The Christmas snowy owl
By Carolyn Foote Edelmann, Special Writer
The 21st Century lacks limitlessness and timelessness. An antidote to this condition in all seasons, awaits at the Brigantine Wildlife Refuge. This paradise of marshes and rare birds stretches along and protects our vulnerable coast. It’s reached by driving usually empty pine roads through the Barrens, east of Smithville, of all things slightly north of Atlantic City.
I’ve sought out ‘the Brig’ in fire and ice, and in fog so thick that that gambling mecca disappears. I’ve been blocked at the gates because of permitted hunts, fleeing to nearby Scott’s Landing and up to Tuckerton’s Seven Bridges Road. These sites, to some degree, replicate “the Brig’s” expanse of silken grasses and glimmering waterways.
Alone and with others, I’ve been down there in winds so fierce that birds attempting to cross the dirt road on the wing cannot make headway. I saw the last sunset of the previous century on Absecon Bay beside “the Brig,” its pink-tinged waters were studded with ice-hued snow geese.
Most make pilgrimage here to “add to their life lists” of rare birds. But there is more to it than birds. This place has a lasting effect. I cherish “the Brig’s” ever-changing palette, above all. It can change five times in one (summer’s) day. Its second major gift is archetypal silence. There’s something about those invisible horizons. There is also “nature raw in tooth and claw,” as predators thrive and carry out their contests in plain sight.
If not for Edwin B. Forsythe, a republican member of the House of Representatives in the 1970s and early ‘80s, New Jersey wouldn’t be blessed by “the Brig.” Officially named “The Edwin B. Forsythe Wildlife Refuge,” this haven stretches benevolently along the shore beyond the Pine Barrens. Locals explore most of its reaches by water. The Smithville site is accessible by vehicle and on foot (eight miles of dike road).
I should say, accessible again by vehicle, since Hurricane Sandy devoured dike roads until cormorants swam where we moved on wheels. Salinities in “the Brig’s” impoundments had risen to match those of Absecon Bay. Both depth and salt content must be ideal for birds of all seasons, depth being critical for diving ducks. It took many months before orange cones and sawhorses were removed at the head of those sand roads.
Three friends recently arranged a Thanksgiving “Brig” jaunt. After hearty country breakfast at Smithville’s Bakery, we joyously crossed the first bridge into the refuge. We were treated to a day of avian delights, all but turkey. Three trumpeter swans greeted us at the Gull Pond tower. Bobbing buffleheads and one black-bellied plover in winter plumage made us laugh at antics and marvel at how white that belly had become to match this season. The species nobody could identify, then identified by our novice, was a female ruddy duck. Appropriately, we drove home through cranberry bogs. Not yet flooded to protect against freezing, vines spread scarlet and crimson tapestries to the horizon.
This week, other dear friends drove me to “the Brig,” their trunk holding our Christmas picnic in a fitted European basket. We would savor steaming squash soup in heated mugs, followed by immaculate tea sandwiches, with a soupcon of champagne. Our driver would reposition the car, so that it faced the most opulent vistas of marsh grass, as tide tiptoed into sapphire waterways. But that would be after absorbing the Brig’s richest gifts,’ on a wooded promontory called Scott’s Landing, slightly north of the refuge.
Come with us. We’ll run away from everything that everybody else is doing. It’s a scintillating day. Every pine on each Barrens road glistens. Silken sand gleams beneath black jack oaks. They retain sturdy cinnamon leaves, waving us along the Chatsworth route. Our eyes are drawn far into forests by blueberry leaves, flinging back blinding sun. We are the only car on most roads.
We stop next to a nameless lake of blue — not quite slate, more than sky. Arrayed along its far bank are nine stately trumpeter swans. Not paired off like their mute cousins, trumpeters are distinguished by black beaks rather than orange. Our largest swans, these birds are rare ambassadors of other realms, worthy of our journey on their own.
My friends are Tasha O’Neill and Alan McIlroy, ever eager for new nature adventures. We don’t stop, as usual, in “the Brig’s” Nature Center to read who’s seen what where (they have a numbered / alphabetized grid pinpointing every sighted bird). The center’s closed for Christmas. We head straight for Leeds Eco Trail. There are sea breezes in our hair, sun dazzle on the bay. This morning, the tide seems locked in place, as great swathes of water reveal ice striations.
