Stop 5: The Woodie Retreat
This wetland is called the Woodie Retreat because of the wood ducks that seem to always be there except during cold winters. This marshy area has water standing in it nearly year round and attracts waterfowl, other wildlife, and wildlife enthusiasts. Some of the birds found at the wetland include green herons, American bitterns, and king rails. Woodie Retreat is one of the best places to see waterfowl throughout the year and sometimes the only place during a dry year. Like the wetland at stop 2, the Woodie Retreat is also a pothole wetland.
"And the male wood duck is a bird so variously and so gorgeously marked that no other bird in the ornithology of the whole wide world can surpass it in intricacy of pattern and design, in multiplicity of colour and in grace."
-Gene Stratton-Porter
Tales You Won't Believe, 1925
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Photo
Source:
Stratton-Porter, Gene. Tales You Won't Believe. New York: Doubleday Page & Co., 1925.
The Loblolly Virtual Nature Trail was created as a part of the Our Land, Our Literature website.