Oregon Hikers

Tons of these around, but I don't know plants. What is it?

Dunno for sure, but it looks like a willow, and in particular, the Pacific Willow.

It's a baby cottonwood.

Populus trichocarpa? I thought the leaves would be wider but otherwise that fits. Is the narrow leaf because these were small?

Many of the upper leaves are curled up at the edges, making them look more lance-shaped than they really are. I took this photo the other day:

Thank you bobcat. I feel just slightly less ignorant now. Additionally, after your first post I took a hard look at some of the wild cottonwoods around here and saw that the leaves were more narrow than cottonwoods I have seen in parks and yards, the latter perhaps being Populus deltoides?

datura, the apparently narrow leaves had me thinking willow too, but I couldn't match it to anything.

That makes sense. My initial guess would also have been cottonwood, except that the narrow leaves "fit" willow better. I will have to look at some trailside baby cottonwoods now to check out their skinny little baby leaves as compared to more mature trees, and then compare both to the baby willows.