IBWOH's: Brian Carlisle, Chris Carlisle.
Summary: My brother Brian and I spent over two hours kayaking Little Lake and the surrounding swamp and flooded bottomland forest, just south of the Wade-Vancleave Road (between MS Highways 57 and 63) in Jackson County, Mississippi. The area is very near the site of a documented Ivorybill sighting in 1982, when birder Mary Morris of Biloxi observed two individuals (see Jerome Jackson, In Search of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, pp. 179-180). Another sighting had occurred in the area about sixty years earlier:
"Locality G embraces the great Pascagoula Swamp, a compact unit, and one well deserving of a separate volume. On two successive days my friend, Mr. Hord, took me out by automobile to points beyond Vancleave whence we paddled in a dugout through miles of veritable fairyland, covering different routes each time. An uncharted wilderness, this vast swamp consists of a maze of interlacing bayous and lakes in which the unacquainted would be speedily lost. The land areas, most of which were under water at the time of our visit, are heavily timbered but without the tangle of undergrowth one might expect, and the water everywhere was completely free from debris, never stagnant, and entirely fit to drink. In the bayous, all of which connect up with the large central Pascagoula River and its branches, the water averaged some fifty feet in depth and afforded wonderful fishing. We saw alligators and swarms of turtles, but very few snakes indeed. Mr. Hord told me that the razorbacks which run wild in the swamp keep them killed off. Hunting parties from Biloxi, Gulfport, and other points find the shooting exceptionally good here, the bags of Wild Turkeys running from ten to twenty for a two or three day trip of several persons, with a few deer and even an occasional bear. With limited time, we could not penetrate deeply enough into the swamp to find such game, but my ornithological zeal was satisfied by the sight of an Ivory-billed Woodpecker, a bird so near extinction that I had never hoped to see a living specimen." (Julian D. Corrington, "The Winter Birds of the Biloxi, Mississippi Region." Auk, Vol. 39: October 1, 1922.)
We began our kayak of the area just after dawn on a fairly clear, unusually warm day. The forest was not too difficult to navigate; a gentle current allowed us to skim the honey-colored water of the channels at a rapid clip or sit quietly as we chose, watched all the while by numerous red-eared sliders warming themselves on logs. Flocks of wood ducks whizzed overhead and though the trees at the edge of our sight, their alarm calls mingling with the screams of hawks. We saw many woodpeckers, mainly the usual suspects -- red-headed, red-bellied, downy, and at least one hairy woodpecker; yellow-bellied sapsuckers and flickers; and finally a pair of pileateds, one of which gave me a bit of a start when it lit in a distant canopy, causing me to scramble to bring the kayak to a halt. Then I heard its tell-tale laughter, bringing a laugh from my brother as well.
I discovered that my camera batteries were dead, so I had to rely on my cell phone. Luckily, Brian's camera was in good working order.
After we had loaded our kayaks back into the truck, we decided that the day was still young enough for more kayaking; so we decided to head back north to one of our favorite areas, the oxbow Hutson Lake. We put in there, and explored a "shadow" oxbow that connects to Hutson via a short channel, and takes in what Hutson may send her. Here Richard Ezell and I had spent hours exploring in the summer of 2014, an experience that left us both completely soaked, and which ruined my cell phone. A lone cormorant greeted us at Hutson, but few other birds made their presence known that late in the morning, and we saw little else besides more turtles.
Summary: My brother Brian and I spent over two hours kayaking Little Lake and the surrounding swamp and flooded bottomland forest, just south of the Wade-Vancleave Road (between MS Highways 57 and 63) in Jackson County, Mississippi. The area is very near the site of a documented Ivorybill sighting in 1982, when birder Mary Morris of Biloxi observed two individuals (see Jerome Jackson, In Search of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, pp. 179-180). Another sighting had occurred in the area about sixty years earlier:
"Locality G embraces the great Pascagoula Swamp, a compact unit, and one well deserving of a separate volume. On two successive days my friend, Mr. Hord, took me out by automobile to points beyond Vancleave whence we paddled in a dugout through miles of veritable fairyland, covering different routes each time. An uncharted wilderness, this vast swamp consists of a maze of interlacing bayous and lakes in which the unacquainted would be speedily lost. The land areas, most of which were under water at the time of our visit, are heavily timbered but without the tangle of undergrowth one might expect, and the water everywhere was completely free from debris, never stagnant, and entirely fit to drink. In the bayous, all of which connect up with the large central Pascagoula River and its branches, the water averaged some fifty feet in depth and afforded wonderful fishing. We saw alligators and swarms of turtles, but very few snakes indeed. Mr. Hord told me that the razorbacks which run wild in the swamp keep them killed off. Hunting parties from Biloxi, Gulfport, and other points find the shooting exceptionally good here, the bags of Wild Turkeys running from ten to twenty for a two or three day trip of several persons, with a few deer and even an occasional bear. With limited time, we could not penetrate deeply enough into the swamp to find such game, but my ornithological zeal was satisfied by the sight of an Ivory-billed Woodpecker, a bird so near extinction that I had never hoped to see a living specimen." (Julian D. Corrington, "The Winter Birds of the Biloxi, Mississippi Region." Auk, Vol. 39: October 1, 1922.)
We began our kayak of the area just after dawn on a fairly clear, unusually warm day. The forest was not too difficult to navigate; a gentle current allowed us to skim the honey-colored water of the channels at a rapid clip or sit quietly as we chose, watched all the while by numerous red-eared sliders warming themselves on logs. Flocks of wood ducks whizzed overhead and though the trees at the edge of our sight, their alarm calls mingling with the screams of hawks. We saw many woodpeckers, mainly the usual suspects -- red-headed, red-bellied, downy, and at least one hairy woodpecker; yellow-bellied sapsuckers and flickers; and finally a pair of pileateds, one of which gave me a bit of a start when it lit in a distant canopy, causing me to scramble to bring the kayak to a halt. Then I heard its tell-tale laughter, bringing a laugh from my brother as well.
I discovered that my camera batteries were dead, so I had to rely on my cell phone. Luckily, Brian's camera was in good working order.
We put in at a small unnamed lake that had overflowed into the surrounding bottomland forest. (Photo: Brian Carlisle.)
Brian was already well ahead by the time I clambered into my kayak and shoved off...
...and yet he still managed to come back around in time to snag a shot of me.
We alternately followed channels and kayaked through the woods, moving generally south- southwestward towards Little Lake.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
I was rather taken by the serene swamp forest. Maybe kayaking through flooded bottomland is still a bit of a novelty for me. (Photo: brian Carlisle.)
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
After some trial and error, we found ourselves on the south edge of Little Lake.
I pause beneath a largish cavity in a tupelo. Signs of woodpecker activity could be easily found throughout this forest, and we were drawn to several cavities, usually in tupelos. Photo: Brian Carlisle.
We kayaked from the south end of Little Lake, through the cypress-tupelo swamp forest of its northern half, and back into the flooded bottomland. We bore eastward, until with a little more trial and error (and some portaging) we found a wide, deep channel that eventually led us back to the small lake near Brian's truck. An older man passed us in his aluminum motorboat, probably heading for a favorite fishing hole.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Photo: Brian Carlisle.
Conclusions: While we saw no suggestive scaling, and heard no kents or double-knocks, Brian and I have already found two other intriguing locations in the vicinity of Little Lake which we hope to explore in the coming months. While there seems less variety of tree species in this far southern sector of the Pascagoula River Swamp, the maturity of the bottomland and swamp forest, combined with the historical record, have made an impression on my imagination.
It is enough to go on.
Looks like nice habitat. Good luck in your search!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Houston!
ReplyDelete