Voices of the wandering wind

Earlier this week, the birding community was a-twitter with the news that razorbills had been spotted at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge and other areas along the coast, even as far south as Miami on the east coast and Naples on the west coast.

This is extremely rare - the razorbill is an alcid that normally prefers cold North Atlantic waters and doesn't usually venture this far south. I wanted to add the razorbill to my life list, so I rose before dawn this morning and drove through the early morning mist to the refuge.

I didn't see a single razorbill. It was, in fact, not a very birdy day at St. Marks, unless you count the Congress of Coots clogging every pond, pool and channel. They were everywhere in the hundreds, squonking and muttering and preening their tidy black plumage.

I figured I'd do my usual perambulation of the tower trail, just to see if the bald eagles were up and about and to check in on the little kestrel that patrols the Headquarters Pond. The wind was stiff, and as I walked, I found myself stalking sound and scent instead of sights on the trail.

A good steady wind gives a voice to everything it touches, and so my hike had a surround-sound soundtrack. It was a feast for the ear - the soft, surf-like roar of tall pines dancing, the hiss and rattle of the reeds, the shushing murmur of marsh grass, the cellophane crinkle of palmetto fronds, the creak of scrub oak branches. Off in the distance, I could hear an occasional deep "whomp" that sounded for all the world like heavy artillery but was probably the bow of a boat smacking the chop in the bay - the wind carried the sound across the flat expanse of the salt marsh with extraordinary clarity.

And the smells - the rich alluvial stink of the mud flats, the salty tang of the marsh, the exotic, spicy scent of dotted horsemint and cedar, a faint, funky mammalian musk. I love them all and sniff the air like a hound whenever I walk those paths.

I lazed my way around the trail and thought I might like to change up my routine on the way back, so I stopped to walk out on one of the dikes. I walked back and back into the seemingly limitless expanse of the salt marsh, with the wind in my face and the sun on the water and the coots, everywhere the coots, conducting their birdy business. I could have kept going all day, except for the two humongous alligators I spied about 50 yards ahead, lolling on a mud bank. Even the smallest gator looks big when you come upon it unawares, but these guys were really huge - at least 12 feet, maybe more, from tail to nose and as broad-beamed and heavily muscled as linebackers. I peered at them through the binoculars and crept marginally closer until one of the brutes lazily lifted his head and looked in my direction. He changed his position so that he was facing me and settled there to see what I would do.

What I did was back away slowly for a few paces before turning around and striding briskly back the way I had come. I got in my car and noodled my way home in a proper Sunday drive, slow and leisurely. When I got back to the wee cottage, I opened all the windows in the house to let the wind in - it had followed me home.

And then I set about making daikon radish pickles and watching football and doing the little chores left over from Saturday.

I'll bet I dream about alligators tonight.