First Osprey

An Osprey hovers high overhead, whistling without a break as if to scold me for my intrusion.

I put in near the mouth of the river on a cool and cloudy day as the tide reached bottomed out.  There was a light wind that didn't add to much to the mid 40 temperature.  I headed straight up the East River knowing that the water level would be too low to use my preferred route through the Sneak.  The first Osprey have arrived and while I don't make it scientific by counting, I guess that 1/5 to 1/4 of the birds are here.  There are about 10-12 nests in this marsh - again, I've never bothered to count.  When the nesting pairs, who often stay together for life, migrate south, they separate and don't see each other until returning to the nest, which they repeatedly use as long as they are together.  I don't see any obvious pairs yet.

At the lowest of the Big Bends, I spot a whitetail doe and yearling, but then further movement reveals that it is a small herd of eight or ten deer, the brush making it difficult to count.  They amble up and over a rise without excessive alarm of my arrival.

Above the Big Bends I spot a pair of Yellow Legs.

Yellow Legs

Just upstream of the Duck Hole Farms I spot a subtle wake on the smooth surface of the river.  I follow fifty feet behind and note a small burst of bubbles coming to the surface every fifteen feet or so.  It's a pretty sure sign of a swimming mammal and after six bubble sets a muskrat surfaces.  It looks around and dives again.  I can stop looking for it as it is going to change direction or tuck under somewhere until I am gone.

I paddle over the Gravel Flats with ease as the tide is not especially low.  I suspect that recent rain has also raised the water level some.  This is confirmed when I get to Foote Bridge where there is a genuine current running through the constriction.  It is time to return.

The tide is coming in and the Sneak is passable on the return.  There a column of 30-some large Gulls soaring over the lower marsh.  The clouds parted about a 1/2 hour ago and I wonder if they are catching a minor thermal off the spartina marsh.  The nest just below where the Neck River and Bailey Creek meet has a pair of Osprey in it.

Up to the Cascades

I set out in the long shady cove.  It is exceptionally quiet and any bump against the canoe reverberates off the forested hillsides.  What first appears to be a 100 yard long patch of pond matter - small sticks, pine needles and other veggie material, turns out to be a layer of cellophane ice from last night.  It is so thin that the canoe barely makes a sound as it slices through.

Skim Ice

At the main river I turn down to round the first point and head up the more secluded Shephaug River.  Just short of the point I hear a half dozen Canada Geese coming.  It is, in fact, only a pair that flies by, the ghost geese being the echoes of their calls.

A disturbance in the water ahead, what looks to be the final remains of a boat wake, signals that I might not be alone.  Around the point I find a motorboat with two men.  One is wearing a drysuit like surfers or divers wear - the entry zipper running across the back of the shoulders.  Perhaps they are setting a mooring anchor in front of Mr. Bigbucks house.  Then, the drysuit guy  jumps into the water and takes hold of a tow rope.  He is barefoot water skiing and they speed about 2/3 of a mile up the river before stopping.  With 45 degree water, I tell myself a story that the skiers legs are numb to the knees and he has collapsed in a heap unable to feel or control them.  As I near them they speed off the other way.

I spot a young Bald Eagle.

I had planned to observe an Eagle nest that I have seen up on the ridge top.  But, I am unable to spot it and have no sightings of any mature Bald Eagles.  So, my bird tally is made up of several Common Mergansers, a pair of Mallards and a few Wood Ducks.  I also note that there is a frequent beaver activity along this shore -perhaps four well used feed zones.  This is bank burrow terrain without ponds or marshes where beaver could build the more commonly known conical lodge.  I've yet to spot a bank burrow here.  I usually find them by locating the branch pile that guards the vent hole.  Here the banks and hillsides rise up so quickly that they might not have a vent.

I add eight Mallard decoys to my collection.  A sip of schnapps to warm ones self while duck hunting might be "almost" okay, but if you drink the whole bottle you're going to lose some gear.

The Cascades

After two hours I reach the cascade that halts further progress (it also prevents downriver travel as there is a deep gorge of junk rapids that can't be walked out of).  A sandwich, some coffee and some sun before following the opposite shore back.

Social Distancing

It is a good day to be outdoors.  Last night it dipped down below freezing, but now it is sunny and the temperature is climbing into a seasonal 40 degree range.  At the put-in two guys are talking about the virus.  One guy, the one doing the talking, has a raspy hoarse voice, as if he talks alot.  With as much stealth as I can muster (with 16 feet of canoe), I sneak off to the water.

I put in at the bottom of Salmon Cove, a favorite canoe trip of mine since I moved here and "discovered" it.  The upriver side of the cove is the former site of the Yankee Nuclear power plant, which has been visibly removed.  The old site is now a no trespassing National Wildlife Refuge, so the cove has regained a reasonable sense of wildness. 

Text book beaver gnawing

 On the way in I pass a well maintained beaver lodge.  It's been here for a few years and is loarge enough that the adults must be breeding.

Bald Eagle in tree

Up ahead at the bend are about twenty Mute Swans.  After the bend I only find two more.  It has been a mild winter with few of the inland lakes and rivers freezing over for very long if at all.  I've counted over 130 swans here during normal colder winters as this area remains open year round.  

At the top of the cove where the Salmon River enters I spot an immature Bald Eagle.  It is unexpectedly calm about my presence and I get a chance to observe it from a closer than normal range.  A pair of Broad Shouldered Hawks occupy a tree top across from the Eagle.

The Leesville Dam is my turn around point and just as I am approaching, a beaver walks off the beach.  It disappears downstream as I take a short look-see above the dam.  When I return I find that the beaver has also returned to the same spot where I first saw it.  Again, it slips into the water and swims back and forth.  With poor eyesight, beaver rely on motion or smell to determine whether something is a threat.  I cross the river and sit in an eddy and the beaver returns to the same spot again to sun itself and groom.  Time for me to go.

