An Evening with Woodies

After an early supper I headed for a shrub wetland where I’d seen signs of recent beaver activity and flushed a pair of wood ducks. This seemed like a spot where there might be a good chance of photographing a beaver in the process of felling a tree, a series of photographs that’s missing from my collection. On a previous mid-day trip to this wetland I’d found a good spot to sit and wait.

So on a beautiful spring evening I set up my folding hunter’s chair, put on my ghillie shirt and facemask, mounted the camera on a monopod and sat back to wait.

It wasn’t long before there was movement out in the water as a pair of coot swam across in front of me –

Shortly thereafter a pair of wood ducks followed almost the same route from one clump of shrubs to another –

The resplendent male and the female in her camo of brown,tan and white –

And then came a muskrat –

Following that parade things quieted down for a while and I kept busy watching an adult bald eagle circling lazily, far off and far above, and the activities of the male red-winged blackbirds as they defended their territories –

And the backs of several very large snapping turtles as they patrolled the wetland in their search for food and occasionally coming up for a breath of air –

As the light dwindled a pair of wood ducks emerged from the thick patch of shrubs to my left and swam 30 feet to my front, feeding on something I couldn’t see –

Then they swam off and out of sight –

  What a fitting end to a beautiful night even if the beavers never appeared.