The Willet Count Increases

I returned to the East River, this time with S in tow. She hasn't been canoeing in several months and she was eager to visit the East River. We put in at the old stage crossing. It is sunny with temperatures heading to about 60F. There is a light upriver breeze and the tide will peak in about an hour and a half.

The forest section has less large birds than on my trip 6 days ago, when I saw 2 Eagles and several Osprey. However, we spot an immature Bald Eagle in the trees a few hundred yards up from the Clapboard Hill Road bridge. We find our first Osprey in a tree just downstream of that bridge.

The sneakier side channel off of the Sneak

In the middle of the Big Bends, we spot several Yellow Legs. There are a couple of large pannes in this area that the birds like to feed from. 

Below the Post Road bridge, we start spotting Willets. This is a signal that more Willets have come in during the last few days. On the 20th, my first Willet sighting was about a mile downriver. Below the railroad bridge, we head into the Sneak, then take the smaller sneakier channel to the upper end of Bailey Creek. We spot quite a few Willets. They seem to be in pairs, and they are definitely more perky than the ones I saw the other day. As we join back into Bailey Creek, we find another bunch of Yellow Legs, again feeding in a small panne.

Willet

We head down the creek and up the Sneak. S hasn't paddled recently, and this is long enough for her. The Willet count is probably five times what I saw just 6 days ago. The behavior is different as well. Some of them are engaging in territorial pre-mating activity - chasing and dogfights. The aerial dogfights are particularly fun to watch as the Willets are large enough to see at a distance as well as being fast and maneuverable. 

In the Big Bends, we spot eight Great Egrets and two Snowy Egrets all feeding from a panne on the inside of the uppermost bend. 

The rest of the trip is easy with the wind at our back. It has been an excellent trip during a spectacular day.

Migration

I head over to my local salt marsh at the mouth of the Housatonic River. I put in under the highwya bridge, as usual, and head downriver. The tide is almost high, so the current is almost not there. The day is sunny with temperatures around 50F and a chilly 10mph wind supposedly out of the east, more or less coming upriver.

Pass three Osprey on the way down. At the top of the marsh, I flush several Yellow Legs and a couple ducks. I spot a mature Bald Eagle about a half mile away, over by Cat Island. The white tail, dark body and wing flap make it an easy ID, even at that distance. There's a couple Great Egrets over there as well, another easy call.

I head down my usual inner channel. I flush quite a few Yellow Legs, mostly in small groups of 6 to 15. It is a common bird here, but this is more than I usually see. They nest in Canada, so it is safe to assume they are migrating. 

Yellow Legs

With the high tide, the bottom of the marsh is fully flooded. When the wind in out of my ears, I can hear Brandt calls. As I paddle across the marsh, I spot a large flock of Brandts over by Milford Point. It might be a hundred birds, but it's tough to see them all at this distance. 

Because of the wind, and the high tide, I decide to head up through the center of the marsh. I start flushing ducks, and they quickly outnumber anything else that I've seen. It is a mix of Black Ducks and Mallards, with large numbers of small ducks. I never get close enough to ID the little ducks, but I suspect that they are Teal based on the coloring and size. I probably see a 150 of them, total. Some teal might nest here, but mostly they are going into Canada or the uupper midwest I spot two Swan nests - one not far from the refuge launch and the other near the central phragmites patch.

I cut across and go round the back of Cat Island. There is a new Canada Goose nest near the island's tip. I push a Swan out of the channel on the upstream side, but even better, that whole sunny and sheltered side of the island is loaded with singing Red Wing Blackbirds. With that, I head back upriver.

The Land of Not Knowing

Five minutes upriver, I pass under a railroad bridge. At this point, the nearest road veers away taking with it any vehicle noise. Fifteen minutes upriver, I pass three or four houses, built on what little high non-state land there is in this section of the Pawtucket. The river immediately turns sharply north, and I pass by a beaver lodge that still has a good stash of winter food in front of it. For the next hour, there are no signs of people other than a couple trails that come from who knows where.

