Young Wetlands

Last week I shared a few pix of the Young Wetlands, one of those places off the 7th Line that I visit.  I showed the flooded boardwalk from a time when the beaver were busy raising the level of their dam, and the Bruce Trail was flooded out.

Reading the comments I suddenly realized that I had not actually been in there yet to see the new boardwalk that was built the following year.  So that's where I headed earlier this week.  The trail has been re-routed a bit too, to provide this nice view of the wetland as you approach it.

I took a quick look and saw only this pair of Canada Geese.

Panning toward the dam (on the right), I saw no other waterfowl.

But then my lazy grey cells clicked and reminded me that I had my binoculars with me.  Suddenly I was seeing a lot more geese!

Looking toward the stump-filled upper end of the pond, I eventually counted nearly 40 geese.  Can you see the 8 in this picture?  All but one of them are standing on one leg - why do they do that?

I continued down the trail to check out the new boardwalk.  It's a serious, heavy duty boardwalk, about 2 feet above water level, and a full 30" wide.  I was in to watch it being built, so I know it's a solid trail.  And the trail crew that built it was able to save the old bridge and straighten it out a bit.

Here's the pond at the high level when the beaver were most active.

And here's part of the boardwalk then, on the surface, but just floating.  I couldn't take a step beyond this.  Quite a big improvement!

As I was heading out another small flock of geese flew in for the night.  I think at this time of year they spend daytime out in crop fields filling up on spilled grain, and then fly to the wetlands where they can perch overnight safe from predators.

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