color can vary considerably (white, cream, and yellow) but we’ve only seen the purple ones. Some Native Americans used parts of the tough leaves to make rope and cord.
Trailing Pacific Blackberry
This native blackberry species is my nemesis. They form dense tangles of quickly growing vines up to 10′ long, taking over everything by blanketing it – even small trees. They spread by a rhizome in addition to seeds (which are spread by birds after eating the fruit) and are very difficult to get rid of once established. You’re looking at a plant that popped up this spring from a rhizome after I had cleared the area last fall.
Western Skunk Cabbage
This plant has huge green leaves and in the spring produces yellow flowers surrounded by a yellow ‘spathe’. The flowers emit a strong odor that is not quite like a skunk’s. It grows in boggy soil.
Yellow Flag Water Iris
These plants grow in clumps at the lake edge, and produce these beautiful yellow flowers in late spring and early summer. We have a few clumps at the lake edge immediately in front of our home.
NOTE: Anyone wanting to eat wild mushrooms needs to be absolutely 100% sure of their identification and should consult an experienced person in mushroom edibility before eating any wild mushroom, especially if they do not feel confident in making that ID.
Amanita Muscaria (Fly Agaric)
This is the most amazing mushroom. It looks like something out of a Mario Brothers game. I happened to be bending down digging near my feet, and as I looked up this mushroom was right in front of my face. This is before it opened. You can see several other babies around the larger one. We see them come up in different spots every year. As with almost all of our fungi, we are seeing more and more of them along our footpaths as we inadvertently spread the spores sticking to our feet.
Bird’s Nest Fungus
We see these small white cup-shaped fungus growing on various dead wood. Invariably their cups are open to the sky. They have an ingenious spore dispersal mechanism – when a raindrop hits the cup in the right way, the spores (contained in small packets that look rather like eggs when they are nestled in the cup) are dispersed by the backsplash of water. Some species have a spore packet with a sticky ‘tail’ that wraps around surrounding vegetation when it is launched from the cup, further facilitating spore dispersal.
Chanterelle
We couldn’t find many of these unique mushrooms last year, but this year there are more. We’ve even purchased and spread some additional spores around the property in likely spots. These are delicious to eat and we’re trying to get more growing. With their fluted shape and distinctive yellow color, they stand out.
Dyer’s Polypore
These large, fan shaped mushrooms are a common sight growing out of trees. As the fall season advances, the center of the fans becomes much darker, but the tips remain bright white. The flesh becomes more woody as well. They are not edible, but apparently they can be used to produce dyes (as the name impies).
Grisette Amanita
These vaguely obscene looking mushrooms are members of the Amanita family. I’ve not seen them very often, but we found this beautiful specimen one day. It’s edible but given its close resemblance to some more toxic species, eating it is not reommended.
King Boletes
I found this on our spring trail one day. It was enormous – and green! I wish I had gotten something in the picture for scale. It was at least 8-10 inches tall, and perhaps 6-8 inches in diameter. Our best attempt to identify it is that it’s a King Boletes. If true, it’s edible. They start out lighter colored and more dense, and then with age darken with the flesh turning more spongy.
Red Coral Mushroom
These fungi pop up along our paths in the fall. They are striking with the brilliant red color, and not as plentiful as the white coral mushrooms. The red color bleaches out to a pale pink color within a few days. Like the white coral mushrooms, they grow in groupings. Unlike the white coral mushrooms, we’ve not seen them growing in the winter. Again, they’re supposed to be edible but we’ve not tried them.
Scarlet Elf Cup Fungus
We found this whimsical fungi in one of my favorite places on the property, a wooded ravine heavy with ferns and containing a small rivulet of water at the bottom. It was so bright that at first I thought it was a piece of trash.
Turkey Tail Mushroom
These are always growing out of wood in fan-shaped arrays. There’s quite a variation in patterns – some are more bland with less striations and bandings. However, some are quite intricate with elaborate detail in the bandings. These mushrooms are some of the most plentiful and common on the Oregon coast. They can grow in large groups.
Violet Webcap
Also known as Violet Cort, or by its scientific name of Cortinarius violaceus, this small mushroom grows in clusters on the forest floor. The tops of them are fairly dark so they don’t particularly stand out from above, but from underneath their heavily gilled undersides are a spectacular lighter purple.