It is a fine day - all sun with temperature heading from an overnight 39F to about 60F. There is some wind out of the south, but it doesn't reach the river in any steady fashion. The water is high, maybe two feet above normal and there is some current to work against. Much of the Pawtucket passes through the Great Swamp, and although different parts of the swamp currently have different names, I'll bet that originally, it was all known as the "Great Swamp".

Beaver Lodge on the right, food stash in center

The river is bounded by lowland forest, swamp (wetlands with trees), and a bit of higher land, which is probably ancient seashore sand dunes. Most of the trees are hardwoods, except for the sandy areas, where groves of sugar pines dominate. Sugar pines do well in sandy soil. Thick brush lines the river almost everywhere. With the water high, the swamps are flooded with a few inches of water. In these conditions, I'm not expecting to see too many large birds. Great Blue Herons for example, will be back away from the rive in the flooded puddles fishing for frogs and other little critters. I do spot a couple Herons, and that is just what they were doing. Big birds aside, there is a nonstop chorus of mostly unseen songbirds. 

Note the gnawed tree. The brush pile next to it covers the vent hold of a beaver's bank burrow

With the current, I suspected that I might not be able to reach the Burdickville portage.  Burdickville has a few houses, a road bridge crossing the river, and the remains of an old mill. In this case, the remains are a broken dam, a mill race, and a cast iron turbine that sits at the head of the race. However, the extra flow has created some long eddies which make it easier than usual to get up to the portage, which is in the bottom of the mill race. It's a very short portage - maybe 20 feet, but it is awkward climbing out of the channel with a canoe.

From here on up, the river will gradually narrow, and the current will gradually increase. I plan to turn at the confluence of the Wood River, but I can't remember how far that is. Just as the current really becomes onerous, I spot familiar terrain marking the entrance of the Wood River. I know well enough that the going will only get tougher beyond this, so I turn back after a short break.

All along I've been thinking about the contrast between my last trip, on the upper Housatonic, and this one. Through a camera's eye, the two rivers might not appear to be significantly different. That section of the Housatonic was new terrain to me, yet I found it predictable and rather boring. Here, I'm on water that is familiar, yet it never seems predictable. Up close, there are differences, of course. The Housatonic passed through forests and old pasture lands. The Pawcatuck is immersed in a great swamp with limited building sites and no real farmland. Emotionally, this river is one where anything can happen while that river had had its mystery removed.  Here there is the possibility of being surprised or being awed, there is always a reason to keep going. This is the type of land where our greatest legends and fairy tales come from. This is the land of not knowing.

The current whips me along and Burdickville shows up in short order. I portage the dam. It is runnable at this flow, but not a good idea when paddling alone. It is an easy quick trip out.

Sled Dogs on the Housatonic

I wanted to see some new water, so I headed to the NW corner of the state to check out an upper section of the Housatonic River. It is cloudy with temperatures in the lower 50's and there is a light wind that seems to come downriver, most of the time.

The put in is just above Great Falls, which is, at least now, a hybrid waterfall/dam with a height of 50 feet. In 1833, an iron works factory was founded here, taking advantage of iron deposits in the area. It operated to about 1870.

I head upriver. There is a 2:1 current today, and I gather that the water is a little higher than in summer, but it is well down within the banks. The river is about 150 feet wide, and the first 45 minutes of paddling is a long bend to the left followed by a long bend to the right. The river is still 150 feet wide. 

The river is bounded by swamp and marsh, and pasture land, and it is located in a wide valley. If I was on a multi-day trip, this would be a good enough section of river.

So, here's where the sled dogs come in. A key trait of a good sled dog is curiosity. In fact, young sled dogs are trained on winding trails and roads, where they are motivated by wanting to find out what is around the next bend. People that have used dogs to cross large ice caps, such as traveling to the South Pole, send one of the teammates well out in front. The dogs, which would otherwise become bored, keep pushing on to find out what that dark moving object is. 

