BIRDWATCHING -- Reservations are filling for field trips during the Othello Sandhill Crane Crane Festival  scheduled for March 25-27.

The are excellent educational opportunities on field subjects ranging from Ice Age Floods -- check out the guided hiket through the Drumheller Channels National Landmark -- to birding in select areas of the Columbia Basin and Columbia National Wildlife Refuge.

Numerous program are scheduled during the festival. Saturday's highlight is a banquet featuring a keynote presentation by habitat biologist and lifelong naturalist Ken Bevis of Twisp, who will speak on “The Saga of Washington’s Fish and Wildlife: In Picture, Words and Song.”

"Most of the speakers are returning favorites, who have designed new talks to educate those who attend on the wildlife, geology and cultural history of the Othello area," said festival spokeswoman Marie Lotz.

Tops among them is Jack Nisbet, a naturalist, educator and author from Spokane.

Read on for details

To pre-register for the pre-festival tours, call the Mid-Columbia River National Wildlife Refuges complex office at (509) 546-8300.

The theme of this year’s festival is the Ice Age Floods and there will be several lectures about that topic. Other highlights will be discussions on local birds, bird songs, long-billed curlews, emperor penguins, burrowing owls, sagebrush conservation, history of the Potholes area and more.

Nisbet will talk on Friday about Scottish naturalist David Douglas and the plants he encountered and discovered during his explorations of the area in the early 1800s.

On Saturday, Bevis will present “The Saga of Washington’s Fish and Wildlife: In Picture, Words and Song” at the festival banquet. His talk will include testimonials, pictures and original songs.

New this year will be a Saturday afternoon keynote speaker from Ducks Unlimited. More information about that lecture will be posted on the website and in the registration brochure to be completed by the end of February.