Kiger Creek is a tributary of Swamp Creek in Harney County in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its so ...

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

. It originates on

Steens Mountain Steens Mountain is a large fault-block mountain in the northwest United States, located in Harney County, Oregon. Stretching some north to south, on its east side it rises from the Alvord Desert at an elevation of about to at the summit. Ste ...

and flows generally north through Kiger Gorge to meet Swamp Creek near the

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

Diamond Diamond is a Allotropes of carbon, solid form of the element carbon with its atoms arranged in a crystal structure called diamond cubic. Diamond is tasteless, odourless, strong, brittle solid, colourless in pure form, a poor conductor of e ...

. The combined streams flow into Diamond Swamp and the

Malheur National Wildlife Refuge Malheur National Wildlife Refuge is a National Wildlife Refuge located roughly south of the city of Burns, Oregon, Burns in Oregon's Harney Basin. Administered by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the refuge area is roughly T-shap ...

. A segment of Kiger Creek, from its headwaters to where it crosses the

Steens Mountain Wilderness The Steens Mountain Wilderness is a wilderness area surrounding a portion of Steens Mountain of southeastern Oregon in the United States. The reserve falls within the Steens Mountain Cooperative Management and Protection Area (CMPA). Both the ...

boundary, is part of the

National Wild and Scenic Rivers System The National Wild and Scenic Rivers System was created by the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act of 1968 (Public Law 90-542), enacted by the U.S. Congress to preserve certain rivers with outstanding natural, cultural, and recreational values in a free- ...

. Designated "wild", the creek supports a population of

redband trout Redband trout are a group of three recognized subspecies of rainbow trout (''Oncorhynchus mykiss''). They occur in three distinct regions in Pacific basin tributaries and endorheic basins in the western United States. The three subspecies are ...

, and its watershed includes habitat for

mule deer The mule deer (''Odocoileus hemionus'') is a deer indigenous to western North America; it is named for its ears, which are large like those of the mule. Two subspecies of mule deer are grouped into the black-tailed deer. Unlike the related whit ...

elk The elk (: ''elk'' or ''elks''; ''Cervus canadensis'') or wapiti, is the second largest species within the deer family, Cervidae, and one of the largest terrestrial mammals in its native range of North America and Central and East Asia. ...

bighorn sheep The bighorn sheep (''Ovis canadensis'') is a species of Ovis, sheep native to North America. It is named for its large Horn (anatomy), horns. A pair of horns may weigh up to ; the sheep typically weigh up to . Recent genetic testing indicates th ...

, and

pronghorn The pronghorn (, ) (''Antilocapra americana'') is a species of artiodactyl (even-toed, hoofed) mammal indigenous to interior western and central North America. Though not an antelope, it is known colloquially in North America as the American ante ...

Name

Kiger Creek as well as Kiger Island in the

Willamette River The Willamette River ( ) is a major tributary of the Columbia River, accounting for 12 to 15 percent of the Columbia's flow. The Willamette's main stem is long, lying entirely in northwestern Oregon in the United States. Flowing northward ...

near Corvallis are named for Reuben C. Kiger and his family, pioneers who settled in Benton County in the mid-19th century. In 1874, they moved to Harney County to the Steens Mountain vicinity but, fearing Native Americans, returned to western Oregon in 1878. Minerva J. (Dolly) Kiger named the creek as well as one of its tributaries, Cucamonga Creek, and another nearby stream, McCoy Creek.

Recreation

Near the creek's source is Kiger Gorge Overlook, a recreation site managed by the

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands, U.S. federal lands. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the BLM oversees more than of land, or one ...

(BLM). The U-shaped gorge, carved through

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanite, aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the planetary surface, surface of a terrestrial ...

ice age An ice age is a long period of reduction in the temperature of Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Earth's climate alternates between ice ages, and g ...

glaciers, is about a half-mile deep. The overlook is from the unincorporated community of Frenchglen along Steens Mountain Loop Road. The site is generally open from July 4 through November 1. At a somewhat lower elevation of above sea level is the Jackman Park Campground. It is along Steens Mountain Loop Road about from Kiger Gorge Overlook and from Frenchglen. Open from June 10 to November 1, the BLM campground has six sites, toilets, and picnic tables. The Kiger Wild Horse Viewing Area, also managed by the BLM, is in the vicinity. It consists of of habitat suitable for free-roaming Kiger mustangs. The area has several viewing sites, generally open from May 1 to November 15. The access road to the site is about from Diamond.

Tributaries

Named tributaries of Kiger Creek, listed from source to mouth, include Big Pasture Creek, which enters from the

right Rights are law, legal, social, or ethics, ethical principles of freedom or Entitlement (fair division), entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal sy ...

, then Mud, Little Kiger, and Poison creeks, all from the right. Cucamonga Creek enters from the left, downstream of where Kiger Creek splits into two

distributaries A distributary, or a distributary channel is a stream channel that branches off and flows a main stream channel. It is the opposite of a ''tributary'', a stream that flows another stream or river. Distributaries are a result of river bifurca ...

and passes under Diamond Lane as it nears Swamp Creek.

References

External links

National Wild and Scenic Rivers System
{{authority control Rivers of Harney County, Oregon Rivers of Oregon Wild and Scenic Rivers of the United States

Name

Recreation

Tributaries

See also

References

External links