Lake Bistineau - August 20, 2006

Don and Susie wanted to look at a house for sale on Lake Bistineau, so we decided to bring the kayaks and go paddling while we were there. It was soooooo hot that we really should have stayed home, but we went anyway. The car temp said it was 100 degrees when we got to the state park where we were going to put in. And the park is not on the open part of the lake, it is on a very tree filled part, so we could not count on any breeze to help cool us off. We put in about 5:30 PM, so the sun was pretty high and boy was it hot.


But as we went from the park down to the bridge we saw quite a bit of wildlife, so I just tried to ignore the heat.


The water was filled with yucky dead and rotting hydrilla. They have drained the lake for the last two years and so as it filled up over the winter time the dead plants just rotted in the water. So it was not exactly a nice place to paddle.


We weren't sure that we would make it to the bridge because the hydrilla that was not killed in the drain off was everywhere blocking the way, but Don went ahead and found a decent pathway for us to follow through the stuff.


We rested under the bridge for a bit to cool off. It was pretty hot still and I was not about to take water from the lake and splash it on myself like I usually do. No telling what bugs/bacteria would be in it. So I took my drinking water and poured some on myself. That felt pretty good.

As I was resting, a dragonfly decided he needed to rest too and lit on my kayak just long enough for me to take a picture.

After we rested a bit we headed back to the park.

I saw a blackish small bird so I went closer to see if I could get a picture. I thought maybe it was some type of black bird until I got the camera on him, but then I saw that it was a green heron. I was too far away to get a really good picture (reminder to self...get a teleconverter!).


The egrets were everywhere, and I saw a whitish bird in the distance and I started trying to get closer. Susie (whose eyes are much better than my expensive lasik fixed eyes) said, Hey that one looks different from all the others. I zoomed in and...it was not an egret!

It was a juvenile blue heron...my first! I was thrilled!

I wish that I had been able to get closer, but the water got too shallow and it was filled with the hydrilla and grass. But I was just pleased that I saw it.

I looked a couple of hundred yards away from that and saw another blue, but it was almost all blue. And I definitely could not get real close to this one. Oh well....at least I got one good bird picture!


Susie was close and she said that she saw something moving on the distant shore, so I looked and sure enough there was a doe coming down for water. It was too far away to get a good shot even with the telephoto, but I am posting a few pictures anyway. It's not every day that I get to take pictures of a deer!




When I looked up Don was out of sight and Susie was pretty far away too, so I gave it up and headed back to the car.


As we were putting the kayaks on the trailer, Susie said look...another deer, and sure enough there was another doe feeding on the bushes across from the dock. But by the time I got my camera back out of the car, it had just about disappeared into the bushes. So I missed that one.

All in all the Lake Bistineau trip was very hot...it had nasty water...I think we almost all got heat stroke...BUT I saw a bird I had never seen...so it was worth it for me! I told Don and Susie...we go to Caddo or Cross Lake from now on if it is close to 100 degrees! No more small bodies of water with no lake effect cooling breeze! And when we got our yaks out of the water you could see the scum built up on the sides of our boats. So we will have to wash them good before we take them elsewhere. We certainly don't want to spread that stuff around!

Well...that's it for this report... Hope to go somewhere again next weekend. I am looking forward to September 8th when we go up to Table Rock Lake in Missouri for a few days.

Until next time...

Cathy