Thawing out from Fern
Lower Miss polar vortex ice cap triple-whammy
Random advance notes: john@island63.com is dead! Please use driftwoodjohnnie@gmail.com. River levels this week (using Helena gage): today 4.7, Tues 3.4, Wed 2.3, Thursday, 2.0. Rebuilding website at quapawcanoecompany.com -- go check it out and let us know what you think! Lastly, the first Community Canoe of the Year is appropriately Valentine's Day Saturday! Love your River!
Dear friends, family & fellow river-rats: Sorry about long delay! I have been suffering a 3-week long triple whammy. During the last week of January we got slammed by intense polar vortex ice cap storm (named "Fern"), one that shut down Clarksdale for two weeks (duration of schools closed). Even today as the sun is glowing warmly into the low 70s we have lingering drift piles of sleet-hardened-into-ice still found all over town. Simultaneously I got locked out of my trusty old island63 email (loosing access to this newsletter). And then my trusty old laptop died! No warning. One night I closed down. Next morning would not revive. An agonizing sticky mess. Seemed like the virtual "help" world has become ruled by AI-generated interfaces with no feeling, and inability to problem solve in graceful way. Long story short -- just this morning I finally recovered newsletter access, and I can share again! What a relief. You can't believe what torture this has been. You are the first people to get the news!
"River Time" is our theme. Ultimately all human ambition must yield to the natural rhythm of time, space, and energy. And like Willie Nelson says, "energy follows thought, so be careful what you say!"
I did not fret too long during shutdown. Phone still working, several weeks ago I commenced exploring & documenting -- by foot. I was very curious -- how did creation survive? After checking in on my father Gare-Bear (who lives 1/2 mile upstream the Sunflower River), and my sister Jennifer, and several friends in tender situations, I wandered about visiting with all my wild buddies. Interesting how animals lose their fears of humans in desperate situations. Seems like they knew that I knew that they were so pressured that I was no longer a threat. Or maybe they could feel my compassion. Here in town we witnessed flocks of birds hunkering down in the few leafy or muddy places left exposed over the riverbank, under logs and other debris, and in thick viney brushy places. After 2 days of ice & sleet, I watched a flock of sparrows and wrens repeatedly attack fire ant nests, in their piles of earth along the edges of our Quapaw Canoe Company Sunflower Building. I've never seen birds go after fire ants before. Apparently hunger overcame dietary preferences! Flocks of robins, blackbirds, grackles, cowbirds and cardinals dove underneath our canoes and our trailers, and ripped apart the piles of leaves wherever they could get to them, uncovering grubs and frozen bug treats. One day last week I watched an armadillo descend the river bank, and go clambering along the river's edge behind canoe company. I followed her trail, easy to do in the sun-softened ice, similar to a river otter, the tail meandering back & forth amongst claw marks. The temps were steadily dropping that night, through the teens into the single digits. She wandered into our big canoe overhang and started shuffling amongst the wind-blown debris, physically pushing piles of leaves together in a low spot, I believe to build a sleep nest. I watched for a long time, until sun set and cold creeped in, and then left her to hopefully a survivable night, nestled down as she was in between Grasshopper and Junebug 29-foot voyager style cypress strip canoes. Waterfowl clung to the few open water places until those froze over, and then they moved on. The poor ducks, herons, cormorants, and geese: the skies seemed to be endlessly full day & night of honking, crying, screaming avian waterfowl voices. Where did they find habitat? See below. Yesterday I finally got out of town, the roads and boat ramps melted, and was able to explore the river.
Where did the snow and speckled geese survive the winter onslaught? I set out on paddle board to explore. Yesterday on West Montezuma Island I discovered one secret refuge location: on the giant expanses of sand near water's edge. River level Helena gage 4.7 and dropping. During low water the sandbar turns into a small desert of several thousand acres, spread out along 3-4 miles of the river. Here on ocean-beach sized fields of open sand, thousands of snow and speckled geese had apparently hunkered down in a place I had never before witnessed these geese to choose: on the sandbar. (Normally snow and speckled geese make landings only in wide open winter fallow fields of corn, soybeans, rice or wheat, grazing on the grain remains as they do so). Never ever had I witnessed them settling down on our big island sandbars. But this was a different scenario. Winter storm "Fern" she came to be called. Not at all gentle like the name would seem to suggest! Fern was a scale stronger, with longer-lasting effects than any that I have ever previously experienced. And I have lived in the Mississippi Delta since 1991. (Well, one other just as bad -- the great ice storm of 1994 shut down Clarksdale for 2 weeks.) On Montezuma the snow drifts were polkadotted with salad bowl-sized indentions, and holes. Some like a bowl have been pushed down in the snow. Others sandy-bottomed as if cut out with a cookie cutter. At the bottom of each hole was a small pile of curled up goose poop. And where the snow and ice had melted, the giant sandbars were littered with thousands of piles of goose poop, and circular markings left over from the melting ice. Beyond the doubt, there were casualties. But I was surprised not to find more. I did find one dead snow goose, partially eaten. And I saw maybe a dozen locations with nothing but feathers and pieces of wing. Coyote or bobcat tracks all over in same vicinity. Evidently those predators had taking advantage of the situation for their own survival. Our bald eagle eagle friends could be seen across the river, standing in the high branches of their favorite cottonwood tree. They might have made a few meals also. As I paddled out I scared a single goose from perch on rip rap water's edge, its legs dangling uselessly below, apparently frozen from arctic cold. In town I discovered one cardinal dead by Sunflower River edge, and eaten. I was terrified of finding mass die-offs following storm. But creation is tough, and time-hardened resilient. I saw many friends doing fine, friends who I had feared for: owls, eagles (and the squirrels who live in my back yard trees, in town!). (Note: one day later Humming-Bear and I paddled out to Is. 62 and found similar goose cavities on the giant sandbars there. Also a few piles of feathers where someone got munched. And lastly, a female wood duck who lost use of one of her legs, and was sadly but defiantly maintaining her last station of life in the eddy at base of Is. 63.)
Sending big river love & wishes to you wherever you are! We know many suffered, and are suffering much worse than us. Let me know if we can help in any way. *If you are awaiting an email from me: please re-send any emails previously sent to my new address driftwoodjohnnie@gmail.com **If you are awaiting snail-mail response from me: please know I am slowly getting there!
Upcoming:
Valentine's Day Community Canoe, Sat Feb 14th, 1-6pm, meet at Quapaw Canoe Company, Clarksdale, MS. Reservations Required. Contact Ceili Hale <quapawceili@gmail.com> or John Ruskey <driftwoodjohnnie@gmail.com>~~~Lower Mississippi River Dispatch No. 1016~~~ Since 1995 ~ “Voice of the Lower Mississippi River” ~Quapaw Canoe Company, Clarksdale, Mississippi~
Lovely to receive your update - amazing to see Fern do her thing over Southern States, and yet here in the UK, we just have lots of rain, and more rain. Fab photos - imagining camping out on the islands with snow, that'd be cool, wishing you all well.
Wow, what an update. Yes, when one thing goes wrong everything else seems to follow. 14 below up here in Vermont this morning, neighbors had twenty below, that's been unusual in recent years, but not out of the ordinary years ago. What is unusual is the unrelenting nature of the cold this year, got cold in November and seems like its been steadily below average ever since.