Indian Summer?

It is another spectacular day, this one with almost no wind, and almost no clouds. At my put-in on Pond Brook, I am inland about 25 miles from the house. A few more trees are changing color here, but it is still early for autumn colors. I head down the cove that once was Pond Brook and out into the Housatonic. It is quite still, still enough that sound travels quite far - someone is mowing their lawn a half mile behind me. 

I turn the point and head into the Shephaug arm. I follow the near shoreline, which is a steep and forested hillside with occasional stone wall remnants. The forest smells of autumn - a little dusty, a little musty, a hint of wood smoke, and a hit of something oaky- an odor that reminds me of the taste of oak. It is quiet and very peaceful on this side of the point - precisely what brought me here. It is too early for Indian Summer, but everything today says, "Indian Summer."  I flush a few Great Blue Herons from the shadows as I go. The fall light is already low enough that the Herons can disappear in the shade of the riverside trees. 

At the first big widening, I spot a Bald Eagle. It is one of those "proud" spots as the Eagle is about 400 feet above and about a 1/3 of a mile away. I only saw it because I noticed an out of place white spot in a thin dead tree.

Bald Eagle in the dead tree in the center

I pull close to shore to try and identify the trees that are shifting color. I am botanically challenged, but I guess that the gold leaves are grey birches. The smaller leafed maples are also changing to a dark red. Hopefully, we will have little wind over the next three weeks - our eastern hardwood forests can be something amazing some years.

 

See, I told you so

I turn at the cascades. It has been an easy paddle on calm water with only a few fishermen in the area. I retrieve a fancy frog lure. The line was wrapped around an active paper wasp nest, so I suppose the previous owner opted to not go to any effort to recover it. I snip the line with my knife, leaving the fishing line for the wasps, but at least I removed a nasty double hook lure from the water. I really should have photographed this.

I flush a flock of Wood Ducks on the way back down. Flocks of Wood Ducks is a migration thing. One year, in the Great Swamp, I counted over 600 in just a couple miles.

Other sightings - several Kingfishers, some Mallards, about a dozen Mergansers.