The Inside

Wheeler Marsh
A perfect day, with the tide still rising for at least 2 hours when I put in.

I use the rough refuge launch avoiding the upstream state boat launch and the weekend horde of boat drivers that I find ... depressing.

I weave the bottom of the marsh.  The tide is high enough that the mudflats are submerged and there are plenty of route options.  Early into it, I spot a Clapper Rail, which dissolves into the spartina before I can get my camera aimed.  I explore a few dead ends for the sake of exploring, and because they are there. By the time I get over to Nell's Island, the water is high enough to pass through the Maze.   

There are a great number of Night Herons - both immature and adults, and they are well dispersed and mostly back a few feet from the water's edge.  They flush from the spartina as I get close. At the bottom of Nell's, I flush a dozen Snowy Egrets that were all standing in a small area. Somewhere in there, I flush 4 Short Billed Dowitchers, and spot a second Clapper Rail.

I explore a couple of channels as I head into the Maze.  Both are dead ends and I return to the main entrance channel and follow it in.  I find a great twisty channel coming off of one of the ponds.  It stays 10-15 feet wide and goes on a long winding route before arriving at a familiar spot.  I hope I can find it again, but that isn't always the case.

I exit the Maze and take a couple of my favorite interior "sneaks".  Flush a couple Black Crowned Night Herons from the Central Phramites Patch, push my way out through the reed mat, and head down to open channels that will take me back to my start point.  There, I talk with a bird watcher for a for minutes.