Pond Creek

A few weeks ago some friends of ours took us to Pond Creek National Wildlife Refuge, an amazing natural area that I had never heard about before even though it is only about 50 miles from us.

The Pond Creek National Wildlife Refuge was created in 1994 and is located about 30 miles north of Texarkana, Arkansas and 10 miles southeast of De Queen, Arkansas. Pond Creek is made up of various oxbow lakes, sloughs, and bottomlands hardwood areas along the Little and Cossatot Rivers.

Pond Creek was created in order to protect the wetland and bottomland hardwood habitat and to serve as a habitat for neo-tropical migratory birds. It also serves as an important nesting habitat for wood ducks and wintering habitat for other migratory waterfowl. It is located where the Mississippi and Central Flyways intersect.

The forested wetlands of the refuge are used by migrating and wintering waterfowl during the fall, winter and spring. Mallards, gadwall, American wigeon and wood ducks are among the over 15 species of waterfowl that traditionally use the seasonally flooded wetland habitats of the refuge. Other species seen less often include northern shoveler; blue and green-winged teal.

The Pond Creek Refuge provide outstanding habitat for an abundance of birdlife, particularly neotropical migratory songbirds. Neotropical birds use the refuge as a rest stop during fall and spring migration to replenish energy reserves for the long journey to and from wintering areas in Central and South America. This habitat is also used for breeding and nesting during the spring and summer for many of these species.

We spotted a Cooper's Hawk, an American Kestrel, a Green Heron, and a number of Kinglets, but I couldn't tell if they were Golden-crowned or Ruby- crowned.  Our friends had seen an alligator on a previous visit but we didn't see any on this trip.

This was our first visit to Pond Creek, but it definitely will not be our last.  The day was cloudy, cool and a bit rainy.  I want to return on a day that will be a bit better for photography.

If you love quiet secluded natural places, I highly recommend a visit to Pond Creek Natural Wildlife Refuge.

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St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge

S is for St. Marks Nation Wildlife Refuge.  

On our way home from Orlando after a recent visit to Disney World we were traveling on I-75 between Ocala and Gainesville when we encountered a slow down. It took us an hour to travel a few miles. At the first exit we could get off, we decided to find an alternate route. The back roads that we took were very pretty with many beautiful horse farms.  

As I was looking at the map, I saw that we would be passing by St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. It was just a few miles off of the highway that we were on, so we decided to go check it out.

At the visitors center there was a large pond with a trail around it. The pond was located where there had been a sand pit that provided the sand that CCC workers used to build a road out to the lighthouse in the 1930's.  There were flowers in the pond, and an alligator mother with many babies on the bank.

One of the interesting things about St. Marks is that there are four distinct types of landscape in the seven mile drive from the visitors center to the lighthouse on the coast, forest, swamp, inter-coastal waterway and the coast.  

The lighthouse was completed in 1831 and survived destructive hurricanes of the 1840's and 1850's, including the disastrous hurricane of September 1843.  During the Civil War, Confederate troops were stationed near the lighthouse to defend the area against a Union attack. In March 1865, a Union fleet of 16 ships appeared off the coast and began to shell the vicinity of the lighthouse in preparation for landing a force. The Confederates attempted to blow up the lighthouse during their retreat in order to deny it as a lookout for the Union forces. Although they were unsuccessful in destroying the tower,  the damage inflicted was substantial, necessitating a complete rebuild of the tower immediately following the war.  The lighthouse was automated in 1960 and remains today an active aid to navigation for vessels on the Apalachee Bay.

St. Marks was established in 1931 to provide wintering habitat for migratory birds. It is one of the oldest refuges in the National Wildlife Refuge System.  We saw lots of wildlife during our visit including Alligators, Purple Gallinule, and Anhinga.  

St. Marks was a really quiet peaceful beautiful place.  It was such a sharp contrast to the week we had just spent at Disney World. It was a blessing to have gotten off of the interstate and accidentally ended up in such a beautiful place.  We only had time to spend a couple of hours at St. Marks but I really hope to be able to return when I can spend more time.

   

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