Reconnaisance

I'd only been in this section of the Housatonic once before.  I'd started lower down and paddled up until I found myself in an area of crowded old school beach homes - lots of old two bedroom getaways with broken down docks, great view if you're on land looking out, not so good if you're on the water looking in.  The interstate runs quite close to those houses also, such that the traffic noise isn't just background sound.  This time I started at a launch near Sandy Hook.  The usual twisting and weirdly signed Connecticut roads doubled my driving time. 

I headed up following closely the forested east shore.  I thought about the magic of long distance views, how a grey stick turns into a Great Blue Heron, how a Bald Eagle becomes a bare patch of wood in a tree.  I see a kayaker taking off his sun jacket with a shake...and he becomes a Swan.  The two gomers fishing near shore are still two gomers fishing from shore long after I am out of sight.  Sometimes the magic doesn't work as advertised.

Pomperaug River

I head up into the Pomperaug River.  I'd tucked my nose in heare on that last trip and it's time I see how far I can go.  It quickly turns pleasant with the trees swallowing the highway noise and providing a cool shady route.  Here too are a few old school getaway houses, but not too many.  About a mile up I come to a river wide cobbled shelf.  I beach the canoe and continue on foot finding the rocks round, slick and and nasty to walk on.  I stumble far enough to see that the river is a series of pools and shelves for a few hundred yards.  I really don't want to walk this junk with a canoe on my shoulders, especially if it isn't likely to improve.  I turn back.  Spot a beautiful Oriole on the way.

I take a short paddle continuing upstream until I can sight a bridge that I had crossed on the way in.  This section of the river looks worthwhile for a return visit.  There is a large section of blown down forest on the west bank.  I suspect this is wind damage from the same storm that knocked down Bob and Rita's trees.

I only took one photo today.

Low Tide Feeding Frenzy

The storm that knocked Bob and Rita's trees down a few years back also blew down some of the Osprey nests in Salmon Cove.  As the young had not yet fledged, a whole generation was wiped out.  New nests were started in completely new locations, but of course, new eggs were not laid.  The number of Osprey were down in the following years. 

I set out right at low tide thoroughly absorbing the grey stick swamp landscape.  I have ten Osprey sightings before I get to the turn in the cove.  There are two new and well built nests to add to the two that were here before.  In two of the nests I spot a chick standing up high.  I figure there are 12-14 adult Osprey in the cove today.  They have come back with a vengeance from that storm. 

With the tide bottomed out I follow the channel markers that the locals put out, bleach bottles with red and white reflective tape hung from 12 to 14 ft wood poles.  The route is not direct, meandering through the bottom of the 200+yard wide cove.  But, I figure that 80 percent of the cove is no more than 6-8 inches deep at low tide and the dozen and a half Great Blue Herons that are hunting well out in the middle of the cove support my estimate.  There are five Great Egrets as well and all of the birds are busy stabbing at small fish hiding under pond weeds in the shallow water.

Above the cove in the river proper I spot a Hawk and a pair of Common Mergansers.  But, my goal of paddling up to the Leesville Dam falls a little short.  The gravel bar about a 1/4 mile before the dam is running wading deep and I know from previous trips that almost the full 1/4 mile will be wading, in both directions.  So, I turn back.

By the time I reach the top of the cove the tide is coming back in.  Not only is the water a few inches deeper, but the current has reversed to head upstream against the natural flow.  The Great Blue Herons and Egrets have mostly given up their fishing spots except at the shallowest places.  A few of the Herons are being territorial about the reduced fishing opportunities and engage in some chasing.

immature Bald Eagle

Halfway down the cove I find an immature Bald Eagle tucked away in the trees.  Then, at the point before "the point" I spot another, then another, and then one more that I hadn't seen flies out and up the shore.  On my last trip in here I spotted four immatures all together at the top of the cove and I wonder if these might be the same.  One of them is almost in adult feathers with a white head and tail but still some white mottling on the body.

Almost to adult feathers

It is not far to the take out and the heat of the day is just starting to arrive.

