Photo:Engage

  “ The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but having new eyes. ”  - Marcel Proust     I must admit I didn't realize how important the creation of watering locations by people was to the sustaining power of the refuge system. Like many, I simply assumed that they had always been there, that they were natural features. Without the water, the many avian, aquatic, and terrestrial species that depend on the refuges would have little choice but to compete with people and lose. People built and maintain many of the ponds, lakes, tributaries, and watering holes in the refuge system and it's to them and their hard work that I salute. As I wrote in my post on May 6, 2023...      Let’s take one last look for now at one of the many manmade water sources in Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge. This section of the Oxpen Branch, a small tributary system between the Refuge’s various ponds and lakes, is near the curiously ramped v...

“ Beauty can be seen in all things, seeing and composing the beauty is what separates the snapshot from the photograph. ”  - Matt Hardy     You probably know that President Theodore Roosevelt directed the creation of our amazing National Parks, but did you know he also founded the National Wildlife Refuge System in 1903? On March 14 of that year, he established Pelican Island NWR along Florida's Atlantic Ocean coast.      Since then,  more than 560 wildlife refuges are in place across this country, and they're all managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.  Each NWR unit can be a wildlife refuge, a conservation area, a marine national monument, or a waterfowl production area. The different units help with conserving native species that depend on that land or water to thrive by using scientific management  methods. And I think they're another of our many national treasures.     As I wrote in my post on Ap...