The quintessential coastal deer of the Pacific Northwest is a subspecies of the mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) known as the black-tailed deer. In a classic splitters-versus-lumpers argument, some locals, the “splitters,” refer to the black-tailed deer as a separate species altogether from the mule deer. The splitters reserve the “mule deer” monicker only for the sensu strictu animals found east of the Cascades, the so-called Rocky Mountain mule deer (O. h. hemionus). The splitters become confused whenever someone uses the name “mule deer” to refer to the black-tailed animals on the coast.

Other locals, the “lumpers,” of which I am one, refer to both the coastal black-tailed deer and the interior Rocky Mountain animals as “mule deer.” We lumpers refrain from using the subspecies names except when necessary to avoid confusion.

Further muddying the waters, two different subspecies of coastal mule deer both bear the “black-tailed” name: the Columbian black-tailed deer (O. h. columbianus) ranges from Point Conception to Rivers Inlet, while the Sitka black-tailed deer (O. h. sitkensis), or simply “Sitka deer,” ranges from Rivers Inlet to Prince William Sound.

Mule deer, black-tailed deer, Sitka deer—call it what you will, it’s the good old, familiar, backyard deer we Pacific Northwest kayakers encounter everywhere we paddle along our coast.

One animal we don’t encounter along our coast is the white-tailed deer. Even the lumpiest of lumpers agree that the white-tailed deer (O. virginianus) is an entirely separate species from the mule deer (O. hemionus). The white-tailed deer is the familiar species from the east coast and interior of North America. While the white-tailed deer does overlap with the mule deer in some parts of the interior, the white-tailed deer does not reach the west coast.

Only, in one small area, it does. Along the banks and among the islands of the lower Columbia River in Washington and Oregon, a small, isolated population of white-tailed deer exists. It’s yet another subspecies, the Columbian white-tailed deer (O. v. leucurus).

During the 1960s, the Columbian white-tailed deer was on the verge of extinction due to habitat loss. Thanks to a vigorous program of habitat preservation and translocation of animals among the islands, the Columbian white-tailed deer has increased its numbers in recent decades. On October 17, 2016, the population of white-tailed dear along the Columbia River was downlisted from “endangered” to “threatened” under the federal Endangered Species Act. (A separate and distinct population of Columbian white-tailed deer, located farther south and inland in Douglas County, Oregon, was downlisted from the ESA altogether on July 24, 2003).

Even having benefited from the protection of the ESA for many decades, the Columbian white-tailed deer is not a numerous species. In its 2016 downlisting decision, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimated there were only 900 individuals in the Columbia River population. In 2019, Fish and Wildlife estimated the population at around 1,200. These 1,200 deer are distributed along some 100 linear miles (160 km) of the lower Columbia River, within an area of some 60,000 discontinuous acres (24,000 discontinuous hectares)—a very low population density, within a very small range.

While it might seem hopeless for a kayaker to spot a Columbian white-tailed deer given these numbers, there are a few places where the deer are concentrated more densely. Tenasillahe Island, in the middle of the Columbia River, is the heartland of the species’ range. With an area of some 1,950 acres (790 ha), Tenasillahe Island is home to some 200 Columbian white-tailed deer—a density more than five times greater than throughout the rest of the species’ range.

Tenasillahe Island lies within the Julia Butler Hansen Refuge for the Columbian White-Tailed Deer, a national wildlife refuge operated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Fish and Wildlife does not allow camping anywhere in the refuge, but there a lot of islands in the lower Columbia, and Fish and Wildlife does not control them all. Launching from Skamokawa on the Washington State side of the river, I paddled across to Lark Island, an artificial heap of dredge spoils on the Oregon side. Lark Island is outside the boundaries of the wildlife refuge, and camping is permitted.

The Columbia may be a river, but its lower reaches are a fundamentally coastal environment. Skamokawa experiences a tidal range greater than nine feet (3 m) during large springs. The tidal currents can add or subtract a knot and a half to the river’s regular downstream flow. Fighting upstream against the combined tidal and riverine current to reach Tenasillahe Island was a workout. At the north end of the island, I cut into Red Slough, a shallow channel separating the larger Tenasillahe from the smaller Welch Island to the north.

Currents were gentler down the west side of Tenasillahe and much gentler within the confines of Red Slough. Thousands of ducks and other waterfowl sheltered in these protected waters. Greater and lesser scaup, American coots, American wigeon, and mallards were particularly abundant. From time to time, flocks of cackling geese, hundreds strong, would fly overhead.

The view of Lark Island on Google Earth led me to expect a wide, sandy beach with groves of trees in the upland—perfect camping conditions. What I discovered instead was a sheer cliff of sand sixty feet (24 m) high! Fortunately, there were two locations along the cliff face that had eroded, leaving steep but surmountable ramps of sand to give access to the top.