White Coral Mushroom
In 2023 we saw much more of this fungus growing along our paths than the previous year. We’ve seen it grow in mid winter when most other fungi are dormant. Usually it’s in grouped in clumps of three or more. They are supposed to be edible but we’ve not tried them.
Witch’s Butter
This crops up here and there on wood in our forest, and is quite conspicuous with it’s bright yellow-orange color. It is jelly-like in consistency and supposedly edible, though we’ve not tried it. It’s also known as yellow brain, golden jelly fungus, or yellow trembler, which paints quite a picture of its consistency. This fungus only feeds on dead wood that has already been colonized by different fungi (of the genera Peniophora and Stereus).
American Bullfrog Tadpole
We nabbed this guy at the lake edge. It’s hard to identify as a tadpole, but we think it’s a bullfrog tadpole. We can hear the bullfrogs in late spring and early summer, in the evening.
Common Garter Snake
Our cat brought us this gift one day. Fortunately it was not hurt. It was just a baby, really – this one is quite small. We’ve seen ones up to two feet long. Their diet consists mainly of amphibians and earthworms, but also leeches, slugs, snails, insects, crayfish, fish, lizards, other snakes, small birds, and rodents. Common garter snakes are effective at catching fast-moving creatures such as fish and tadpoles.
Ensatina Salamander
This small salamander can be found under logs and debris on the wet forest floor. They also can be found swimming in North Tenmile Lake, near the shore. They’re somewhat drab on top, colored to match decomposing leaves, but have a dull orange underside.
Northern Red-Legged Frog
We found this frog near our wood shed in some brush. Females are larger than males (up to four inches), so we thought it must be a female. From above it blended in with the brush quite well; I almost missed it.
Western Red-Backed Salamander
Despite its name, according to the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Western Red-Backed Salamanders have a wide stripe running from the head to the tip of the tail that can be yellow, orange, green or brown (not red). They can grow to just over four inches in length and are lungless. We found this dude under some wood.
Banana Slug
We often see slugs 6 inches in length when stretched out, and apparently they can get up to 10 inches long. When they really get moving, they can burn up the forest floor by traveling up to 6.5 inches per minute. They can be seen in a few different coloration variations – pale/bright yellow, pale/bright yellow with black spots. Banana slugs will eat almost any kind of plant (leaves, stems, roots, flowers, seeds, and fruit – even poison oak). They also eat fungi, and will consume animal feces and carcasses. They can be eaten by humans too – a cooking tip is to cook them over a fire like a hotdog until all the slime falls away. I’m not sure that’s something we will experience in our lives, but it’s good to know in a pinch.
Columbian Black-Tailed Deer
We see these deer in our back yard often. They’re relatively fearless, and unfortunately have cropped our strawberries to nubs several times. They’re beautiful animals though.
Eastern Cottontail
We see these small, drab bunnies close around the house occasionally. There’s at least one that lives under our backyard shed. They blend in well and are easy to miss. It’s been a battle to keep our hydrangeas alive between these guys, the occasional deer, and banana slugs, but the cages I recently put around the hydrangeas will at least take care of everything but the slugs. These rabbits were introduced into Oregon sometime in the late 1930’s or early 1940’s.
Freshwater Bryozoan
These are very strange looking colonies of aquatic invertebrates that live on the outside of a gelatinous substrate that attaches to anything handy. We did not notice them last season (2022) but suddenly in 2023 they are everywhere. They feed on algae, bacteria, and protozoa. Is it any coincidence that our water quality was vastly improved this year, with no noted algae blooms? We think not. Having these in the lake is a sign of good water quality. They are not native to the area.
Lancetooth Snail
We see several kinds of snails in our area. This drab one’s shell was a bit larger in diameter than a quarter, and we found it on a forest road in the hills above our house. My best attempt at identifying it is a variety of Lancetooth snail, which are native to the Pacific Northwest. Some varieties of this snail are voracious predators of other snails and slugs, while others are more omnivorous but will eat other creatures opportunistically. They get their name from certain patterns on their shell.
Pacific Sideband Snail
Sherri took this picture one day on a walk. It seems to be two snails getting it on…or exchanging genetic material if you prefer. We see empty shells from time to time, but these snails are not nearly a common a sight as the enormous banana slugs in the area. This snail is the largest native snail in Oregon, with a shell a bit larger than the diameter of a quarter. They eat fungi and decomposing plant material.