An immature red-tailed hawk presides at the entry to this trail. Imperious, he seems lord of land, water, trail and forest. The entire time we are out on the boards, checking, checking for other rarities, this red-tail claims his evergreen. Tasha, a fine art photographer, tries out her new camera on His Highness, His Haughtiness, with stunning results.
Arrow-slim dark tails of a floating flock reveal the name of the next species — Northern pintails. Quintessential dabbling ducks, they’re all feeding. All we see are eponymous tails and white triangle upside-down bodies.
I think I see a fish ring on flat, ice-blue Absecon Bay. But Tasha identifies a diving duck. With her camera, she captures many unique poses on the surface, between merry plunges. A pied-billed grebe, this is one of the tiniest birds afloat. When it vanishes, it leaves rings like moiré silk all across that water. Atlantic City seems a mirage.
Another tiny duck, on the other side of our road, in the impoundment, must be Sibley-identified — a horned grebe. To be in the presence of grebes is an enormous privilege, up there with our trumpeter swans. All pintails are upright now, looking ready for an Embassy Ball. These exquisite scenes unfurl along pristine waters, beneath limitless reaches of gold grasses above peat the color of bittersweet chocolate.
Mallards show off tangerine-hued breeding-hued legs, as they tip for Christmas feasts. One saucy shoveler, an unusual singleton, reveals hefty splotches of Christmas-tree-green, dried-orange-peel orange, yes, snow-white plumage. His spatulate beak seems crafted of patent leather. Shovelers literally shovel with that straining mechanism, beneath marsh muds.
Overhead are slate blue, cinder grey, ragged white birds. The rowing of those lengthy wings, the paper-clip legs announce great blue herons. One gulps fish after fish until its belly seriously protrudes. Full or not, that heron goes right on gulping. Through binoculars, we watch each catch swim down that seemingly interminable neck toward the distended pouch.
We come upon a flock of birders, every muscle intent, huge lenses of cameras and scopes turned toward a seeming empty stretch of tawny grass. Tasha asks, “What are you seeing?” The answer exceeds our hopes — here is the snowy owl. About the shape of an upended peck basket, this white form, motionless as Carrarra, becomes clearer with the aid of optics. Gazing into those unblinking golden eyes, we share an encounter with serenity.
The dike road is a sharp U, angling east, then north, then west. On the north stretch, we are treated to flashing clouds of sandpipers. Beyond is a dark smattering of Canada geese. In the water, common mergansers and dazzling black-and-white hooded mergansers process with enormous dignity. The few females display spiky red-orange feathers that zing from the backs of their heads, as though receiving electric shocks. Snow geese float silently. Where there are hundreds, there will be thousands, as waters freeze over to our north.
A trip to “the Brig” can also be about what you don’t see. Others tell us of the peregrine parent and its yearling — which we unfortunately miss. No egrets or ospreys this time of year, of course. Oddly, no mute swan couples, on water or land.
We try to recreate our circuit, tallying species, as we drive over the final bridge. We take angled Route 561 at the firehouse toward Leed’s Point. And now, the Christmas picnic. Aren’t you glad you came?
Between bites, you have Alan repeat our route down — 295 to Columbus and over to 206 south, then off east below the circle at Carranza Road. 532 east to Chatsworth and 563 south to the turnoff to New Gretna. Sleepy Route 9 and a snippet of Parkway. The Smithville exit is 48, and you’re back on Route 9. Brigantine Wildlife Refuge is off to the left after the firehouse, along Lily Lake.
How tedious are these numbers! They do not capture the privilege and glory of pine forests, old cemeteries (the last Lenni Lenape is buried at Tabernacle), the tiny towns. Numbers can’t evoke silence and the beauty, but they can take you to it.
Any time — even Fourth of July and Memorial Day, you’ll be mostly alone on pine routes to “the Brig.” Where wonders await. Where timelessness and limitlessness are the norm.