New Webs: A Late Winter Swamp Slog, 2 March 2015

IBWOH:  Chris Carlisle.

Summary:  I had a "free" day (more or less) on Monday, 2 March.  My fellow hunters, Brian and Richard, were both still at work, and I am not yet confident enough in my kayaking abilities to try taking the Kuhn out solo; so I decided to drive down to the Pascagoula Wildlife Management Area (WMA) for a lone walk through the north sector.  There is one final long road in the area that we had not walked, an old logging road that parallels the WMA boundary line in the northeast corner; with the goal of walking it in mind, I drove through the rain and predawn darkness, and had boots on the ground a few minutes before the feeble sunrise.

Fog lay heavy on the Pascagoula River in the grey morning, and I could not see its waters from the great bridge east of Benndale.  Hours later, the river still lay hid in the mists, which clung to the nearby lakes as well.

The already challenging terrain of the Pascagoula WMA is now even more so, due to rising waters everywhere that make some streams impassable.  (The Pascagoula is the longest undamned river of its type in the 48 contiguous United States.  It is allowed to flood its basin, which it does with impunity.)  Large swathes of bottomland that lie relatively open during the summer and fall are now filled with water.  Be that as it may, I was still able to ford the rushing streams to reach my goal.  Here and there along the old logging roads, I ducked beneath or around single golden filaments, the beginnings of the greater webs of the orb weavers that will by May turn this place into a real-life mirror of Tolkien's Mirkwood.

The forest is still gloomy with winter, but many birds were singing.  All the usual woodpecker suspects were present, including the pileated woodpecker Big Sam, who as before lured me close with his heavy tapping; and I observed what I believe were two separate pairs of Pileateds.  White-eyed vireos sang their Quick-wherrre'd-you-put-the-beer-at's like Spring had already arrived.  Near the end of my hike, around the deformed oak I call Devil's Fork, I glimpsed a Barred Owl being mobbed by blue jays, titmice, and red-headed woodpeckers.  He glanced angrily over his shoulder at me (as if to say, "Great, one of you, too") before flapping off in the direction of the Pascagoula River.  Seems a hard life, being an owl.  Later, after completing my hike, I drove across the highway to Dace Lake, Big Lake, and Davis Eddy, but was greeted only by a small herd of deer, numerous flickers, and a flock of ring-necked ducks.

In the area north of Devil's Fork, I found no evidence of scaling among the mature sweetgums, and saw none in any of the areas we have explored previously, aside from some old scaling that is merely suggestive of IBWO feeding behavior, and can not be considered diagnostic.  I walked with my eyes and ears open, but saw nothing resembling an ivorybill, and heard no kents or double-knocks.

Spring teasers. 

 Spiny orb-weaver spider nursery.

 View of Dace Lake, in the far north end of the WMA.

Conclusions:  I now believe that we have explored the north end of the WMA as thoroughly as we possibly can.  My honest opinion of this area is that, while it certainly could be used by a population of Ivorybills as either an occasional feeding area or a travel corridor, there are probably no individuals of the species there as permanent residents.  This may be due to its relative accessibility to humans, unlike areas of the WMA further south, which can only be reached through private property or by water.  I do not intend to return to this area any time soon, unless it is to visit the titan cypress I call the Ancient of Days, who no doubt spends these months ruminating in his water-filled hollow.

Update to the Project Coyote Site

Mark has posted an update regarding the latest efforts of the Project Coyote team in Louisiana, which have yielded some very encouraging results.  You can read Mark's trip report and view photos at the Project Coyote site.

The trial run of the Kuhn was a success (I did not capsize).  However, time and money constraints, and some really poor weather, have kept me out of the field for a while now.  I hope to remedy that soon, and look forward to several trip reports from the Pascagoula River basin in March.

The Kuhn

My 10' fishing kayak arrived a couple of weeks ago.

I had initially christened the kayak IBWO-2, but after some reflection, decided to name it after one of my heroes of the Ivorybill story, the wood-wise J.J. Kuhn.

I hope to take it out for a trial run at my brother's lake soon.  He will join me, having gotten a sand-colored version of the same craft.

I am excited and nervous.  Soon, hopefully, we will cross the water barrier to Big Swamp, and see a land that few others have seen.

Excursion: Bogue Chitto National Wildlife Refuge, 24 January 2015

IBWOH's:  Brian Carlisle, Chris Carlisle.

Summary:  Eager to get back out into the field during this important part of the Ivorybill search season, Brian and I decided to take a trip down to Bogue Chitto NWR.  Bogue Chitto encompasses the north end of the important Pearl River complex; its massive southern tier is where Mike Collins has searched for the Ivorybill for many years.  (Read his reports at www.fishcrow.com.)

After several days of cold and rain, the clouds finally moved out of southwest Mississippi not long after dawn, though the cold remained, with temperatures for most of our trip remaining in the upper 30's (Fahrenheit).  We drove down past Picayune, MS, to the southernmost finger of the NWR, and hiked a trail around a small lake.  Driving back north from there, we wandered the backroads between Interstate 59 and the NWR, looking for interesting habitat and points of entry therein.  We found some of the former, and (as usual) far less of the latter, finally putting boots to the ground in a swamp between a youngish pine forest and some well-to-do farms.

