I was saddened to wake up to the news that Harry had passed. Like many of
the other "old-timers" who have chimed in I had many wonderful great birding
experiences with Harry. I first met him in 1975 when I had a flock of
Bohemian Waxwings outside my apartment and I called the number still etched
in my brain 233-3976 and he came out to check them out. Shortly thereafter
we started going on regular birding trips around Western Oregon since I had
a flexible schedule and as others have pointed out Harry liked mentoring
eager young birders. I probably saw a third of my first sightings of Oregon
birds with Harry. Most memorable was a trip to the South Jetty of the
Columbia River on Memorial Day 1976 where we joined Jeff Gilligan and Mark
Smith and saw Oregon's first Least Tern along with Common, Black and Arctic;
other pelagic species as all three jaegers, Leach's and Fork-tailed
Storm-Petrels, Sooty, Pink-footed and Manx Shearwaters. That is still one
of my best birding memories ever.
As others have noted Harry was a classy guy. I never heard him criticize
anyone and he was friend to all. I enjoyed his subtle sense of humor and
lived for some of his comments on the rare bird alert like "rare birds
continue to be uncommon." Another of his favorite tricks was on long trips
coming back from the coast just when I (or a third person) would start to
drift off to sleep he'd loudly proclaim "Black Swift!"
It was always a joy to bird with Harry and I learned an incredible amount on
my trips with him. As many others of my generation have stated it is really
a shame that today's younger birders never experienced Harry. He was one of
a kind!
Tom Crabtree, Bend
From: obol-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:obol-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Gerard Lillie
Sent: Wednesday, July 20, 2022 9:03 AM
To: OBOLINKS; acontrer56@xxxxxxxxx
Subject: [obol] Re: More on Harry
It is a shame that birders new to Oregon did not get a chance to meet Harry,
an institution in the history of Oregon birding. Jeff has provided a nice
summary of Harry's involvement in Oregon birding. It's difficult to imagine
the amount of work and dedication it took to gather and disseminate the
large amount of info going to him in pre-computer days. I'm sure he received
many calls asking him what a bird could be based on the verbal description
of the caller. I didn't realize how difficult that is until I started
leading Portland Audubon's Mt. Tabor bird song walks and began getting
similar questions. Harry was also a trickster and I'm sure got a kick out
of some of the pranks he pulled off, as he did on me. I was birding Sturgeon
Lake on Sauvie Island and scoping shorebirds on mud flats at low tide. I had
been there a while when he came walking out. We chatted for a while and then
he said, "hey look, there's an arrowhead." I looked down at my feet and sure
enough one was there. I couldn't understand how I missed it. I later told
that to Jeff Gilligan and he laughed and told me it was one of his old
tricks. Yup, he got me good. Harry was an all around nice guy always willing
to help in any way he could to advance Oregon birding. I can still see him
in his tan windbreaker and khaki pants, and I bet you can still reach him at
233-3976.
Gerard Lillie
Portland, OR
_____
Subject: [obol] More on Harry
Jeff Gilligan, who is not on OBOL, asked me to pass on his memories of his
mentor Harry Nehls.
"
I had known Harry Nehls since I was about 12, which was 60 years ago. A
friend in my neighborhood in Portland (Ron Klein) and I had become
interested birding, and he and I and a couple of other friends made a few
trips through MacCleay Park to The Pittock Sanctuary at Portland Audubon
(PAS). There we got to know the few active birders of the time, and mooched
rides on some of the field trips that went to locations away from Portland.
Harry frequently led trips, and we got to know him that way. After a time
we would get invited to join him on other birding trips as well, such as to
the coast or central Oregon.
Harry got interested in birds and birding by noticing the gulls that would
accumulate at the football field at Benson High School, which he attended
the early 1950s, as I recall. He went to the library to see what species he
was seeing, and eventually made his way to Portland Audubon, where he
started going on field trips, and learned from the older birders of the time
- Leo Simon, Theo Moulton, etc. Birding as a beginner was much more
difficult at the time. Birding identification books were usually poorly
illustrated, and often inaccurate. When Harry started birding Peterson's
1941 "A Field Guide to Western Birds" was the standard reference. While
even the edition that came out in 1961, which at the time was considered a
vast improvement, was useless for the more difficult to identify species,
the 1941 was far less useful. (The much better Pough's western field guide
seemed to be little used.) That caused Harry to pore over the written
descriptions in sources like Gabrielson and Jewett''s "Birds of Oregon", and
the Bent series from many decades earlier.
I recall a story of then teenage Harry attending a Friday PAS meeting, and
reporting that he had seen an American Redstart on Sauvie's Island. His
sightings were gruffly received by Stan Jewett whose opinion would not have
been questioned, and he was told that such a rarity needed to be collected.
Harry eventually took over writing the bird notes in PAS' monthly
newsletter, The Warbler. He also co-authored the regional report in the
national publication, Audubon Field Notes, the predecessor to American
Birds, with John Crowell.
Soon after I met Harry, he replaced the editor of the field notes in PAS's
newsletter, and co-author of the regional summary in Audubon Field Notes,
Alan Baldridge, who had taken a position as chief librarian at the Monterey
Bay Aquarium Research Institute. Harry continued writing the bird summary
in PAS' monthly newsletter until a few years ago. When as a board member of
PAS in the late 1970s that PAS sponsor a telephone hot line to call for a
weekly bird information, Harry took it on to record a summary every week,
and drive to PAS to put it on the call-in phone. To the surprise of some, I
was told that people called night and day to hear what birding news had
occurred in the week.
I don't recall when he started, but I think he was the first coordinator
for breeding bird surveys in Oregon, and continued that role for decades,
often doing the remote routes himself where there was no one else to run
them.
Harry was a regular on several bird counts - Portland, Tillamook, and
Sauvie's Island particularly. He chaired the Oregon Bird Records Committee
for many years.
Working with others (Ken Bachelder and John Crowell), his "Familiar Birds
of The Northwest" was a popular introduction to the common birds of the
region, and used the original R. Bruce Horsfall's paintings that ringed the
old meeting room of PAS as illustrations. The profits exceeded
expectations, and enabled PAS to do things that far outstripped the small
membership dues of its several hundred members.
For years the start of PAS' Birders' Night would begin by Owen Schmidt
asking Harry "What's the rarest bird in Oregon.". Harry would give a
summary, glancing down occasionally at his notes.
He was always a jovial guy, and willing to take on whatever bird-related
function needed someone to do. I am sure that he got a lot of phone calls
about birds and had to sort through which ones should be passed on to the
birding community. That written, I wish he had not dismissed the report of a
Yellow-crowned Night-Heron in what is now Tualatin NWR, or that of a
Violet-crowned Hummingbird that was reportedly dueling with Anna's
Hummingbirds at feeders in the St. John's neighborhood, and only mentioned
these later at Birders' Nights.
I hadn't seen him in perhaps two years or so. I remarked to someone
recently that I had not seen him at even the rarest bird stake-outs, or seen
any reports of what he had seen recently, and meant to call him on one of my
infrequent visits to Portland. I wish I had. Harry will long be remembered
for his long service to Oregon birding."
Alan Contreras
acontrer56@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:acontrer56@xxxxxxxxx>
www.alanlcontreras.com <http://www.alanlcontreras.com>
Now living in SE Eugene