the Way of the Turtle

3 Mile Walk at Five Rivers EEC
Saturday, October 1, 2011

Fortunately I was feeling well enough today for a walk at Five Rivers, and even more fortunately the rain held off until I was done, since it was chilly enough without it. It's hard to believe that just a few days ago I was constantly drenched in sweat in some rather unusual late September heat and humidity... today feels more like late fall!

Wandering around Five Rivers is always worthwhile, and today was no exception. When I swung by the bird feeders behind the nature center, I was pleasantly surprised to see a turkey on the ground - presumably the one which has been there frequently for the past year, and this summer was escorting a trio of chicks. I wondered where the latter were, until I looked up and saw two more turkeys perched about five feet off the ground on the two platform feeders. One was snoozing, and the other looked ready to take a nap as well - at a guess, those are the two remaining youngsters.

As I made my way through the paved paths near the nature center, I had my second surprise - another walker pointed out a small hawk perched in one of the spruce trees, saying it was either a sharp-shinned or a coopers hawk. Quite the beauty - I took a couple of pictures and then continued on so I wouldn't scare it off.

Wandered down to the Heron and Beaver ponds, where apparently a lot of work has taken place in the last month. One of the observation platforms in the Beaver pond has been moved, after being washed out of position several times in the last year. The path to the bridge has been rebuilt, as has the entrance to the boardwalk. But the biggest change is an attempt to re-route the stream that runs into the pond from the west - one branch of that stream has been washing out the end of the boardwalk and the path to the bridge, possibly due to the beavers diverting it to flood the marsh.

As I walked around the pond, I spotted several ducks, a lone canada goose, and a kingfisher. No beavers in sight, but it was still pretty early. From there I headed back to the Vlomankill trail, where even more work had been done, in this case to reinforce the bank which was washing out. Walked up the hill and across the fields, startling a couple of deer along the way. Also spotted another kingfisher and a green heron in the Sunfish pond.

On my way back to the car I swung around the bird feeders again - turkeys were still there, but I guess they'd had enough of a rest, because the two perching hopped down to the ground and all three headed off foraging. Followed them for a bit, then headed back to the car to change into dry shoes and run a couple of errands. No doubt spending the day in bed yesterday and this morning did a lot of good toward my kicking whatever bug's gotten a toehold in my system - but walking at Five Rivers today did me a lot of good too.

JMH