The Anti-Anxiety Machine

I heard an osprey twice call out from a nearby tree as I started into the Elfin Forest.  I only spotted it as it took wing and crossed the marsh to perch in another tree some 200 yards off.  It had a good sized fish in its talons.  A few more bends in the tiny stream and I came across a female Wood Duck with a single duckling.  Woodies protect their young by ditching them and decoying with a faked injury the suspected predator.  They exceed expectations on the decoying often skittering along the water for a few hundred yards.  This Woodie with only one of her brood remaining has had a hard go of it.  I turn back and leave the deeper area of the Elfin Forest to her.  On my way out, I stop and watch the Osprey eat the fish.  Shreds of flesh and fish scales flutter down as it gently rips the fish apart with twisting head motions.

The first half hour of the paddle was one of distancing myself from the unfortunate events of the past week.  Pandemic, riots, protests and a president that can't do anything except make matters worse make a trip to the river all that more necessary.  In fact, my main way of maintaining contact with my distant friends, Facebook, has become nothing but an anxiety machine with far too much information and emotional distress.  I've had to cut FB use off as the only way to fix a broken anxiety machine is to power it of for awhile.

Exiting the Elfin Forest, a jetski speeds by well over the 6mph limit.  Across the channel, a guy in a pontoon boat gives the driver a more polite signal to slow down than the one I used.  But, this started a conversation and I find the two guys in the pontoon boat to be a pre-columbian archaeologist and a photographer.  We talk for a good twenty minutes.

Main Channel Eagle Nest (see below)

I head up the Osprey Channel.  I'd spotted one beaver lodge on the way down and figure it worthwhile to see how beaver were fairing up in this long dead end.  I find one new and well built lodge which is small enough that the pair living inside of it probably aren't producing young, yet.  A lodge can triple in size in a week or so if the beaver need more room.

Small Lodge in the Osprey Channel

I head down and out into the main river for my return.  A tailwind evens out the oncoming current.  I find a new eagle nest.  An Bald Eagle perched nearby flies off, but before I am out of sight another returns with a fish in its talons.  As it lands on the nest dinner causes a single Eaglet to pop up into full view.

Note Eaglet in Nest

Just about to Whalebone Cove I pass a guy in a canoe going down river.  Looks like a 16 ft Penobscot canoe.  He looks familiar and has a twisted kind of woodsie old timer thing going on.  I think I've seen him before, but I can't remember for sure.

To the Cascades of the Shephaug

The Eagle spotting was worth a gold star if I do say so myself.  500 yards off and up the hill in a pine tree, but way back in the shadows of the branches.

Bald Eagle just left of center

The Same Bald Eagle

I put in on the always silent cove and paddle out into the main river, although controlled such as it is, it appears as a lake. 

No matter, there is enough protected forest in this area to make it look like something it isn't.  At the bottom of the cove some purple growth draws me straight across the water.  I find a bumper crop of purple wisteria vining up the trees on the hillside.

I head down and around the point into the Shephaug River, which also looks like a lake.

Not far up from the point I spot a mass in the branches overhanging the water...an Eastern Hog Nosed Snake, although I do have to wait until I'm home to identify it.   

Eastern Hog Nosed Snake

I follow the shoreline north for the next hour and a half until I get to the cascades of the Shephaug.  There is no canoeing past here, in either direction for some way with a tough rapids through a gorge with no way to exit the river.  You can't even access the shoreline to look at it.

I turn back.

The mild wind has freshened some, but it comes in long gusts with long pauses between.  It is not a problem and actually serves to cool off a warm day.

At the wooded point where the two rivers join, the same point I rounded on the way out, a couple sits in their lawn chairs behind their big bold No Trespassing signs.  This is a long walk from their house, but so be it.  I ignore them.

Earn It

A three day weekend in the midst of a two month weekend seems redundant.  But, a heavy overcast with a light misting rain made this a good day for me to be alone in the canoe.

I put in by the sea, where I usually do and headed straight up the river as the tide was still too low for passage through the Sneak.  I estimated that I was riding a short mile per hour flood current, an easy paddle.  It was quiet although with a fair amount of bird activity.  Osprey were out in numbers, indicating that their eggs have hatched.  Both adults can leave the nest although at least one will stay close.  The first Osprey to cross my path was carrying a large fish, large enough that it stayed low and skimmed the surface until it could find a feeding spot.  Willets occasionally showed themselves near the water's edge, but for that species I figure there was one of the pair sitting on a nest at this time. 

