Sharing the Fascinating Ice Age Floods Story Since 1995

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My husband and I attended the 2019 Sandhill Crane Festival in Othello, WA.  We went because of my interest in seeing the ice age flood related features, but I also wanted to the the Sandhill Cranes – which we were told accumulate there by the hundreds of thousands.  They are large, heron-like birds that like to fuel up in the fields on remnants of corn and alfalfa before heading north for the summer.

We were warned to register for events as soon as possible, which we did.  Nevertheless, the motels in Othello, a town of 7700, were full, so we stayed in Moses Lake, which is about 15 miles from Othello.

The Festival used the high school  gymnasium for exhibits and kid’s handicrafts and the classrooms for lectures and presentations.  The events are obviously well attended because the parking lots were completely full.  My husband was pleasantly surprised to be greeted by the mayor!  I enjoyed seeing the familiar faces at the Ice Age Floods Institute exhibit.

Our first tour, the evening we arrived, was out to the fields to see the cranes.  We had a Fish and Wildlife biologist and an engineer from the Columbia Valley Irrigation Co.  Apparently the cranes winter in Central Valley, Calif. and summer in Bristol Bay.  They tend to be “right wing” (pun intended).  As promised, they were present in the fields in the several thousands.  Fortunately, our guides know which fields and sections line roads to take.  The cranes make a unique noise, very distinguishable from the honking of geese.  There were also hundreds of thousands of snow geese circling like clouds overhead.  Unfortunately, the Pothole Lakes were still frozen.

The irrigation engineer provided interesting input with regard to the value of the irrigation system, i.e. water provided by the Grand Coulee Dam and a sandy loam soil provided by the ice age floods, The area was obviously rich agriculturally.

Our Saturday field trip was with Brent Cunderla, former BLM geologist.  He took us through portions of the channeled scab land formations and provided a good overview of the flood story.    We listened to his talk prior to the field trip – which provided background on what we were to see.

Our Sunday field trip was a hike through the Drumheller channels with Bruce Bjornstad, also a geologist and author of several papers and books on the Ice Age Floods.  Drumheller is a state park that includes buttes and cliffs on the columnar basalts.

Although I was focused on scab-land geology, the festival had speakers and field trips by many biologists, regional geologists, and and naturalists.  If I were to do this again, and I’m tempted, I would attend some of these.  All in all, it was a lot of fun.

by Lynne Dickman