Steigerwald Lake a birding paradise

Refuge opens to public after 24-year wait

By Ellen Spitaleri

Pamplin Media Group, Feb 11, 2010

JONATHAN HOUSE / Pamplin Media Group

Park ranger Jim Clapp stands on a pedestrian bridge, made from recycled fiberglass, over the refuge’s Gibbons Creek.

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It’s been a 24-year wait, but birders and hikers finally can trek through Steigerwald Lake National Wildlife Refuge.

The refuge, opened to the public last June, is located a few miles east of Washougal, Wash., and it’s well worth the drive.

“Because of its location at the mouth of the gorge, there’s the potential to see rare birds normally only seen east of the Cascades,” says Ron Escano, a Portland Audubon member who leads bird walks at Steigerwald. “During the spring, we can easily see over 50 species on a walk.”

Less than an hour’s drive from Portland, the refuge contains 1,049 acres of mixed wetlands, a stand of Oregon white oaks, cottonwood trees and grassland habitats. In winter, Steigerwald Lake refuge is a grassy expanse, punctuated by pools of sky-colored water. Walkers might see a shy, solitary deer on the edge of the lake, a pair of herons on the wing or a red-tailed hawk cruising overhead. Cottonwood trees line the horizon, signaling the location of the nearby Columbia River.

The Steigerwald family operated a dairy farm at the property in the 1920s, says refuge manager Jim Clapp. It became a wildlife refuge in 1985, when the land was set aside as a protected wetlands to offset development of a second powerhouse at Bonneville Dam. Last June, the site was formally unveiled to the public, with groomed trails and a trailhead information display.

Volunteers from the Columbia River Refuge Stewards and the Lower Columbia River Estuary Partnership have planted thousands of native trees and shrubs north of Gibbons Creek, east of the bridge and between the trail and the creek, Clapp says.

Refuge staff members and volunteers are continuing to enhance and maintain habitat and remove invasive species, he says.

Clapp regularly spots hawks, waterfowl, woodpeckers, deer and the occasional coyote, among other species. Of the 300 different bird species sighted in Clark County, “200 of them have been here,” he says. “Our hope is to make good birding better.”

The property doesn’t attract the large water birds that frequent Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge, its sister site north of Vancouver, Clapp says. But smaller birds can be seen all year, and spring migrations regularly bring in much larger numbers of migrating birds.

The refuge is open every day from dawn to dusk. The trails provide easy walking, with no steep upgrades, and all are accessible to people with disabilities.

Guided walks will begin at the site in May, says Escano, a retired wildlife biologist.

From the trailhead in the parking lot just off State Route 14, walkers can follow a gravel trail south to the bridge over Gibbons Creek, and walk half a mile on the Columbia River dike before continuing to the east end of the trail, looping back to link up with the original trail.

The 110-foot Gibbons Creek Bridge is the second-longest single-span, recycled fiberglass bridge in the world, second only to a bridge in Spain, Clapp notes.

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