A line of ten or twelve dark birds flies upriver too distant to be identified.  I suspect Glossy Ibises.  Cormorants will fly in that formation, but it seems to me that they were too far inland.

My current estimate was fairly good as I reach Foote Bridge in an hour and ten minutes, about 4-1/2 miles from the start.

Marsh Wren nest at center

Just below the arch bridge I spot a dummy Marsh Wren nest, then a proper nest a few feet away.  The dummy nests don't have an entrance hole.

Marsh Wren nest

At the Big Bends I spot the Glossy Ibises, two groups, one of six and the other of four.  They cooperate fully with me to get what is sure to be an award winning photograph.

I return via the Sneak.  I spot some other paddlers in the area, but I lay low and try not to give away my secret passage.  Only when they've left the area do I make my way out.  Some things must be earned.

Farmington

I set out from the huge Gifford Pinchot sycamore, heading upstream against a normal 2:1 current (2 hours up, one hour to return).

First was a male Mallard.  It flushed and left the scene.
Second was a mature Bald Eagle that did not take wing until I was right under it.

 Third was a Great Blue Heron that overtook me on my right flying low up the river.

Fourth was a Red Wing Blackbird
Fifth was never seen, but it was most definitely a wood pecker and it was working away with a machine like diligence.
I lost count, but something like ten through twenty three was a hen Common Merganser and twelve ducklings all hauled out on a log to sun.  She was likely tending two broods.

Common Merganser hen with 12 ducklings

Add a pair of Wood Ducks, a couple Kingfishers, a few Swallows, a few Bluejays and several more Red Wing Blackbirds.

It was a pleasant day with almost no wind and plenty of sun, and I had the river pretty much to myself.  Lately, with the pandemic lock down, I've been hiking with S or our friend M.  But, sometimes I need to go off on my own.  Nature is my spiritual place and spiritual places don't work with other people to distract you. 

At two hours I became bored.  The Farmington is a bit over-controlled.  It looks good, but if you peer behind the thin line of trees along the bank you realize that it isn't quite as it should be - too much of the same for too long.  The return trip ran just a tad over one hour.  I spotted three Hawks along the way.

Eagle Check

We set out from Pilgrim Landing to go up into the farthest reaches of the cove.  The day is grey and overcast, cooler than the the last few days and with a threat of rain as a weather front moves in this evening. The tide is nearing high and it is also a higher than normal tide, so the shallower side channels should be passable if we choose to use them.

There are plenty of birds around, but they are not particularly active.  In fact, the whole day is rather quiet if we discount Mr. J.Q. Moneybag's gardeners who are leaf blowing his multiple acres of water front property a good 3/4 of a mile away.  Red Wing Blackbirds are all around and every so often one of the nesting Osprey flies by.

I go right to get around Coute's Hole, a weird round pond in the marsh circled by a wall of cattails.  Somewhere, I miss a turn and we deviate farther to the right than anticipated.  I end up pushing the canoe through shallows for about 25 ft to get back to the plan.

Eagle nest (pine tree right of S)

The distant nest, somewhere near Ely's Ferry Rd is obvious on the skyline.  I knew it was there but didn't know if it was Osprey or Eagle as you cannot paddle within a 1/2 of a mile of it.  S uses the binoculars and can see the white heads of mature Bald Eagles in the nest.  We continue into the older nest.  Both adults are there perched near and below the nest.  Their chicks have hatched.  These two are superb Eagle parents having raised three Eaglets during each of the last two years.  Normally, Eagles raise one - two if they're good.

Just as we turn to come back, the temperature drops a good 5 degrees or so in about the same number of minutes.  A cool sprinkle of rain comes about ten minutes later.  There will be no let up for the rest of the day.

I find the remains of a Goose nest on one of the rock islands, a usual nesting spot every year.  It's just some feathery mess and a few egg shell fragments.  About a half mile further on, we spot the Geese and five small goslings that are all of three days old.

We end up seeing a total of six mature Bald Eagles.  Also, the first Marsh Wrens of this spring, one Great Blue Heron, three Great Egrets, a Mallard, a Turkey Vulture and maybe eight or ten Osprey.