I was standing around and waiting for my explorer partner who was watching a small Heron. Having a shorter zoom on my backup camera I grabbed a few ‘scenic’ shots of the neighborhood.

Above was taken from a Trunk (water gate) which you can see part of on the left side. This is a canal that runs between the open water off in the distance and many larger marshes behind me.

The water in the distance is a large pond that was once a very big plantation rice field. This is in a remote area. I had always assumed a plantation included a big house, barns, and many out buildings. Not so much. There were plenty of places with huge rice fields, and nothing else. They were maintained and harvested on a schedule.

Here I am looking in the opposite direction of the first image. A dirt road passes through here and turns further down to run along the top of the various dikes separating marshland. Keeping areas separate allows for changing water levels, by opening a trunk, to control vegetation, swamps, and wildlife feeding.

At any given point just looking around will find several types of critters.

Last image here I again did an about face to catch the complete opposite direction. I wanted this for perspective, to try to impress on how large this is…and I am in one small corner of the wildlife area.

If you click and enlarge the image above you will see a figure down the dirt road, watching a small Heron of course. Way off on the left you may see a white structure. This covers tractors used for maintaining paths, and travel. In the thousands of acres that roof is about all you will find.

This marsh area here is about 30 miles (49 Km). Bring food and water, no creature comforts… for a long way.

ACE Basin, Bear Island, South Carolina.