Cahooque Creek is just a few miles from my back door step and makes a for a nice little paddle when the winds are up or the tides aren’t right for exploring the area’s estuarine environments. It’s not the best paddle location for wildlife photos but occassionally you get lucky. Recently I got lucky. On my last two visits I came across a Green Heron. These little herons aren’t seen in abundance in these parts so it was a treat to see and photograph one. In fact this is the first “Greenie” I’ve had the pleasure to photograph.

The Green Heron can be found throughout the eastern United States during the summer. It is a year round resident of Central America and the northern end of South America. This small heron is unique in that it is one of the few tool using birds. It drops bait onto the surface of the water then grabs small fish that are attracted. Baits and lures used by this cleaver bird include various insects, worms, twigs, and feathers. These birds breed in swampy thickets, foraging in marshes, along creeks and the edges of ponds and lakes.

There are certanin large wading birds I always love to see. However, those birds also are some of most skiddish birds found around the Crystal Coast. A couple that are always especially hard to get a shot of are Reddish Egrets and Little Blue Herons… though admittedly the more common Great Blue Heron and Great Egret can be pretty tough to get close to as well. I also find getting within camera range of Snowy Egrets to be particularly challenging. Even though the kayak helps, allowing you to get a bit closer than you could using a land approach, it doesn’t take much to spook these guys. Here are a few shots from my last couple of kayak outings where I happened to get lucky.

A large North American shorebird, the Greater Yellow Legs is similar in appearence to the slightly smaller Lesser Yellowlegs. Adults have long, yellow legs (hence their name) and sport long dark bills that are slightly upcurved. The bill tends to be about 1 1/2 the length of the head with a lighter color near the base. In contrast the Lesser’s bill tends to be equal in length to the head and lacks the up turn and lighter colored base.

The Greater Yellowlegs is a migratory bird that travels south to both the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of the United States and South America. The bogs and marshes of Alaska and Canada’s boreal forest region are its breeding habitats. The female builds a ground nest where she lays three to four off-white eggs with brown markings. Both the male and female tends the eggs which take twenty-three to twenty-four days to incubate. The couple also shares feeding duties for the young.

The photos below were taken along the Rachel Carson Estuarine Reserve on an early spring afternoon. The birds were feeding in the shallow waters along the shore.

The weather has simply been terrible lately. Combine that with a fairly full schedule and I’m finding myself suffering from a major case of cabin fever. It’s been so wet here lately that even setting-up in the backyard to photogrpah birds around the feeder is a challenge. It would take very little activity to turn my yard into a mud bog! But at least there’s plenty of time to dream and to plan the adventures that will come with Spring.

One thing I’m looking forward to when warmer weather arrives is doing a bit of kayaking. There are some very wonderful natural areas around the Crystal Coast, but many of them are only accessible by water. The kayak will allow me to explore some areas that I wouldn’t be able to otherwise. One advantage of a kayak, or so I’m told by those that use them for wildlife photography, is that birds and animals aren’t as skittish of kayakers as they are hikers. Most of the things that threaten them in the wild come from the land, not the water. Another advantage is that a kayak sits you closer to the surface of the water… that gives you a lower angle of view in your photos. And, of course, it’s a fairly quiet way of approaching wildlife, unlike a skiff with its outboard motor. It should be fun.

In selecting a kayak with photography in mind I probably made a pest of myself on a few of the nature forums. I asked a lot of questions of folks with experience… possibly to the point of being annoying. But it is so easy to spend money poorly when setting-out in a new direction and I really wanted to make a sound decision. From my research I decided that I wanted a “recreational” rated boat, as it would likely be a bit more stable. (For some reason camera gear and baths don’t mix well!) This style of boat also tends to have a larger cockpit making it easier to shoot from. I also learned that there is some advantage to length. The longer boats tend to move through the water faster, easier, straighter and require a bit less effort to paddle. While I started out looking at 10 foot boats I ended up with a 12 footer. I settled on a Prodigy 12.0 by Perception. The three boats I was most interested in were the Prodigy, the Pamlico or Pungo by Wilderness Systems, and the Dirigo by Old Town. I suspect any of the three would have met my requirements.

Since this is a new endeavor for me I wanted to keep things as economic as possible. Anytime embarking on some new outdoor activity there’s a real possibility of finding it’s not what one thought it would be! As such I shopped around for a used boat. Many times kayaking outfitters will sell off their rental boats during the off-season. These kinds of purchases can save one a bit of money. I ended up buying a rental program boat from Paddle Creek, Wake Forest, NC. I found them to be very friendly and helpful throughout the process.

So here I sit, daydreaming of adventures to come. As warm weather arrives I hope to provide some reports, and imagery of course, from places like the White Oak River, Newport River, Back Sound, Shakleford Banks, Rachael Carson Estuarine perserve and other wet and wild places around the Crystal Coast. Since I really don’t have an image taken from a kayak yet, but it wouldn’t feel right to make a post without a photo, how about a nice symbol of Spring? Taken recently along the Neusiok Trail near the Pine Cliff recreation area, an Eastern Bluebird… certainly a creature of the spring in my mind.