By 45 minutes up the river, I begin to think that I can predict everything that I will see today. Finally, the river makes a sharp bend. Here, I find a muskrat, a Kingfisher, a couple Wood Ducks and a few Red Wing Blackbirds. Then the river returns to what it had been. With a 2:1 current, I set a turn around time of 2 hours, unless the river changes. That will give me a 3 hour round trip. The river is still 150 feet wide - no islands, no braids, no marshy inlets. I know what is around the next bend.

At two hours, I reach the first bridge. I round the center pillar and head back. I put my camera away because there's nothing more to photograph. I think about what was missing on this trip - there is no element of surprise, no chance of being awestruck, it's not small enough to be intimate, there's nothing to explore, and it's far short of anything spiritual. It's just a good workout.

Returning to the East River

I started from Bear House Hill Road. I don't know the origin of that excellent name, but I imagine it to be an old name. What I do know is that this is the original wagon crossing of the East River. At high tide, the water here is not much more than 3 or 4 feet deep with the river being about 30 feet wide with firm banks on either side. Downstream of this point all the way to the Sound, the river runs through a wide marsh. Nowadays, there are a few bridges lower down, but all of them required enough earth moving that they had to wait for the industrial revolution. For me, canoeing has always been tied to a healthy interest in history. As a Boy Scout, some of my first trips were crossing Many Point Lake and paddling into the Little Ottertail River. We actually were paddling into a less swampy man-made channel of that river that dated to logging days in that area. The bottom of the river, in places, was covered with waterlogged trees that sank before reaching the mill. Here on the east coast, I tend to find old dams, fords, and mill sites.

The tide is high and just beginning to fall. The temperature is in the 50's with a light mist that stops as soon as I get started, and there is a light wind of no account coming up the river.

Before I can get to the first bend in the river, I have spotted a Great Blue Heron and an Osprey, and by the sound of it, the small cedar swamp on the left is filled to capacity with Red Wing Blackbirds. 

There are several Osprey up in the air looking for fish. To save time, I'll just say that all of the known Osprey nesting sites in this river system are occupied, 'nuf sed. 

When I get down below the railroad bridge, I paddle through the Sneak and into Bailey Creek, then down and into the Neck River. A couple bends down the Neck I spot my first Willets. It takes a few moments for my eyes to adjust to spotting them - if they keep there wings folded, they blend in with the marsh surprisingly well. This is the time for them to be returning to the marsh for nesting, and I've noticed in the past that they seem to fill the marsh from the ocean side going inland - kind of like filling a glass of water. By the time I reach the confluence of the Neck and East Rivers, the tide has dropped about a foot. And, as I head back up the East, I begin seeing more shorebirds as they come to the newly exposed silt banks to feed. I end up with about a dozen Willet sightings. 

I spot a Snowy Egret, my first of the spring, just above the Post Road Bridge.

Back up at the Big Bends, a flock of 20-some Yellow Legs cross in front of me to fee on the right bank.

 Just below the Clapboard Hill Road bridge (another excellent old name) I spot a mature Bald Eagle. There are a half dozen Osprey circling above, and it may be that the Eagle is waiting for a steal. It flies upriver.

As I get near the old burial ground*, I spot an immature Eagle, and a hundred yards upriver, the mature one. With that, it's just one more mile to go.

*There is an old burial ground on the right side of the river. It contains the leader and an unknown number of militiamen from Guilford that, around 1760, went north to fight in the French-Indian War and returned infected with smallpox.

Hamburg Cove with All the Fixin's

I put in at Ely's Ferry on the Connecticut River. It is sunny with a light wind and temperatures near 60F. The river is running high, as it has been for several days, although in this area it is less obvious as there are plenty of tributaries and marsh areas to absorb the extra flow. But, there is still a zippy current out away from the shoreline. 

I head upriver following the shore closely. It's about 3/4 of a mile to the entrance to Hamburg Cove, and it is a particularly beautiful stretch of shoreline, with a sandy shore and steep forested hillsides with no houses in sight. 

