Here a photograph I could not have have taken a few weeks ago, the fall weather has pushed down the high grasses. Now the old wooden structures can be seen. They may have been used to dry nets or as a duck blind years ago when this was still private plantation lands.

Both the Great Blue and Egret moved around on the old posts catching the first rays of morning sun.

In a few weeks all these reeds and grasses will become a dull brown, but for now everything is golden.

These were some of the last photographs of the year in these marshes. Rangers close the dike roads, tens of thousands of acres, each winter to protect the habitat and migrating birds.

Bear Island WMA, South Carolina.