Cougar sighting inspires Fall Creek woman to help create a caring community of more than 2,000

By DEAN REA/Correspondent/The Herald—June Walker recalls the afternoon she and her husband looked out a window of their Fall Creek home and spotted what they thought was a deer in their neighbor’s yard.

“Then we realized that it was a cougar. A grandmother was living with the couple who lived there and was watching their babies. She often was in the yard with them. Needless to say, we were greatly concerned.”

So, Walker set up a website group page on Sept. 29, 2015, and the Fall Creek Neighborhood Watch community was born.

Today, more than 2,000 people are members of the Facebook group centered primarily in Fall Creek, Lowell, Dexter, Pleasant Hill and Jasper. Walker serves as administrator. Geoff Hedlind and Angela Townsend are moderators who help remind members that they are “to be kind” or be kicked off the page. That means no politics, bickering or unkind words. For-sale items are posted on a buy-sell page.

Expect to read a dozen or more posts a day about a limitless number of topics, including threatening forest fires, weather problems, traffic accidents, lost animals, stray pets, suspected criminal activity, community events and need for help for such things as mowing a lawn, fixing utilities, hemming curtains, baby-sitting.

“We take the bite out of crime” is a statement that appears high on the website’s introductory page. That includes keeping track of strangers who snoop around the neighborhood, especially at night.

Walker, who works in the medical field, recalls how the community dealt with Diesel, a yellow Lab on Place Road, who would wander around the neighborhood. Neighbors purchased and installed an electric fence so he wouldn’t escape from the yard.

“Diesel doesn’t get out now,” she said.

The neighborhood also helped Jessi Osborn purchase a chip reader to track dogs and a kennel to care for stray dogs with what Walker says has been a “high degree of success.”

Osborn, who is adopting Tink, a miniature goat, has cared for an estimated 100 stray dogs during the past five years, which saves sending the dogs to a pound in Eugene.

Osborn recalled how Fall Creek residents cooperated in helping return a dog to its owner in Sisters earlier this year. The dog ran loose in Fall Creek for a week. Meanwhile, someone checked out missing dog reports and learned that a woman from Sisters had become separated from a dog in Springfield. Case solved.

As in any family, Fall Creek members sometimes bicker and become divisive, especially when the political scene heats up as it did in July.

The challenge may be analogous to the bee swarms that are reported on the website.

“We have several beekeepers in our neighborhood who take care of bees,” said Walker, who joined her lieutenants in reminding website members to take the bite out of their stings.

The scene often is enlivened by humorous comments like those of Amber Stevens, who lives in Dexter: “Anyone around here sharpen axe blades?” she inquired. “I’m tired of chopping wood with the equivalent of a spaghetti noodle.”

Last spring when strawberries began to ripen, a Facebook member asked if anyone knew of a place near Eugene “where I can pick strawberries?”

“Try Evonuiks on Seavey Loop,” one person suggested.

“Albertsons,” another replied.

Photographs often illustrate newsworthy events such as fires, weather, accidents, cougars on the prowl.

Barbara Anheluk of Lowell posts photographic scenes of the area, which Walker says “are uplifting and something everyone likes.”

And weather conditions are updated daily by Daisy Neet of Lowell.

A couple of weeks ago Walker posted the two winning photographs in the annual Fall Creek Neighborhood Watch contest. The first-place winner, which was submitted by Kacky Whitney, appears at the top of this article and will top the website for a year. Nancy Deyhle won second place with a photo that tops the buy/sell page.

Walker, whose community roots trace back to days when her father helped build the Lookout Point Dam, said she plans to continue helping inform community members about “what’s going on here, good as well as the bad.”

Meanwhile, if you see what looks like a deer in your front yard, check it out. If it turns out to be a cougar, post it on the Fall Creek Neighborhood Watch website.