In
2009 Doug McConnell met with Lake County Land Trust board member
and Rodman Preserve Committee Chair, Brad Barnwell, for a trip up
Rodman Slough. Doug McConnell produces “Open Road,” on KQED in San
Francisco. The program aired during the summer of 2009.
By Brad Barnwell
We all met at the Tallman hotel in Upper Lake and after getting
acquainted I suggested to Doug and his crew that we paddle up the
Rodman channel holding to the west side in order to slip into the
spur channel that borders the back side of the Rodman Preserve
owned by the Lake County Land Trust; then head up the main channel
to the Great Blue Heron colony.
I was hoping that Mother Nature wouldn’t let me down and would
give us some good wildlife shots and sounds. Doug’s film crew
would follow using Ray’s bass boat as a platform for Jack and his
camera and sound equipment. After sound checks we were off.
Within the first hundred yards we sighted a group of circling
turkey vultures and with a closer look through the binoculars I
found that one of the vultures was a three-year-old bald eagle.
Doug and crew were elated and Mother Nature started to put on a
show so intense that the camera crew focused on the wildlife for
most of the next two hours with only a few minutes of shooting
devoted to Doug and me. When we entered the channel on the east
side of the Rodman Preserve we were able to see and photograph,
Marsh Wrens, Yellow-headed and Red-winged Blackbirds, Wood ducks,
Mallards, Great Blue Herons, Black-crowned Night Herons, Green
Herons, Snowy Egrets, Great Egrets and their nesting colony as
well as American White Pelicans, Osprey, Western, Clark’s and
Pied-billed Grebes and a low level return flight of the Bald
Eagle. Two and half hours later and having never made it
anywhere near the Great Blue Heron colony we were hauling the
kayaks out of the slough talking about how fantastic it was to
experience so much wildlife so close to home for the residents of
Lake County and the need to continue to preserve the wetlands
remaining on the shores of Clear Lake.
