The Freedom of the Migratory Geese

When I stepped outside this morning, I heard the distant honking of Canada Geese, and I scanned the tops of the surrounding trees trying to spot them. Seeing nothing, I waited for them to fly into view.  Then, I turned my head skyward and saw a lopsided V of thirty-some Geese somewhere between 500 and a 1000 feet overhead, the sun sparkling off of their feathers.  These are the Geese that have held onto their freedom, traveling thousands of miles each year in their migrations, travels that must be more interesting than the endless nibbling of parks and golf courses that their non-migratory cousins engage in.  The park Geese have developed shorter necks, and hunters tell me that they do not respond to decoys.  Giving up the migrations, the park Geese have lost some of their social abilities - they no longer join the feeding Ducks and Geese out in the marsh.  They might as well be staring at their smart phones.  I'll take the freedom of the migrating Canada Goose, thank you very much.

I put in at the Rocky Hill Ferry crossing and head down river.  There is a light wind out of the north, a coll wind on a day that will not top 65F.  The river is low and there is little current.   The sky is clear.

I follow the shady east shore for just short of an hour before crossing back.  I spot a small inlet that I have always passed on previous trips.  This time I enter. I weave around a few deadfalls before seeing to a three-footer that blocks for sure.  I hear running water and move up to the last downed tree, and find a 4-foot high beaver dam about ten feet farther in.  I stand up to get a better view and a better photograph.  A flock of migrating Canada Geese pass overhead.

The beaver dam is in the shade

I decide to explore on a later trip, and head back to the river.  When I get to my starting point, I continue up.  I find a couple of ripe patches of  wild rice on the west bank.  

Wild rice

I know it was ripe because I tested it with an easy rap of the paddle and a couple dozen grains landed in the canoe.  I continued a bit farther and then, feeling satisfied, crossed the river again and returned.

Wild rice grains

Hamburg Cove

I set out from the North Cove at Pettipaug (Essex)... yeah, I think the original name has a bunch more pizzazz than the current name.  The water is low and the tide is still dropping, but there is enough depth to get through the gap and out into the main river without having to divert through the marina.  The sky is a high hazy overcast with strips of light blue running across the sky from east to west.  There is little wind and the temperature is in the 70's.  

A Hawk is perched in the tree near the gap.  I'm not sure of the species, perhaps it is a juvenile without the more distinct markings of adult Hawks. It is docile enough that I get several photographs.

I head upriver and cross to the east side following the old Ely Ferry route.  It is the narrowest point in the river for a good distance in either direction, an obvious location for a ferry before the advent of steam power.  Today it might look a bit odd with the west end being a landing on a long marshy strip of land.

I head up the beautiful east shore, a steep forested hillside with small beaches and rock outcrops.  I pass fifteen Common Mergansers - probably one or two female adults and the rest being first years.  Then, I turn into Hamburg Cove.  It is a quiet day with little boat traffic, and none at all in the cove.  There are a good number of Great Blue Herons.  Whenever I flush one, I get a half dozen scolding croaks.  They never go far, crossing the narrow cove or circling around and resuming their original position.

Eight Mile River is running very shallow and I ascend only about 50 yards to the first gravel bar.  It would be mostly wading from that point on, and as the river is only reasonable for a third of a mile on a good day, it is a good place to turn back.

Nearing the gap into the North Cove, I spot another Hawk - or it may be the same one.  It is on the shore and seems to have something worth eating.  I circle it up to the north and around, just to get some more distance.  It seems to always surprise me, but the top of the cove is almost as far upriver as Hamburg Cove.

Low Tide through the Wheeler

I first went to the refuge launch, but found that my ideas about the rising tide were a bit too optimistic with twenty feet of exposed mud between firm ground and the water.  And, I know from past experience that the goo will be half knee height or better.  I divert to the state launch, a mile upriver but with a concrete ramp descending into the semi-briny. 

It is mostly cloudy and warm with a light wind from who knows where.  The tide coefficient is very low, so the difference between high and low tide is small, and the resulting tidal currents are also minimal. Low tide was almost 2 hours ago.

Reaching the marsh, it is clearly low tide and I head down Nell's Channel, which is always deep enough for a canoe.  I find a bottle protruding from the cut bank.  It is a one pint Lord Calvert bottle, 15 inches deep on river left, about 1/3 of the distance from the bend to the main lower entrance to the Nell's Island maze. At that depth, the bottle has probably been in place since around 1950.