An anhinga swims past a great blue heron. 

Canada geese in a farm pond. 

Much of the swamp floor was dry.  Unlike other swamps in this region that I have explored, there is a sandy, gravelly bottom here. 

Water lines on the trees indicate that the water can get quite high.  The forest here is almost exclusively black gum, with some baldcypress, and is entirely second or (more likely) third growth. 

We discovered a dead gum tree with some intriguing woodpecker work.  It was the only such tree we found there.

 At first, I thought it might be beaver work that was done during high water.  I quickly decided that that was not the case.

Note the small size of the bark and wood chips at the base of the tree. 

The scaling and excavation is dramatic in both this and the following views. 

Though the tree was obviously dead, the bark was still fairly tight. 

I believe the peeling and excavation to be the work of a Pileated Woodpecker, though it is some of the most impressive I have seen from that species to date.

Conclusions:  Nothing too compelling, IBWO-wise.  Some truly beautiful country, though, and my curiosity is now at least temporarily satisfied regarding an area that I'd long had in my sights.  At some point I would like to return, and explore the NWR on the west bank of the Pearl, in Louisiana, which is much more extensive than that on the Mississippi side.

Of note:  my wife recently procured for me a used copy of Hoose's excellent history, The Race to Save the Lord God Bird, which I had been needing to add to my library, mainly for its information on the recent history of the search for the Cuban Ivorybill.  Also, I ordered my kayak yesterday!  Delivery is expected in one week.  I am excited and very nervous, and will have to take the kayak to a safe place for some trial runs first, since I have no experience with such craft.  But with the kayak, the water barrier of Black Creek can be crossed, and vast Big Swamp -- in the heart of the Pascagoula River Swamp, the most promising Ivorybill habitat I have personally found -- will lie open to us for exploration.

New Essay and Game Camera Images at Project Coyote

An essay by Frank Wiley that discusses the pros and cons of game cameras in the search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker accompanies several amazing photos!  Have a look for yourself at the Project Coyote site.

Rising Waters: Eastern Borderlands, 28 December 2014

IBWOH:  Chris Carlisle.

Summary:  A five-and-one-half-hour survey of the lands east of Hutson Lake and Lake Hollow Man, following the north-south line of the old logging trail between the two lakes.  Several long, narrow fields, planted in ryegrass, are interspersed with prime stands of mixed bottomland forest, and with a network of wooded sloughs and small lakes.  Dominant tree species are water oak, swamp chestnut oak, sweet gum, water tupelo, baldcypress, and spruce pine.  The eastern edge rises to mature upland pine forest, eventually giving way in its turn to a much younger, monoculture pine plantation on private property.

We have surveyed much of this area before, but the eastern edge is new to me, and I was well pleased with the quality of the mature bottomland forest I often found myself in.  The sloughs and small lakes in the area are on the rise, due to recent heavy and sustained rainfall.

After a long drive through the dark and the intermittent rain, I began my hike at 6:30.  Dawn came around twenty minutes later.  It was muggy, and as the temperature rose to near 70 degrees (Fahrenheit), I was soon sweating under my flannel shirt.  The rain held off for the duration of my hike, though the sun only occasionally shone through a tear in the blanket of clouds.

Most all the usual avian suspects were present.  The area is infested with red-headed woodpeckers.  At times it was difficult to hear any other birds over their ubiquitous rrruuuuukkkk's, the resident blue jays demonstrating their entire repertoires, and the screaming of Cooper's hawks.  Pairs of wood ducks whistled at whiles through the trees overhead.  As for Hutson Lake itself, cormorants have laid sole claim to its waters, at least for the day.

The predawn forest. 

A woodpecker totem-tree. 

Rye grass field. 

Heavy scaling and some excavation to a dead snag. 

 I had a Milky Way bar, in tribute to the memory of Jack Kuhn.  

Another woodpecker totem-tree (right). 

El Tenedo del Diablo -- Devil's Fork. 

 One of many wooded sloughs in the area.

The forest wears the rags of summer like a mourner's cloak. 

I spied beyond this grove another monolith -- a titan cypress.  High water prevented me from getting close enough for a photo. 

Loblolly pines, a sure sign that the bottomland forest is ending. 

Hollow Man's lake has engulfed him. 

Conclusions:  I heard no kents or double-knocks.  Despite the leaf-fall, which has opened up much of the forest to human eyes, I found no peeling or excavations that I felt could be considered diagnostic of ivorybill feeding behavior.  I must admit to feeling discouraged.  More than once, I found myself muttering, "Where are they?  They should be here."  I may have exhausted my search efforts in this particular area, which due to the quality and extent of habitat, I have long considered prime ivorybill real estate.  There were signs of human hunting activity, however, in the form of spent shells and shell boxes; but I encountered no hunters personally, and the sounds of gunshots were to the west of the river, and farther east, on private property.

I may return to the area in January, if only to install a game camera, which my brother Brian feels could be an important component of our overall search effort; and I have begun to come around to his thinking on the matter.

Still, the question remains:  where are the ivorybills?