Coloring for the Owyhee Canyonlands

As efforts to win permanent protections for the Owyhee Canyonlands in southeastern Oregon continue in full force, Environment Oregon Research & Policy Center has engaged in a collaborative effort to educate more Oregonians and spur them to use their creativity to make their voices heard to protect this Oregon treasure. 

Featuring colorful canyons, seas of sagebrush and the rambling Owyhee river, this ecological haven provides habitat for hundreds of plants and animals such as the imperiled Greater Sage-Grouse, California Bighorn Sheep and the endemic Owyhee clover. But with only 5% of Oregon’s Owyhee Canyonlands permanently protected, we’re continuing to urge Sens. Wyden and Merkley to work with the Biden administration to establish the Owyhee Canyonlands National Monument based on the community-led, consensus-driven vision outlined in legislation drafted and introduced by Sen. Wyden.

Through a collaboration with Mackenzie Bakewell at Ziebee Media, we developed coloring sheets with information about the Owyhee on the back. We started distributing these informational activity sheets at Multnomah County Libraries in the Portland area in July and August. Building on that collaboration, we connected with Por Que No Taqueria, who made the coloring sheets available to their patrons as a part of a monthly coloring competition that took place throughout the month of September. 

After collecting more than 100 unique coloring sheets through these efforts, we will be delivering them directly to Sen. Ron Wyden on Tuesday, Oct. 8 at his Clackamas County town hall event. 

You can still get involved

We’re continuing this collaboration with a new coloring sheet that you can download on our website, or get — and color on site — by stopping into either Por Que No location throughout the month of October. As a special event, our staff and the illustrator will also be at the Hawthorne location on Oct. 16 to host a “Coloring for a Cause,” event.