I continue on to Milford Point, passing the point for a quarter mile or so towards the sound.  But, there are almost no birds of any interest, so I head back to the marsh.

Crossing over to the east shore, I spot a Clapper Rail, but it disappears into the spartina before I can get at my camera.  There is no point of trying to out wait a Rail, so I move on.  I flush an immature Yellow Crowned Night Heron, but again, no time for a photo.  I do pass several Snowy Egrets and one Swan.  Then, at the east shore, I find another immature Yellow Crowned Night Heron.  This one poses for me.  That is the big change since my last trips in here. It seems that most of the Night Herons have migrated out. I do not see any Osprey as well.  

I head back out and upriver. It has been a quite pleasant day. 

Old Friends

Lord Cove -
Some places that I paddle are like old friends. I listen to them, and perhaps they listen to me.  I take away a bit of the garbage they must deal with, and they take away some of the garbage that comes my way. There's no arguing.  We get along.

I put in at Pilgrim Landing. There are billowy clouds that don't seem to be long for the day.  It will be sunny and warm with a light wind of no consequence. Four people are just getting back from a morning of river trash collecting. Today, there is an organized effort of trash pick up.  I do it all the time on my own, and not being particular to being organized, I did not join in.  It is good to see.

I head up into the cove.  Cormorants are the most numerous bird as I head in.  In fact, there are few other birds to note.  As I get nearer to Cout's Hole, the Great Blue Herons start to add up.  I head up one of the dead ends towards the top of the cove, flushing more Great Blues and fewer Cormorants as I go, and the Great Blue Herons soon outnumber the Cormorants.  I come back and drift over to the old Eagle nest.  I did not see any activity this year in this large old nest. 

When I head over to the bridge - there is only one bridge in the entire cove - I start flushing Mallards, the first that I have seen today.  I figure it'll just be that first eight or ten, but then it's another dozen, and another fifteen, and some more, and some more.  Seems like fifty or so by the time I go under the bridge. I didn't count because I figured each flush was the last flush.

The cattails are browning out.  If one looks carefully, there are some green cattail spears, but almost all of them are in fall color. 

I spot an Osprey on the way out.  Getting a little late for Osprey, but there's always a couple that hang on until it gets cold.  Back to Goose Bay, there are a half dozen Osprey in the air.  I get to watch three good dives. I spot an Eagle chasing an Osprey, and then notice that there is a second Eagle - both are mature Baldies with white heads and tail feathers. 

I take the long way out, rounding the bay and exiting into the main river, crossing to Calf Island and returning to my start point.  I have had the cove to myself for a good three hours. 

Bantam - Dreaming Canoes

Last night, I had a canoe dream.  They don't come along often, so I feel blessed when they do.  
I had a friend in the canoe and we paddled the shoreline near my Grandma's lakeshore home over to Clay Cliff.  I don't think that Clay Cliff is an official geographic name, but anyone living in that are would know it as such. The cliff was about 50 feet high in 8 year-old measurements, but I suppose it was little more than half that in reality. It was not a rock cliff either, but a compacted wall of dirt.  There may have been some clay in it, or not.  It was part of a summer manor that had a small stylish mansion and a large caretaker's house. The caretaker's kids were friends with my cousins, so we had the run of the place if Mr. Moneybags was not around. When we got to the base of the cliff, I looked up to see a jagged hacked off limb of a tree.  It had been chopped at (cut is not the verb for such crude work) with no skill until, I imagine, the person with the ax finally yanked the limb free. I told my friend that this is where my cousins, a wild breed of the family for sure, had hung a rope swing. In fact, there was no room on Clay Cliff for a swing of any sort although you might dangle a rope down the face.  I followed a brick walkway at the base of the cliff (there was no such thing) until I could look around the corner.  The view there was as I remembered from decades ago with a large tented dock where the rich guy's boat was stored in the summer.  My friend wandered off in the meantime.  It was time to go and I pushed into a rush of waves that left a thick layer of foam on the water.  I waded by feel on a rocky bottom until the water was deep enough for the canoe, and I paddled out against the waves.

I put in at the lower end of Bantam Lake.  I've not paddled the lake except at the top where the Bantam River enters.  The water is green in an unhealthy manner - too many nutrients.  The lake does have a good amount of development although it is clean and neat - it does not remind me one bit of the trailer trash development of Lake Zoar.  It would be quite nice if two out of every three houses were removed and the forest was allowed to regrow.  I have no way of knowing, but I suspect that the green water stems from lawn fertilizer and perhaps old septic systems.  I cross over to the east shore and follow it up to the top of the lake. There are very few boats - a couple fishermen and a couple sight seers.