The top of the sand plateau was flat, but there were no trees. The trees, so easily visible on Google Earth, grew in swampy conditions at the base of the cliff. The top of the plateau was a barren plain, swept by powerful winds driven up and over the lip of the cliff. Camping here during the summer might be lovely, but I was camping in January. Bands of freezing rain and gusts of strong wind blew through all weekend. There was no shelter on top of the plateau and nowhere to hang a tarp.

Near the base of the cliff, a few feet above the highest high-water mark, I found a flat ledge of sand. A small grove of alders overlooked the ledge, providing supports for my tarp. I managed to raise the tarp and tent just before an unrelenting rainstorm blew in, driving me under shelter for the remainder of the afternoon and evening.

At 1,950 acres (790 ha), Tenasillahe is one of the larger islands in the lower Columbia River. Tenasillahe Island is a natural landform, but like all estuarine landforms, its contours are constantly shifting due to erosion and deposition of sediment—at least, they would be shifting were it not for the vast system of dikes built around the island in the 1920s. The dikes stabilized the shoreline of the island and converted the ecology from wetlands to agricultural fields. The Fish and Wildlife Service took over from the farmers and ranchers in 1971.

In defiance of its own namesake, the Fish and Wildlife Service still allows seasonal cattle grazing on Tenasillahe Island, even though the island is supposed to be a wildlife refuge nowadays, not a cattle ranch. Fish and Wildlife justifies the perpetuation of cattle grazing as a management technique to improve wildlife habitat. My goodness, what ever would wildlife do without such management? Just pay no attention to the barns, sheds, roads, dikes, boat docks, barbed-wire fences, earth-moving equipment, shoreline armoring, and flood-control gates that are all necessary to support the cattle grazing.

It wasn’t cattle season on Tenasillahe Island when I went ashore to search for deer. It wasn’t tourist season, either—I didn’t see another soul. I took advantage of Fish and Wildlife’s engineering efforts and walked all the way around the island on the well-maintained ring road that runs atop the primary dike.

Even here in the heartland of the Columbian white-tailed deer, I wasn’t confident I would spot any. Deer can be quite shy, I reminded myself, and I had gotten a later start in the morning than I had hoped, due to yet another rainstorm. It might take all weekend just to find a single animal, I told myself, and I mustn’t be disappointed even if I never…oh look, a whole herd of white-tailed deer, gliding out of the fog just fifty yards from the landing beach, two minutes after I landed.

I had worried the Columbian white-tailed deer might be difficult to distinguish from mule deer—or, as the splitters would have it, the Columbian black-tailed deer. What if I never saw their tails? Could I tell them apart at all?

To my delight, the white-tailed deer were immediately distinctive. Compared to mule deer, the white-tailed deer’s facial features were more delicate and “cuter.” Their ears were shorter, and their movements lighter and more graceful. Best of all, their tails weren’t hard to see; they were the most visible parts of the animals. The deer would raise their fluffy tails upright whenever they ran, in the same manner as dogs. They waved their tails back and forth like white flags, easy to follow even through the fog or in dense brush.

I saw over fifty deer in the course of my circumambulation, something like one-quarter of all the deer on the island. The reason for such profusion, I think, is that the interior of Tenasillahe Island is a boggy mess in spite of the management efforts of the Fish and Wildlife Service. The deer seemed to appreciate the higher, drier ground surrounding the dike. I suspect the deer population, already concentrated on the island, is even more densely concentrated along the ring road, making the deer easier to find than would otherwise be the case.

Having found so many deer so easily on Saturday, I did not return to the island on Sunday. Instead, I paddled a circuitous route back to Skamokawa. I threaded various sloughs and streams on the Washington side of the river. Fog rolled through all morning, shrouding the trees and waterways.

Sunday was the last day of duck-hunting season, so shotgun blasts resounded at short intervals up and down the river. Between the grazing and the shooting, the Fish and Wildlife Service runs quite an extractive operation here at this national wildlife refuge. Fortunately for me—and even more fortunately for the ducks—hunters are primarily a terrestrial species. In my kayak, I could reach islands and estuaries most of them could not touch.

Altogether, I saw fifty-one species of bird, of which the most notable sightings were two great egrets and half a dozen western meadowlarks. I saw seven species of mammal: beaver, harbor seal, California sea lion, Steller sea lion, coyote, raccoon, and of course, the rare and precious Columbian white-tailed deer.

The Columbia River is a place where seemingly ordinary animals behave in extraordinary ways. On the East Coast, the white-tailed deer is so common as to be a nuisance, but here on the Columbia River, it has established a stronghold far outside its usual range, like colonists from the Age of Discovery. Here on the river, there are not only the familiar blue herons but also white ones, the great egrets. One morning, I saw a beaver and a Steller sea lion swimming down the same channel, a freshwater mammal and a saltwater one, swimming side-by-side.

In the end, I must give credit to the Fish and Wildlife Service. They may not operate our national wildlife refuge the way I would if I were director, but they have done well enough to keep this extraordinary place and its wonderful animals alive.

—Alex Sidles