Housatonic 4

I put in at Pond Brook. The parking lot, such as it is (it's a big field), looks a bit like a county fair.  Apparently, a hiking club and a mountain biking club are both using the nearby trail system. There are only two other boaters, a pair of dippers who don't look like they will go very far. 

I pass four more kayakers before getting to the confluence with the Shephaug, all dippers, but wonders of wonders, 3 out of the 4 are wearing PFDs.

The day is very humid, so much so that I feel lethargic.  The sky is overcast with cumulus clouds and while it opens up a bit as I paddle, it never gets less than 90% clouds. When I get to the main river, I let the wind decide on my course.  It seems that the breeze is slowly increasing.  It is coming up the river, so I head down, following the shore closely.  It is my "Natty Bumpo" canoe technique - weave in and out of the overhanging tree branches up close to the forest so that no one "out there" will see me, while I pay close attention to everything.

I see a few Osprey, a few Great Blue Herons, and a Mallard with seven ducklings in tow. 

The wind is at my back on my return, and it feels like 10-15 mph.  I pass a herd of 6 dippers. Two of them are working their paddle boards as if they were galley slaves.  Looks like fun (end sarcasm font).  

I'd expected more motorboats, but once I left the confluence, I saw no one until my return, and that was almost nothing. 

The Advice Column

It's a nice Friday. The temperature will be about 80F, the wind is moderately light and there is plenty of sun. Low tide is around 7:00am, and I don't feel like dealing with summer highway mayhem, so I aim for something close by where the tide will be unimportant.  I put in from O'Sullivan's Island near the top of the tidal section of the Housatonic.  There is a pretty good current at the start, but it fizzles away as I head downriver. 

At the confluence with the Naugatuck, I cut over to river-left where I can paddle in the shade of river bank trees.  The water is higher than I expected. That may be a combination of the incoming tide and extra water being released from the Derby Dam. I noticed yesterday that the reservoir above that dam was higher than normal.

My mind drifts off to deeper thoughts.  This happens often when I am canoeing.  This is my spiritual place.  It was not something I planned nor was it something I was looking for.  I bought a used canoe and put it in the water, and then put myself in the canoe, and I knew it was where I belonged. It just happened. 

Recently, I watched an interview with a well known mountain climber.  Currently in his senior citizen years, he still climbs and described it as his way of staying sane.  I wouldn't put words in his mouth, but I interpret that statement as, climbing is his spiritual place."  I did a fair amount of mountain climbing when I was younger. While there were many moments of excitement, fear, physical and mental challenges, there were on occasion, these moments that transcended the earthly bounds.  Usually, in what some place where you realized that you were so small as to be no more significant than a grain of sand.  It might be a deep in a gully with thousand foot high walls on either side, on a thin ridge with a thousand feet of air on both sides, staring into a seemingly bottomless crevasse. All it took was a moment to pause and see the wonder of the surroundings.  

After climbing, I road raced  bicycles.  It was competitive, intense, and often fun.  It was never spiritual.  When I quit that, I started mountain biking in the backcountry... not racing, but just exploring. A few times each year I went on solo rides to explore trails that were seldom biked or hiked.  Those rides often had a good degree of spiritual qualities.  Being alone in the backcountry will do that.  One more thing, I grew up going to a lot of church, and never found one thing spiritual about it. It was joyless doctrine and obedience and being told that you weren't trying hard enough if it wasn't working for you.  So, what's this all about?  Find a spiritual place. I don't think anyone will be able to lead you to it... you're on your own for that.  You'll know it when you get there.

I hear the raspy whistle of a Bald Eagle.  Near the sand bar that the fishermen often use, I find a mature Bald Eagle in a tall snag. But the raspy whistle alerts me to the immature fledgling perched on a branch below the adult.  Farther down, I spot another mature Bald Eagle. I continue past Wooster Island, where I often turn back, and continue down to the unnamed island. I circle that island and head back.  Four Osprey are feeding on the submerged sandbar above the island.  Instead of high dives, the Osprey are down low, four or five feet above the water, and making last moment dives into the water.  There must be a school of small fish, but the water is too murky due the recent rainfall for my eyes to spot them.  

I spot another immature Bald Eagle as I near O'Sullivan's Island.  This one is a second year - some white feathers coming in on the head and tail.

