I hadn't intended to go the the park yesterday. Instead, I'd planned to stay at home, in front of the computer, drafting some educational wildlife one-sheets for the park. You know what they say about "best laid plans". Whatever plans I had for the day went down the tubes early when I received a text message from Dana Buck saying that someone had vandalized all of the visitor sign-in sheets on the visitor information kiosk and she'd had to remove them. She knew she had a pile of blank sheets around the house somewhere, but couldn't find them. Did I have a blank sheet that I could print copies from? Of course, thought I. I was sure that I'd put one away somewhere for safekeeping. That thought instantly aborted itself in one of my famous senior brain farts, culminating in an intensive search of all logical and/or remotely possible hiding places, to no avail. I found blank work-party volunteer sign-in sheets, I found blank salmon counting logs, I found blank habitat restoration plant inventory forms, none of which are used any more, but I failed to find a single blank visitor sign-in sheet. I contacted Dana and advised her of my inability to locate the necessary blank. She said that she thought she had one in her computer. Could she attach the file to an email and send it to me. Yes, certainly, if she could find it. I knew that Adele had blanks, but Adele was out of town, so I fired off an email to Steve and Margery. Anyone have any blanks? Steve said that he had some and would drop them by the park on Wednesday. That was the point when I decided that I'd better make a trip to the park to pick up the vandalized sheets so that I would have them in case Lt Hatfield, from the Federal Way Police Department, wanted them. I have a notebook full of photographs that I use when I lead tours through the park. Just before I ran out of the front door, I decided to check that notebook and, viola!, found a blank sign-in sheet. I immediately printed five copies of it and headed for the park. By the time I arrived at Dana's house, she'd found her stack of blanks, so we ended up with blanks galore and the crisis was averted. So, ...there I was in the park, despite my best-laid plans, and you know that it's patently impossible for me to simply turn around and catch the bus back home without making an end-to-end survey of the park before I leave. I'm really glad I decided to stay, too.
Mr. Muskrat was busy swimming across Marlake. I was way down at the opposite end of the lake when I took this photo, but I'm glad that I decided to take it when I did. The muskrat was swimming in the direction of the old dock, so I headed down the path in that direction, hoping to get a better shot of the little rodent from that end of the lake. To my great disappointment, when I arrived at the old dock there was no sign what-so-ever of a muskrat. I don't know where he went to. I must have stood on the dock looking for him for at least ten minutes and never saw him surface anywhere on the lake. Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky.
I did see baby fish though. These aren't tadpoles, although they were hanging out atop the same plank where I took my best tadpole photos. These are tiny fish. And, there are a lot of them! That's so exciting! Last year the City stocked the lake with fish and now the big fish are restocking the lake with baby fish, creating a wonderful food source for so many of the park's animals.
The dry season has finally arrived. Even though it seems to have made a late appearance this year, it's effect can already be seen in the park. This is a spot where I photographed many frogs, as well as a parade of baby ducklings, this Spring. Yesterday, it was dry as a bone. There wasn't even a little damp muddy spot that I could see. If you hadn't seen it until now, you'd never believe that this area was full of water and teeming with life just a few months earlier.
In weather this warm, any self-respecting frog will be found in the water, rather than sitting beside the water, or on a tree branch, or skunk cabbage leaf. Just like humans, the wild animals that live in our wetland have a very narrow temperature range that they consider desirable. If the temperature's too cold, frogs dig themselves into the mud to stay warm. If the temperature's too hot, frogs dig themselves into the mud to stay cool. Ahh, mud, that multipurpose habitat!
This picture was taken in that shallow area to the right of the Brooklake viewing platform, in between the viewing platform and the top of the fish ladder. Frogs like slow-moving or still water. Up until this year, I never spotted frogs in this area because the water was moving too fast for them to feel comfortable. Last winter we had a major storm that brought down a lot of trees in the park. A handful of trees fell over this area of water, which is normally very shallow to begin with, slowing down the water and creating more swampy quiet space. This Spring, the frogs returned to this area in abundance. I've spotted as many as a dozen frogs in this spot on one visit. Once, I spotted five frogs all crammed together on a single tree limb.
The animals were driving me crazy yesterday. Nothing was sitting around posing for me. Everything seemed to be moving quickly and was almost always obscured by some kind of vegetation, so that I couldn't get any kind of shot at all. This great blue heron was one of those animals that gave me a run for my money yesterday. First he was on one side of Brooklake, obscured by tree branches, then he moved to the other side of Brooklake, obscured by the vegetation growing in front of the Brooklake viewing platform. I even stood up on top of the benches in an attempt to get a better view, but that didn't work at all. I finally managed to zoom in on the bird through a pinhole in the vegetation that was only about the size of a piece of toast. If you look closely, you can see something in the heron's mouth. Heron's are excellent hunters, patiently moving one tiny millimeter at a time as they slowly sneak up on their prey, then suddenly stabbing into the water with their long sharp beaks. This one caught lunch. Yum! Shortly after devoring his lunch, this beautiful bird settled down into a soft gray lump of feathers and appeared to take a nap.
I was standing on the boardwalk, back arched, camera pointed up, trying to get a photograph of this fast-moving brown creeper in the trees. Just as I got the creeper lined up in my view-finder and in focus, an entire herd of people, some pushing baby strollers, literally stomped down the boardwalk right in front of me, ruining my shot. Obviously, they don't camera etiquette. Darn! Even with a tripod, my camera can't compensate for the movement of the boardwalk caused by nine people stomping their feet. What was with the stomping, anyway? For the life of me, I couldn't figure out what they were stomping for. Since they didn't appear to speak English, I couldn't ask them either. It will remain a mystery.
As I approached the Old Sitka Spruce, I got this creepy feeling that something was following me. I turned around to see what it was and there was this cute little Douglas squirrel right on my heels. As soon as I raised my camera to snap a shot of him, the little squirrel jumped off of the boardwalk railing, raced across the boardwalk, and disappeared under the boardwalk on the other side. Rocky the Squirrel!
When I got back to Marlake, I walked around the back side of the lake and over the bridge. Just as I approached the log jam at the north end of the lake, I could see these large, long, feathered pantaloons ending in large, sharp, talons heading across my vision to the right, followed by a huge splashing sound coming from the lake. The bird was so big and so close and everything happened so quickly that it startled me and took my breath away. What in the heck just happened? Immediately after the splash, I saw this huge osprey flying circles over the nearby trees clutching a big fish in it's talons. Wow, an osprey fishing in Marlake! I've never seen that before! I was so excited that my heart was racing a million miles a second.
I was still elated by my run-in with the osprey when I came around the corner and met Chris and Rose Tolvtvar. They'd just gotten married and had come to West Hylebos Wetland Park to have some outdoor wedding photographs taken. I can still remember twelve years ago when the park was a dark, creepy, mysterious, well-hidden, barely-used place. Now, it's bright. open, accessible, and being used as a backdrop for wedding photographs. That also takes my breath away. Good job, Federal Way! Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Tolvtvar! May many joyous years lie ahead of you!
Teri I. Lenfest
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