WESTERN TANAGER

The Western Tanager, like the Pileated Woodpecker, is also more plentiful than usual. My introduction to this was made along the newly constructed road grade on Tahoma Creek. A small bird was seen with olive green upper parts and dull yellowish wing bars and I was puzzling over what kind of a warbler it was, but the bird was large for a warbler. In a moment out of the woods flashed a bright bit of color and took its place near the bird under observation--the answer to my query. The new arrival was the male Western Tanager and I had been studying the female. The contrast between the two is very great. The male was decked in bright summer plumage of bright lemon-yellow and crimson head and black saddle, wings, and tail. This is the showiest of our birds and occurs in the lower levels of the park up to 3,000 feet altitude. Although the bird was not very shy and was followed for some time, it remained silent.

By Charles Landes, Ranger Naturalist.

ENJOYING THE PARK BEFORE YOU GET THERE

One of the many attractions of that part of Rainier National Park made accessible by the White River entrance lies not in the Park at all but in the 30 miles of magnificent forest traversed in reaching the entrance. One of our frequent visitors remarks that "he always begins to feel better when he topes the hill this side of Enumclaw". May the Lord help the man who wouldn't feel better as he wound in and out through this virgin fir forest over a road of perfect bed and easy grades, yet a road that fortunately lacks the sophisticated atmosphere of modern highways and retains the charm of an old woods road. Following now closely, now at a distance, but always through the forest of giant trees, the road winds on around the White River. About half way from Enumclaw is Naches Tavern. A few minutes can well be spent in its lobby examining relics that date from before the coming of the White men down to the World War. A little black cub bear is chained in a pen outside and a mountain lion is tied on the front porch. The cub seems content in his new home as does also the mountain lion, (The latter being of the "genus taxidermii" species. On and on through the forest until suddenly a turn in the road, a little bridge and you are before the gates--not the "Pearly Gates"--but certainly the gates to a veritable Paradise on earth.

By C. B. Hickok--Ranger Naturalist.