Since I have two days to explore the swamp I figured I would spend the first day doing what could be done on foot and by car. It is a swamp, after all; there ain't that much you can do and still keep your feet dry! Still, I arrived about 10 minutes before the first tour boat left. Now, I have to admit I am not without shame when I admit that I paid the fee and climbed aboard the little skiff. I've always thought such things were for tourists! Then I realized, hey, I'm zipping through here -- I AM a tourist. Our tour guide was named Joey, a 7th generation "swamper" who, as all good tour guides do, regaled us with corny jokes and a surprising knowledge of the swamp, its history, its present and its critters.
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| Should be 18" of water covering this peat ... |
The Water (hydrology): So we got 90 minutes of the following: "They say the water in this swamp is pure, 90% pure -- the other 10% is gatorade." This elicited a groan from me ... and a smile, though I hid it from Joey because I did not want to egg him on. The water level in the swamp was down about 28" due to lack of rain. The swamp is fed entirely by rain (called
ombrotrophic) -- there are no streams flowing into it, though the St. Mary's and Suwanee rivers flow from it! The swamp occupies a basin, a low bowl left over from 65 million years ago when the area was part of the sea. The sea left nutrient poor, sandy soils while wave action in more recent times carved the basin which today is filled with rainwater. Joey also pointed out that it takes 10 billion gallons of water to cause the water level in the swamp to rise one inch. Its a big place, covering over 400,00 acres (an acre is the size of a football field.) So for now, until the next hurricane the peat will be dry. This turned out to be pretty cool as Joey stopped the boat and we were able to wander around on the peat flats. I understand why the Seminole named the area "Okefenokee", or "land of the trembling earth". You bounce on the buoyant peat -- its like walking on a firm mattress, as if the ground were not quite solid ... well, because it isn't solid!
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| Alligator Hole |
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| Palmetto Thicket |
The Habitats: Whew, where to begin. The diversity of wetland habitat here is astounding! There are wet forests (what we traditionally think of as a swamp), swamp shrub environments, floating peat mats, wet and dry prairies, saw palmetto thickets, bay forests, bald and pine cypress swamp, tupelo swamp, and bog. More on these tomorrow.
The Critters: A sampling of today's Critters:
And More: Of course the silence was total and lasting. Occasional birds, the course scraping of saw palmetto leaves blown by the wind and, of course, the occasional airplane were all that could be heard. I spent a couple of hours writing and about an hour and a half in silence, just sitting, meditating until civilization crept in; I had left my phone on and my sister called! I had finished walking every trail I could get to and it was time to move on anyway. Alas.
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