 

 

Third Try

The weather was a little unsettled, some rain, some chance of more rain, and some wind. I headed to the first stretch above the tidal section of the Housatonic where the best start point is Indian Well State Park. However, the roads at the Derby choke point were completely choked for some unknown reason, although I suspect some road repair due to recent rainfall, but that is just a suspicion. I diverted to the Eagle Scout put in, a bit farther up and on the near side of the river, but I got a good look at the water level from the road, and it was quite high.  This section of the river is an old style reservoir from the days when engineers couldn't build hundred foot tall dams.  The normal water level is probably no more than 25 feet above to original river and the reservoir is in a 5 mile long narrow valley.  This means that the water steadily flows in and out.  High water means a lot of water is moving through, and that means that there is a real current, which is damn stiff in the upper mile and a half.  So, I divert again.

I end up putting in under the highway and paddling down to the Wheeler Marsh.  The tide is coming in, and although the water doesn't look particularly high, it feels high for some reason.  Anyway, I have the wind at my back and the opposing current is of little count. 

Laughing Gull

Common Terns are still hanging about at the last dock, but today there are a couple small black headed Gulls.  I think they are Laughing Gulls.  The only good photo that I get is an almost mature bird, its head not completely black.  At the dock Osprey nest, there is a young Osprey that is not yet ready to fly.

The rising tide shows itself as I enter the marsh.  The Wheeler is a mile by a mile and a quarter and roughly oval in shape.  Tidal currents don't move upriver and downriver in most of the marsh.  Rather, they flow in or out, much like a sponge soaking up water.  In a falling tide, if you follow the current, you'll have a good chance of finding an exit.  In a rising tide, if you follow the current you might find an open channel, or you might end up in a long dead end.

I refresh the memory by exploring channels that I have not been in for a long time, knowing that there is a reason that some of them don't get visited.  I find a few dead ends, but I also find some passsages that I had forgotten.  I see quite a few mature Yellow Crowned Night Herons, and a few more immatures than on earlier trips. It is notable that the mature birds scare well before the immatures.

It starts to rain.  It is light rain.  I look around at the clouds and where I am, the clouds do not suggest a thunderstorm.  I do not mind canoeing in the rain, but the marsh is far too open for stormy stuff.  

All in all, it is a very nice trip and I have an easy return back to my start point. 

Marsh Memory Game, and Birds

I set out from under the highway and head down to the marsh.  High tide peaks in about a half hour, so the current is just about non-existent. There is a light breeze of no significance with mostly clear sky other than some high dappled clouds. The temperature is in the mid to upper 70's.  It is a pretty good day to be on the water.

There are 31 Common Terns perched on the last dock before the marsh with another 10 or 15 in the air. By this time, I have solved all of the worlds problems, which is what canoeing is all about.

I cut through a favorite short-cut and head to another internal channel that I found earlier this year and still need to burn into my memory.  With most things in the marsh looking alike, repetition is the only way to remember which inlet leads to someplace that you want to go.  I find the internal channel on my second try, and get through it with only one wrong turn. There are a good number of Yellow Crowned Night Herons, mostly adults, just a couple fledglings.  

Short Billed Dowitchers with their usual photo cooperation

I head into the maze using the Nell's Channel entry, almost.  I take a wrong inlet, but with the high tide I can push through a canoe length of weeds to get where I was supposed to be.  I flush some Mallards, and find a good number of Yellow Crowned Night Herons - maybe 15 by the time I leave the maze.  There are several flocks of waders rising up and circling around the marsh before settling back in.  I am pretty sure that they are Short-Billed Dowitchers.  Flushing before I can get a photograph and circling around the marsh in a flock is exactly the behavior that I've seen them use in the past.  I spot only 5 or 6 Willets today, all near the bottom of Nell's Island.  When their young are fledged, they leave the marsh for better feeding. 

Immature Yellow Crowned Night Heron

I cut across the marsh somewhere near the midpoint, still amazed that I always manage to get across without running up a long dead end channel.  I head up the east side and back to the main river, where I turn upriver towards my start point.

Sleepy Time Paddle

We put in on the Lieutenant River, making it a leisurely and rather late morning start.  The weather is great - maybe 80F with a light breeze and no clouds.  The tide is falling and has been for about an hour and a half, but that is not so much an issue here. We head upstream.

It is a peaceful upstream paddle against a light current. We pass a few boats right away, but they are the only ones we will see until we come back down the river.  Great Egrets seem to be the main large bird today.  We also see a couple of Osprey and a couple Great Blue Herons.  It is pretty bird quiet.  

Lieutenant River

There is quite a bit of milfoil weed matting in the river, and it is much more than I remember in the past.

S stays on the jb picking our way through the Boulder Swamp.  The water level is just perfect for many of the boulders to be just a couple inches below the surface.  This takes us into Mill Brook, which yes, did have a couple of mills on it at one time.  There was an Eagle nest near a house in here, but last year the owners remodeled the joint, which disturbed the Eagles for most of the summer.  They abandoned the nest after their young fledged.  But, we hear what we suspect to be a young Bald Eagle calling out repeatedly from the forest just opposite the old nest.  We pause for several minutes and let the canoe drift hoping to catch sight of the nest, but we have no luck.  There is too little water to pass under the bridge on Mill Brook, so we turn and pick our way back out.

