High Tide

I set out for a short trip through the local marsh after a few days of stomach crud. It is a partly cloudy day with a light cool breeze and the tide is just about peaking when I set out from the wildlife refuge launch.
By the way, I recently learned about the namesake of the Charles Wheeler Wildlife Refuge. Usually, you expect the honoree to be a biologist or environmentally minded politician. Wheeler was a well known duck decoy carver...surprise on that.

 It's a high high tide today, and a quick glance from the bank shows that I can go most anywhere without having to follow any of the standard channels. I head down and around - clockwise, wanting to cruise along Milford Point to look for shorebirds. Not far into it, I spot a single Great Egret, the first of the year. It will be the only Egret of the day. I spot a few Canada Geese and some Ducks, and nothing on the point. Then I head straight up into the center of the marsh.

Next, I cut across to the central phragmites patch, then into the channel downstream of Cat Island. I get around the island with a short wade, flushing two Great Blue Herons and a mated pair of Mute Swans as I go. Then up and into side channel that leads back to the phragmites patch, and then a somewhat circular route around and back to my put-in. I flushed a substantial flock of small Ducks on that last bit. I never got a good Id on them, but I suspect that they were Teal.