The Zumwalt Country

Obscure by Oregon geography standards, the Zumwalt Prairie in the extreme northeast corner of Oregon represents a wonderfully diverse ecological niche. As set out in the book, "The Prairie Keepers" by Marcy Houle, this area demonstrates how ranchers and grazing and wildlife "not only can coexist, but in some instances must coexist." A single gravel road accesses these thousands and thousands of acres, where nature and silence have scarcely been disturbed from time immemorial. Whether one photographs, reads, or meditates, the silence makes its own music.