Mill Brook

We pass our start point and head down to Watch Rocks.  Still, not much in the way of birds. We head up into the short Duck River, just because I don't go in there on a regular basis.  We turn back at the McCurdy Road culvert, which would have to be portaged, and call it a day.  It is warm and peaceful in a way that makes us both rather sleepy.

It's New Bird Time

It is a great day again, perfect for canoeing and just too good to pass up.  As a bonus, the tide is high near 8:30 in the morning, which sets the stage for exploring the marsh.

Many of the larger birds are starting to fledge, or at least nearing that point in their development.  The other day when I went for a walk at Miford Point, I spotted a newly fledged Night Heron parked in the center of a large six inch deep puddle at the Audubon Center.  So a run through the Wheeler Marsh seemed appropriate.

I started from under the highway, as usual.  The tide was dropping, so it was a speedy run down to the marsh.  At the last dock, which is along one, about 30 Terns were perched with at least another dozen in the air nearby. 

I head into the Nell's Island maze.  It immediately brings to mind yesterdays trip in the Quaboag, which I noted as lacking the intimacy that I usually find when paddling in marshes.  The entrance to the maze is just a few feet wide, it bends one way or another and requires attention to the paddling.  I flush a Yellow Crowned Night Heron and a Willet, both from close up.  The water is still too high to get under the big deadfall that blocks the "easy" route.  And, my skinny bypass seems to have filled in - at least with the summer spartina, it is invisible. But, there is a deep channel around the deadfall that I do not remember ever seeing.  While the salt marshes are fairly stable in the big view, minor changes do happen as banks erode with channels opening and large lumps of root bound mud fall into open spots.  I take the normal route through, flushing quite a few Yellow Crowned Night Herons, some Mallards and a couple Willets. Only one of the Willets bothers with scolding me. 

Glossy Ibises

I cross the marsh to the east side.  The lower marsh is pretty much flooded and there are few birds.  A mature Bald Eagle heads up the east shore going past Cat Island before I lose sight of it.  I head into the Central Phragmites Patch.  The channel in is closing in and I don't know whether this is just summer spartina or mud blocks shifting about.  It is definitely a tighter fit than ever before.  I flush a Green Heron on the way in, but otherwise no birds.  It has been a preferred Night Heron hang out in the past.  Five Glossy Ibises fly over.

Newly fledged NIght Heron still with bad hair

I head up Beaver Brook.  Find a couple newly fledged Night Herons, both which are not quite sure of what to do when a canoe appears on the scene.  I go as far as the last bend before the culvert, where I spin the canoe and find a white tail doe with a pair of spotted fawns.  They walk into the water and make a quick swim across and disappearm literally, into a stand of phragmites. I spot the Bald Eagle again as it flies off to who knows where.

White tail fawn

On my way back, the Terns are stil camped at the long dock.   

Something New

I put in on the Quaboag River.  I've never been here before and it has been on my list.  It is a sunny day with temperatures in the 70's and a predicted 6-8 mph wind.  A fairly ideal day for canoeing, especially in mid-summer.

I make a wrong turn or two on my drive, but once I figure out to toss the shithead google map route, it's easy.  In fact, it's not much more than 10 miles away from the Quinabaug put-in, which I know well. The start is a hand-launch parking area very near the intersection of Rt 9 and Rt 67.

I head upriver with a tailwind.  Having not been here before, I start out paddling against the current, just in case.  But, the current is a nothing burger, just enough movement to bend the water plants and show the direction of the current.  

The first mile is in the forest with the river being about 5 canoe lengths wide.  There are a few shallow spots, but nothing that can't be paddled through.   About a mile in the forest begins backing away from the river.  Now the river is more like 10 canoe lengths wide, meandering casually through a wide treeless marsh.  In fact, there will not be a spot of shade for the remainder of the trip.

The river is beautiful, but I find it lacking in intimacy.  I am so much more used to paddling up against the swamp plants and near the forest.  The edges between ecozones have so much more going on with variety in flora and fauna.  In the Quaboag, I feel as if I am kept at an arms length.  Anyway, the paddling is good and there are few people.  I go just over 6 miles to the mouth at Quaboag Pond and return.  I see 4 dippers and a pontoon boat tour during the 4 hours.  Also, several Great Blue Herons, a couple Osprey, Kingfisher, some Geese and Mallards, an maybe a dozen beaver lodges.