Just before exiting the river and entering the cove I spot two, then a third, then a fourth - immature Bald Eagles.

On the last stretch, I find a flock of swallows.  They must be migrating.  They weren't here when I went in and they aren't actively feeding.  In fact, when they leave their perch high in a overhanging tree, they spend most of their energy chasing each other.

Folklore

We've had a string of nice weather, but today was the first in awhile to come without gusty winds.  Today would also bring a very high tide and the opportunity to paddle wherever I wanted with uninterrupted views. 

Recently, I've been thinking about folklore and how people who lose touch with their folk stories lose a piece of themselves.  I set my camera to sepia, as I often do when I'm thinking about such things. Below is a sculpture that I have in a current show.

Huldre - found objects and horse hair

I set out from Foote Bridge, up in the forest and near the upper limit of paddling for this river.  Setting out, the water still had 2 feet to rise.  The wind was at my back and more than made up for the flood current that was opposing my outbound travel.

This is about time for the Osprey to return and while none were sighted today, it will not be long.
A Red Throated Loon was fishing in the first bends below the RR bridge.  They are common spring visitors often seen near river mouths.

I passed down through the Sneak with more than enough water and flushed about a dozen Black Ducks in Bailey Creek.  I also spotted a few Buffleheads and one Red Tail Hawk. It was otherwise a quiet bird day.  On my return I drifted in on the Loon.  It dove a few times to hunt but when I was about 75 yards away it dove again and resurfaced only when it was a 100 yards behind me.

Near the Duck Hole Farms

Hooded Mergansers

Foote Bridge and the newly fallen tree.

Trance Paddling

Although overcast with a middling threat of rain, the day was calm and warm enough to not be a grim mess if the rain should come.  I set out just before the crest of high tide and rode an easy current upstream into the Neck River and Bailey Creek.  By the time I passed through the Sneak and reached the railroad bridge I had seen about 4 dozen Black Ducks and a half dozen Common Mergansers. 

But, this day seemed to be a trance paddling day.  I kept a steady paddle going without pausing.  This brought me to the "trance" of long distance motion.  The land swept by and while I noticed and knew the birds that I saw, I did not devote any mental effort into counting or observing them.  I suppose you become more animal than man, but you definitely become a part of nature when you are not an active observer.  The tidal current went slack by the time I got through the Big Bends and I continued on until the first bend above Foote Bridge.  Then I returned on that slack water not getting any beneficial ebb current until I was again below the Big Bends.

East River

Spirits

Yesterday, I delivered one of my sculptures to a gallery for an upcoming show.  It's a piece that depicts a forest spirit - a collection of found objects; bones, broken glass and pottery, antlers, driftwood  and a mass of horse hair on a toddler manikin that I pulled up from a sandbar.  So, today's train of thought was already prepared.

I put in from Ely's Ferry as a sightseeing boat from Essex passed by.  A former commercial fishing boat, the motors thrummed as it passed by a 8 or 10 knots.  As I paddled I watched it head away upriver, the skipper guiding it closer to land than most of the pleasure craft drivers would dare.  The skipper knew the river.  I'm sure it was an Eagle watch tour.  When I got near the historic Ely houses, which sit at the mouth of Hamburg cove on one of the best pieces of land on the river, I spotted a mature Bald Eagle perched in an evergreen behind the house.

Entrance to the Elfin Forest

I headed up into the Selden Channel but rather than passing all the way through, as I normally would have done, I turned into a side channel which I named the Elfin Forest.  A few meanders between forested hillsides takes me to an open marsh of grassy hummocks and stunted twisted trees.  It is an intimate place.  I've never seen anyone else in here.  I suppose most people that come this way have decided that this channel doesn't go anywhere, which means to me that it might actually go everywhere.  I've been here on warm days when the cool air slides down the hills of the surrounding forests and flows over my body like water.  I've peered into the shadows of those trees wondering what hides in them.  Today, I just sit and take it all in.

On my return I turn up into Hamburg cove.  There is a little bay of seclusion not far into the cove and today I find the upper end of it still iced over.  The bow of the canoe pushes easily into the front edge.  The ice is a full half inch thick, but totally rotten. I examine a piece, noticing the deep pits that have formed in the surface.  It is in the process of disappearing.  But, today it sings.  The little bay has a sound, a rustling of tissue paper.  It is the rotten ice flexing and yielding.  When I push on the surface with my paddle, the sound is an almost metallic creak.  If this was cold firm ice it might almost hold one's weight but today it has no more strength than styrofoam.

Lower Housatonic

I put in from the feral cat park near low tide with a light upriver wind.  I head across the river to pass behind Pope's Flat and Long Island, not to be confused with the Long Island, this one being a few hundred yards of high spartina marsh.  The tide is too low to get behind the other two islands, Carting and Peacock.  An immature Bald Eagle flies up the river as I make my way across.

It is sunny and I ride a natural downriver flow against the wind which creates a light chop and a few small waves. 

I cross back over the river while passing under the bridges and then continue following the east bank.

There have been few birds. Aside from some Gulls, I flushed about 40 Canada Geese, spotted a dozen Buffleheads and a half dozen Common Mergansers. 

On the return I take the passage behind Peacock and Carting Islands.  It is still shallow but a swift upstream current shows the tide coming in.  A few times I ground out in the silty bottom and patiently wait a few minutes until the canoe starts drifting with the rising water.  I only portage a bedrock dike that I've never noticed before...a 6 ft portage at most.

Back at my put-in, I spot a Common Loon.  It dives and is not seen again.