Beaver scent mounds

The upper lake is much nicer.  The houses are old lakeside cabins, for the most part, and there is more forest land.  The uppermost shoreline is the marsh of the Bantam River.   

I head up the river. The water becomes clear the instant I leave the lake.  The first beaver dam is comes soon, right where I remember it.  Maybe 15 inches, it is sturdy and recently maintained.  It smells of castoreum.  From this point on, there is frequent beaver sign - current lodges, old abandoned lodges, beaver drags, and scent mounds.  At one point, there are more than 10 scent mounds in sight on either side of the river, which is clearly a territorial boundary.  I suspect that there are several more lodges in the marsh that are out of view from the river.  I also decide that the lake was a nice start.  I like the idea of putting in some distance before getting to the good stuff (the river).

I run into a few kayakers being led by a grumpy woman when I get to the rough river put-in.  And then there is the woman in the kayak sitting sideways in the middle of the river who looks at me like a space alien when I suggest that she move forward so that I can get around her.  I paddle off wondering if I just insulted the Dowager Empress of Litchfield.  Fortunately, all of those people are going downstream.

I continue up to the pond.  This involves crossing five beaver dams, two of which are flooded, with the others requiring a step out onto the dam to get the canoe over.  There are several in-use lodges on this stretch.  

From the pond, I turn back, making my six beaver dam crossings to get back to the lake.  I zig-zag down the lake by making crossings between the three main points in the river.   

Lover's Leap

I put in by the 4-span steel bridge and head upriver.  It is mostly sunny with a wind coming down the river.  The wind is steady with an occasional prolonged gust, but I make good speed into it by hugging the forested shoreline where the wind is buffered.  

I paddle steady, a tripping pace, something I could do all day, feeling it at the end but not ending exhausted.  There are just a few boats out - mostly bass boats. The round trip will be about 12-1/2 miles - a half day of canoeing.

Lover's Leap

Hugging the shoreline, I look up into the forest.  Sometimes, the land drops steeply to the water, but quite often there is a gradual slope with little brush.  Every so often I spot an old stone wall, a reminder of the wool "gold rush" of the early 1800's.  This hilly terrain would have been pastureland.  Sometimes, the walls end at an eroded bank, all of which tumbles into the water.  Sometimes,  a wall crawls out of the woods and disappears into the depths.  The canoe passes over pastures drowned. I flush Great Blue Herons every once in awhile. They are the dominant bird among a some ducks and Swans.  One pair of Swans has 6 gray cygnets - I often see 3 or 4, but this is the first time I've seen 6.

I get to the narrow gap known as Lover's Leap, pass through and then turn back.  

Exiting Lover's Leap

The wind has decided to ease up.  It is always in my favor, but not as strong as when I came upriver. I cut the corners of the S-ing river taking advantage of any wind that finds me.  

It was a good day. 

Happy Place

I put in sometime after noon on the Menunketusuck.  The tide is low and still dropping, the sky is mostly cloudy with the clouds moving about, and the temperature is in the 70's.  There is a stiff wind coming up the river.

I often set out thinking about the things that I might see, particularly the unusual or new things that nature throws out from time to time.  This tact disappears by the second bend, and I am just happy and thankful to be in such a beautiful place.

It seems that the Osprey are gone.  I spot a Yellow Legs every so often, and a Great Egret.  It is bird quiet for sure.  I'm tallying the few birds, which includes a Cormorant and a few Mallards, when a loose flock of a dozen Great Egrets comes in over my right shoulder and lands, half on the other side of the railroad, half on this side.  I suppose to a creature that flies, the ten foot high berm of the railroad doesn't look like much of a divider. I spot a couple Snowy Egrets.  There don't seem to be any Little Blue Herons or Glossy Ibises, and I suppose they have headed south.

I head back from the rail underpass, which is a one way trip when the tide is moving, and take the east branch up until the water runs thin. Then I head back out and take the west branch up to the pond, which has a 15 inch high stone dam holding the pond water.  I haven't been back here at low tide, so this is the first time that I've seen that, although I have suspected that the bank on this side of the pond might be man-made.

With that, I head out and back up river.