golden fields of grain

December 12th, 2014 § 0 comments § permalink

I live very close to the mouth of the mighty Altamaha River, where 14,000 square miles of central Georgia surface water tumbles into the sea. Un-dammed and free flowing throughout its entire course, the Altamaha is a biodiversity hotspot, and has been the focus of intense conservation efforts for decades. Today, thanks to collaborative effort between GA DNR, private property owners, and The Nature Conservancy, the Altamaha boasts a 42-mile continuous corridor of protected lands, and serves as a best practice for other critical habitats on the coast.

On its north shore lies the small town of Darien, chock-full of history, shrimp and home to a expertly-curated marine hardware store (just a few of my favorite things).

At the hardware store in Darien, GA

At the hardware store in Darien, GA

I cross up to Darien on old Route 17. This route passes through a vast area of impoundments that once comprised the massive rice plantation owned by Pierce Butler. It is a space that contains multitudes. Here, it is possible to gather threads of some of the most pivotal/defining/challenging narratives of the antebellum Lowcountry. Fanny Kemble, Roswell King, The Weeping Time, the Bank of Darien and Gone With The Wind are imbedded in the very landscape.

Rice impoundments at the mouth of the Altamaha River

Rice impoundments at the mouth of the Altamaha River

These impoundments are a living vestige of forced labor performed by slaves from West Africa’s Rice Coast (Senegal, Sierra Leone and Liberia), who would give rise to the Gullah-Geechee people. The earthworks speak volumes about the scale and scope of forced labor in a way that lands differently in me than visiting a historic tabby ruin.

Rice was grown in diked fields at the mouths of most Lowcountry mainland rivers, with production reaching its peak between 1850 and 1860. In Georgia alone, about 23,000 acres of land were felled of cypress and worked into an orderly grid of canals and impoundments.

Today what remains of Butler’s rice operation are a few historic structures and the extensive dyke system, which is laterally compressed to the view of the casual motorist, but extensively accessed by local populations of waterfowl, sportsmen, and natural resource managers. Some of the other rice plantations have been converted into other uses like residential subdivisions (See FLORIDA) and crawfish farms (See WOODBINE), but many remain fallow yet functioning, with a diversity of marsh grasses now mixed in with the most persistent wild rice.

On the Satilla near Woodbine, GA

On the Satilla near Woodbine, GA

The stirring juxtaposition of intrinsic good – biodiversity, ingenuity, and productivity – nested within unbearable suffering – enslavement, abuse, and separation – is something that I rarely see in the interpretation of plantation-era sites. Interpretation, like people, is often segregated. These earthworks present an impossibly complex narrative deftly, even marking the passage of time and imparting a sense of urgency looking into the future.

woodstork chicks

May 29th, 2014 § 0 comments § permalink

Last week I got to help out with Georgia DNR’s Wildlife Resources Division, placing bands on endangered woodstork chicks. It was messy work (they emphatically unload from both ends the moment you pick them up) but it was incredible to do field work with these pros, and visit this particular site – a former industrial site in St. Mary’s that is now a massive rookery. When we were in St. Mary’s earlier this year, I was dying to get into the property and poke around.

It made me think of Newtown Creek and the birdwatching trips we do, where we see many of the same shorebirds I see here regularly. Even in this wild place, the woodstorks are venturing into a disturbed site and thriving. “Teeming” is the word.  Along with the storks, there were cormorants, pink spoonbills, and every kind of egret in there.

Holding a football-sized wood stork chick is: warm, floppy, sloppy and aromatic.  I can’t say they are cute in the classic sense, or even very charismatic, but they are special nonetheless.

This trip also made me think of my field work days in Ecuador, when I found myself in the cloud forest/paramo/rainforest/Galapagos thinking over and over, “I can’t believe I am getting to see this first hand.”  As much wilderness as we have in the US, it is still a continual surprise to me to be on the East Coast and have so much wildlife (Teeming is the word…) literally within arm’s reach.

Where Am I?

You are currently browsing the endangered category at plankton every day.