The Drought's Impact On Raymond Reservation

     I had heard from a friend that Raymond Reservation (a wetland in a tributary of the Sudbury River) had been almost completely dried up by the drought. The summer of 2022 has had very low rainfall compared to past years. His text to me mentioned a lot of dead fish, and "weird birds" I got curious and decided to check it out. I walked down a rail trail and then out onto the peninsula that i found otter tracks on a few months ago. I made my way down to the wetland and saw that the massive pond that had covered maybe 5 acres had turned into a cluster of puddles, near the center of the clearing. There were also a few smaller puddles closer to where the riverbank used to be. There was a bad odor. Each one of those was packed with rotting bluegills, with a few shiners mixed in...

...My friend pointed out two much larger fish sitting next to the piles of bluegill: a Largemouth Bass and an American Eel. Both of their carcasses were covered with maggots.

 

The drought clearly killed off most of the fish population in the wetland, but it will recover fast next spring, when the few surviving fish spawn, and the rain reconnects the pond with the Sudbury River, which is still flowing strong, even with the drought, and i'm sure plenty of animals, like the fly larva, and the raccoons will benefit from their deaths.

The birds were more picky though, and were only fished the small area which still had live fish. There were a lot of species feeding in the remaining water, including a double crested cormorant...

                                                            Double Crested Cormorant
                                    

                                                                    Green Heron

                                           Either Baird's Sandpiper or Sharp Tailed Sandpiper

                                                                    Mute Swan Family

While watching the swans, I heard a chattering sound behind me. A female Belted Kingfisher landed in an oak tree for just long enough for me to get a few blurry photos. I know that it was a female because of the orange band on its breast. Kingfishers are a very hard bird to get pictures of because they are very skittish, and this photo is my first ever decent kingfisher photo:

                  The kingfisher has been a goal of mine for a while, which i finally completed today.