The cove is a good and well protected harbor not far from Long Island Sound. In summer, parts of it are a big boat parking lot. In the off season, it is quiet and seeing another boat, of any sort, is rare. It is a pleasant but rather ordinary paddle, unless one takes in all of the side trips. I head in and follow the shoreline with no hurry to be anywhere. Osprey are out and about, for sure.

Eight Mile River is my first side trip. With the big river running high, I suspected that the Eight Mile would have some extra depth, and it does. One enters the river under the beautiful Joshuatown Road Bridge at the far end of the cove. The Eight Mile is narrow and shallow, a mix of gravel bars and boulders with a downed tree thrown in for good measure. 

The boulders and gravel bars are well submerged today and I have full width of the river to work with. There is a 3:1 current, but grabbing eddies makes it an easy upriver paddle. About 3/4 of a mile up is the normal turn around point. At the first bend, I spot a pair of Osprey sharing a tree, plus a couple of Great Blue Herons. Checking old maps showed that the current main channel, which is a steep, fast, straight and narrow toboggan run, was not the original route.

The old channel of the Eight Mile River

There is a longer oxbow that usually is dry. Today, it has a good flow of water. I head up that direction until I would have to wade the canoe past some fast water. I beach the canoe and walk up. The river is shallow and fast, an easy wade. But, about 200 yards up it becomes log jam city. This is far enough.

I head back down cutting past the marina. One of the marina guys wished he was in my spot, and I compliment him on his office space, outdoors on the pier.  The next stop is a couple of marshy ponds, the mouth of Falls Creek. The entrance is a duck under a low bridge, followed by an even lower bridge that requires laying down in the canoe. There's a pair of Swans, a pair of Geese, an Osprey, and a Mallard that comes in for a landing with its wings set tips low. There are some big patches of new cattails coming up. They are only 8 inches high with none of the usual dead growth from winter. I figure this is due to the winter ice moving around and shearing off the old growth. There is old growth closer to shore where the ice was fastened to shore. I turn back at the lower beaver dam, which has been breached since I was last here. 

I head back to the cove. On the way out, I take a short turn around a small inlet just inside the cove, then into the big river and follow the shore back to Ely's Ferry.

Along the Edge

It is a very nice day with temperatures 10 degrees above normal, clear skies, and a light wind. But, I change my original plans, which involved a bit of a drive, due to a prediction of gusty weather in the afternoon. 

I head up the Housatonic and put in on Pond Brook, a quiet wooded tributary to the big river. From there, I head out and downriver, rounding the point that puts me into the Shephaug River. 

Female Common Mergansers

This area is all reservoir, and so wildlife spotting is a bit off when compared to a natural waterway. The water was raised almost 70 years ago, and even after that amount of time, the shoreline is unnatural. The current shore is situated on a steep forested hillside and the bottom drops off quickly within a few feet of the shore until one gets into the upper end of the reservoir where the water level is closer to its original depth. Following the shoreline is to paddle the boundary between two ecological patches - one being the forest and the other being deep open water. While it is a beautiful paddle, particularly on the river-right shore, which is almost all protected land, there is a certain sterility to it all without any meadows, shallows, or marshes, which all together would sustain a much more diverse mix of wildlife.

The wind stays mild throughout the trip, except for a couple of small patches where the wind is quite a bit stronger. These locales are windy both when I am heading up and on the return, which probably is due to the the lay of the valley hillsides.

Just below the Shephaug cascades

I go as far as the cascades and turn back. I usually see at least one Eagle, but that didn't happen today. I saw a couple Wood Ducks, a half dozen Mergansers and a few Kingfishers. The Woodies are comfortable in the forest edge, and the Mergansers like water deep enough to dive and fish, and likewise Kingfishers just need some open water to spot prey. It was Vultures that dominated the day, mostly because they were perfectly happy to stay up high soaring on wind currents. I thought about how, if you wanted to be a bird because you liked to fly, the Vulture would be a good choice... if it weren't for the rather putrid diet that came with it.