Day 30,East Coast trip, Wed.Oct. 18, 2023 Montezuma NWR NY

 Day 30, East Coast trip, Oct. 18, 2023,  Montezuma NWR NY

The sky was still cloudy even though the prognostication was for partly cloudy. We never saw the sun all day. That did not stop us from going to one of our favorite venues the National Wildlife Refuge's that have a auto drive through the Refuge. This Refuge was only about thirty minutes away and we will probably spend another day there hoping the sun come out.

Montezuma NWR headquarters

 

We got under way at about 9:30 and headed straight for the refuge.  (Well almost!) We made one stop along the way for a barn for Ruth and then stopped in the Refuge visitor Center to pick up a map and some information. Basically this refuge has a series of ponds, marshes, mud lots, flats, fields, and a few other units. There are 25 different units in all. Some are accessible by trail, but most can be seen from the auto route.

Bennings Pool at NWR

Main Pool

More of the MainPool

 

Driving at about 2 to 5 mph, it takes a while to get around the 50,000 acres of swampland and associated uplands although the auto route does not take you into all of those. (The drive is about 9 miles around) The first big stop was by the main pool, which is the largest on the refuge. Here we saw primarily Pintail ducks by the thousands, and some Pied Billed Grebes that we have been looking for but had never seen on this trip. At a small pond on the north end we observed about a dozen Green Winged Teal that were feeding together. At one point when we pulled order to observe, Ruth remarked/shouted that there was a Bald $agle that just landed in a pine tree next to us. Of course we got excited and took a few photos and spread the word to others coming down the road. The Eagle was very high in the White PIne tree and was still there after we had observed for a number of minutes.

A Green Winged Teal of many.

The Clyde River which is part of the Erie Canal

Those moveable dams .Note metal plates at bottom

The plates hold the water back and can be withdrawn.

Bald Eagle in tree

 

 

 

 

At the North end of the refuge there are some ponds adjacent to the Erie Canal. We took time to visit Lock number 25 and a dam on the Clyde River which the men were working on as we approached. So we got to see both a lock and one of those movable dams that I talked about previously. This part of the canal is met by three water bodies...the Clyde River, the Erie Canal and and old towpath that no longer is used on the canal. I think I mentioned before that the canal originally had 82 locks, then 75 locks while today there are 36 locks, so many of them are unused pieces of the canal that are used locally but not part of the canal system anymore.

There is some color starting to show.Come on sun!

Lock # 25 near  Clyde River, NY

Smartweed is invasive ...But pretty!

 

Including a few birds that we saw in the campground we saw 25 birds today, for our largest total on the trip. During migration or springtime the bird counts will reach 50 or 60 per day quite easily. But we were satisfied with that and super excited to see birds we hadn't seen previous until today. We did see more Halloween skeletons today and one that Ruth  liked particularly was on a swing having a good time.

It was a good day in spite of the sun not showing. A few colors could be seen on the trees and they would be much sharper with some sunshine. Maybe tomorrow?

We stopped for a few groceries in Wolcott  (Bob's Market) which for a town of its size was a wonderful store, very clean, organized and heavily stocked. We found everything we needed there

The day ended with supper of those noodles again made up with Alfredo sauce and chicken. Ruth also put on the table carrots sautéed with butter and brown sugar. Of course we ate the rest of the blueberry pie for dessert. Love that pie. (loved!)

We believe tomorrow we will head back to Montezuma NWR and hope that the sun does come out so some of those color pictures will be more brilliant. See you then.

Thanks for reading– –Jim