Hot Day

It is a hot day and although I am not starting particularly early, I should miss the peak temperatures.  The tide is low and rising when I set the canoe into the river.  Two bird researchers launch just before me.  They've been here on my last two trips counting one species or another.  I suspect that they are looking at Seashore Sparrows.  I've been told that there are some others watching Clapper Rails. 

I head up the East a short ways and then veer off into a sinewy natural dead end channel.  It goes quite a ways and I'll have to come back at high tide to see how far I can get.

There is nothing out of the ordinary to report.  Osprey and Willets are doing the appropriate things for this time of summer - watching nests, and the Egrets are feeding - their nests are a long ways off somewhere. 

I pause wherever I find shade to sip from my water bottle.  The edge of Cedar Island works...and each of the bridges. 

I find a shallow pit and a "drag" trail on the mud bank just up from the rockpile in the Big Bends.  I'm not sure what it is but I suspect that it might have been made by a snapping turtle.

Maybe a snapping turtle track?

I turn back when I get to the stone arch bridge.  I could go farther, but the heat makes it less appealing.  The return is more comfortable as the tailwind that had been pacing me is now blowing across my skin.

At the Sneak I find enough water for passage, so I do.  Willets scold me as I near their nest sites in that narrow meander through the middle of Ox Meadow, but I'm gone quick enough and they return to their watch.  An Osprey on one of the conservation easement signs lets me pass within 30 feet....and lets me shoot several photos.