PA Buzzard Swamp Wildlife Management Area - Allegheny National Forest

Buzzard Swamp Wildlife Management Area is a partnership project area shared by the Pennsylvania Game Commission and the Allegheny National Forest. We visited this vast wetland system and hiked an out-and-back on its main loop trail for about 2.5 miles. Pleasantly surprised by the beauty and the richness of wildlife here, we could have stayed the whole day but decided to make a half-day of it due to the heat and biting flies and my big black dog being uncomfortable with both. 

We took our time and admired every view, pond, meadow, and lake and were pretty much awed by it all. With over 1,200 acres of protected wetlands, a chain of ponds and lakes with large wetland marshes is partly managed by humans with small culvert and sluice gates but the real water managers were the beavers and muskrats. We found evidence of both everywhere we went from beaver dams and beaver lodges to muskrat cattail huts along a main gravel road. There were deer, so many birds, and plenty of scat on the path - coyote, mink, raccoon, even fisher. 

Beaver dam against the road

Butterflies and dragonflies were everywhere in the road, most feeding on salts found in scat piles or preying upon the flies that hung around the scat. Monarchs were common thanks to vast meadows of Milkweed, Indian Paintbrush, and other host plants. The beaver-made wetlands are critical habitat for two Clubtail Dragonfly species of concern in Pennsylvania. We stopped at Pond #5 (out of 15) for a water and snack break and watched families of Barn Swallow swoop out of the culvert we were sitting over, We could hear the young begging from the nests inside the culvert. 

An Osprey adult flew with her two newly-fledged young who were just earning their wings over the largest lake behind us. A juvenile Broad-winged Hawk flashed through a spruce woods that ringed with Red Maple and grassy marsh. We had just experienced an adult Broad-winged Hawk wheel at eye-level over the truck on the rough road up from the Clarion River, so seeing a juvenile within the hour was a treat.

Milkweed

Spruce opening

This is the kind of place that whispers to you when you hike through. The wind in the meadows creates a kind of sigh that is perfectly punctuated by Red-winged Blackbirds. You can almost hear the flap of Tiger Swallowtail Butterflies as they cruise close to your ears. Green Frogs and Red-eyed Vireo compete to be the loudest until the Marsh Wren shows up. To not stand still and listen to the chorus of meadow insects and the whirrrr of dragonflies over the ponds is a mistake. Take the time to stop and do nothing else but listen. 

Looking out across this vast basin of ponds and marshes I felt somewhat reassured that everything will be alright. Migrating waterfowl will begin arriving by September and Atlantic Flyway will again be full of birds moving steadily south. There was something tremendously hopeful in how this wetland complex was so full - absolutely crammed - with animals, birds, bugs, reptiles, and amphibians. We came across a Snapping Turtle nest that had survived predation and showed the prints of tiny turtles fanning out from the nest to the edge of a pond. The cycles of life large and small wound round and round, full of promise. 

While on our camping break in the Allegheny National Forest I had learned about the passing of Joanna Macy, American Buddhist and great lover of all things wild. I'll write more about Macy in my companion blog Uphill Road over on Substack later this week, but here in the middle of the great wet meadows I had the sense that this was a place I could find her if I needed her, a traveling poet spirit on the breeze in "widening circles" through the watery landscape not unlike and nor far from her Western New York childhood home. 

“To be alive in this beautiful, self-organizing universe—to participate in the dance of life with senses to perceive it, lungs that breathe it, organs that draw nourishment from it—is a wonder beyond words."

- Joann Macy, World as Lover, World as Self (1991)

Notes:

Allegheny National Forest trail map for Buzzard Swamp WMA https://www.alleghenysite.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Buzzard-Swamp-Trail.pdf

PA Shawnee State Park: Disappearing Allegheny Oak Glades

On a very hot, humid day in the Allegheny Front region of Pennsylvania I decided a change of plans was needed to spare my not-so-heat-tolerant coonhound from another day in the sun-exposed bogs of the Gallitzin State Forest. We retreated instead to the nearby oak forests of Shawnee State Park, a few minutes east. I had just listened to the latest 1A podcast episode on Sam Bloch's new book Shade  so of course I had to make some plant surveys! I chose a closed canopy 2 mile-long forested trail within the park but what I found there - besides being drastically cooler - was a real treat for me (and Amos).

Bloch describes how tree shade affects humans and animals biologically as a multi-layered canopy  lowers air temperature on a hot day by as much as twenty degrees F. The heart rate slows down and the body's cooling mechanisms relax. Shady forests can even generate their own ground to canopy breezes which help with evaporative cooling.  As we climbed up the slope to the broad knoll on top, the shade quality went from humid and deep to breezy and cool above. Amos even had a little fancy prance at just about 80 F' compared to his sluggish walk in the open bogs at 95 F' yesterday. 

Chestnut Oak, Quercus montana

As we hiked along the dry shady oak ridge of weathered sandstone, the cooling effect of the great old oaks was intoxicating. Acres of massive Chestnut and Chinquapin Oak, all of them hundreds of years old with their great out-sweeping limbs shaded  patchy below-canopy grasslands spread across the forest floor like a vast carpet. But, unlike what I'm used to seeing in our acidic woods at home, there were no heath plants, no blueberry or huckleberry, no laurel or rhododendron understory, so I knew the soil composition was very different. I scuffed around in the duff which was very thin over light sandy soils that barely covered the sandstone bluff.  The deeper we went down this old growth path the more I suspected that a unique kind of habitat, part woodland, part grassland, was unfolding in front of us. 

