River Mud Tells Tales

We live near the flood plain of western Massachusetts' Housatonic River, which has been behaving well this spring, without the usual coincidence of melting deep snows and warm spring rains. With snows gone from the valleys and melting quietly in the hills, the spring flow has been, well, civilized, this time, with the river just a bit below the mean for this time of year. In all seasons we like to wander along its bluffs and ox bows as it relentlessly cuts the flood plain down with its meanderings, a mere trickle in any season compared to the torrent of the glacial melt of 10,000 years ago, which last deepened the channel to Long Island Sound and then left the rich river-bottom soils as the ice vanished northward.

The ever-changing river today cuts its way through deposits of various ages, dislodging tree trunks buried by ancient floods, blue clays deposited by glacial streams back when our area was a vast ice-age lake, and even a mastadon carcass, or two, whose locations are among the best kept of local secrets.

Today's wildlife has adapted to the icefree warm climate of this interglacial moment. From belted kingfishers, to osprey and eagles and the fish they hunt, to diverse water fowl and muskrat, mink, otter, fisher cats, and beaver. Indeed, the beaver has become a pest up the tributaries and into the swamps, where they build their huts and dams, which soon flood meadows, lawns, and roads. But in the river, the beaver build no huts, which would be swept away by spring floods. Instead they set up housekeeping in holes in the banks, under riverbank snags, and otherwise go with the flow.

As we creep along the bluffs, peering over to the receding waters, we hear a tail slap, and see a boil of water as a beaver escapes into its hole, leaving nothing but a 5-inch forepaw print in the mud.