Canoe building plan

Crapping on Golf Courses

"Why do you like Canada geese," asks S.

"Well, I think if you grew up in the midwest it has something to do with the circle of life...kind of like salmon on the west coast.  Other birds migrate, but geese announce it.  They come in formation and you often hear them before seeing them.  They show that everything is continuing."

We talk more.  I add my admiration for how they shit on golf courses and rich people's lawns...shitting all over.  I figure a Canada goose can locate a Chem-lawn lawn from a hundred miles...a perfect place for a crap.  They are the Greenpeace of birds, the eco-activists that we all should be.  Crapping on golf courses.

We started at the sea and head up the Neck River just as high tide turned.  The osprey seem to all be in place, although most of them were down in the brown and flattened spartina.  Only a few were perched up high.  We flushed the osprey off her nest at the first bend.  She circled and returned as soon as it was clear that we were of no concern.  It seemed a behavior for a bird that might already have eggs in the nest.

We passed The Sneak and continued, a light wind at our back and a light current at our front.  In the marsh below the arched bridge we passed a flock of nine snowy egrets, the first we've seen this season.  They were lined up in orderly fashion along the bank.  A couple of great egrets were about as well.

red throated loon

We stopped at the old sawmill dam ruins.  It seemed far enough.

On the return I turned us into The Sneak to cheat the wind.  It was draining but seemed to have just enough water for passage.  I was wrong.  Almost precisely half-way through we ground, or better, mudded to a halt.  I got out, a boot sucking cardiovascular workout until I got on top of the spartina, and attempted to tow the canoe with S inside.  But the water was dropping too fast.  Instead, we executed a fine tundra portage...dragging the loaded canoe on the grass some 200 yards to Bailey Creek.  I would not normally drag the canoe, but the spartina is harmless and the mud that it grows in has the consistency of grease...no rocks and no shells.

With that and our various smears of mud, we resumed the trip. 
At the take-out, we had a nice long chat with a mother and son who were out trying their hand at bird watching.