Chinquapin Oak, Quercus muehlenbergii 

Aprons of grasses and small forbs grew in the distinctly circular canopy shadow beneath each of the giants. Beyond the aprons were small Sassafras, Shagbark Hickory, larger Cherry and Sweet Birch saplings all forming a ring of transition woodland around each of the giant oaks. Seeing the repeating pattern of open shaded grass glades beneath each of the old trees, mostly made up of native Poverty Oatgrass and Little Bluestem, I was sure I'd wandered into an Appalachian Oak Glade, one of Pennsylvania's most vulnerable Allegheny Mountain habitats. I stepped carefully into one of the large green patches beneath a Chinquapin Oak to survey what grew there. 

Indian Tobacco

Blue-Eyed Grass

Grass Pink

Poverty Oatgrass

Pennsylvania Sedge

The vulnerability of the Allegheny Oak Glad is concerned with invasive non-native plants and fire/grazing suppression. These little patches are little prairie oak savannas in miniature and they occupy mid-elevation southern facing outcrops with poor soils underlaid with calcium-bearing sandstone. Valued by indigenous people who lived in the Allegheny/Appalachian Valley and Ridge region these little oak glades attracted big game like White tailed Deer, Elk, and Bison. Controlled fire was used to sweep upslope to the summits to deter all but the toughest trees like Oak, Pitch Pine, and Chestnut while favoring the deep-rooted grasses and forbs that herbivores love. 

Oak Glade in transition

As settlement and cultivation overtook the fertile valleys and Shawnee peoples were forcibly moved off their ancestral homelands, farmers continued to use these open oak glades for summer livestock pasture. As Crosby (1986) described, the Neo-Europeans and their non-native livestock swarmed over the Alleghenies, "grunting, lowing, neighing, crowing, chirping, snarling, and buzzing in a self-replicating and world-altering avalanche." This activity bought the oak glade habitats a little more time until another invasion took hold. From DCNR flyers of non-native invasive plants, these were some of the most abundant invasives I noted in the little aprons of Oak Glade grasslands:

 

Now that controlled fire and intensive livestock grazing is all but gone over this sandstone knoll (being a protected landscape within the state park) the little patches of prairie beneath the old growth oaks are threatened with a number of invaders. Encroaching on the little grassland habitats were hundreds if not thousands of small sprigs of Japanese Barberry as far as the eye could see. Interspersed among these were Winter Creeper, an invasive vine that prefers open woodland, and a few dense stands of the prolific Common Velvet Grass, a common, aggressive European pasture grass that has made its way upslope from farms beyond the park. 

So what? Isn't this just a little niche habitat doomed anyway to environmental change and not worth all the worry? To the everyday hiker a little disappearing oak glade may even be invisible, therefore not a concern at all as one goes on about her hike. But this is for me an example of living in Aldo Leopold's "world of wounds" where my love for ecological communities and environmental history can leave me feeling sad. Standing along the mile-wide knoll with all its many patches of oak glade grasslands tucked neatly into the cool, cast shadows of the giant tree canopies overhead, I saw the shade for what it provided this wild, increasingly warming world with its own special sanctuary from the sun - a place born of harsh, hot environments after all and that offers us the possibility of shady resilience against the onslaught of heat waves. Amos loved this slow paced walk among the old trees so much that he gave a few of them a loud HELLLOOOOO! 

Notes:

Alfred W. Crosby. 1986. Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900 - 1900. Cambridge University Press. 

Common Velvet Grass  https://elibrary.dcnr.pa.gov/GetDocument?docId=3643509&DocName=Velvetgrass.pdf

Winter Creeper https://elibrary.dcnr.pa.gov/GetDocument?docId=1738762&DocName=winter%20creeper.pdf

Asian and European Barberry https://elibrary.dcnr.pa.gov/GetDocument?docId=3549861&DocName=Barberry.pdf

Shawnee Trail, Shawnee State Park, PA 

PA Gifford Pinchot State Park: Round the Lake Hike, 12 mi.

 

American Toad - poison glands obvious! 

On a very rainy day my dog Amos and I hiked a circuit around the large impoundment lake at Gifford Pinchot State Park in York County. I am not a fair weather hiker. I go hiking no matter what. "It builds character!" a hiking friend once said  (we were hiking in a hurricane) and that's sort of how I felt about this excursion. Amos and I harvested some more of that character on this 12-mile slog through flooded trails that, with one major road-walk reroute, ran and pooled with water the whole way 'round.  It was a challenge - and a lot of fun!

We started at 9am when the rain did...

...and the mud became muddier...

...then the trail ran like a river...

...until it became a lake.

Amos will wade through any water AS LONG AS IT DOES NOT TOUCH HIS BELLY. That said, I tried hard to follow Leave No Trace principles and not hike around, but Amos and his belly dictated that at least two deep water go-arounds were non-negotiable, so a-bushwacking we went.  Otherwise we waded and mucked and sloshed straight on through. 

Oyster Mushroom

Mullein

Coreopsis

A well-known wildflower photographer once gave a workshop at our local nature center. He stressed that cloudy, rainy days are the best times to go out and capture color. I remembered that little tip as we passed woods edges full of flowers so brightly beaming yellow despite the low light. Even yellow mushrooms were in on the act. Goldfinches and a Common Yellowthroat at the marsh twinkled in their intense yellow spring plumage. It all but made up for the absence of sun.

See the resemblance?

Diabase rocks made monumental pasture walls

Diabase boulder overlook

Tessellated weathering (tiles)

Diabase is the rock type here. It's a sub-volcanic rock that weathered out from buried plutons, underground chambers that cooled in place and never reached the surface as lava. Diabase is found throughout Northern York County in a belt of volcanics that stretches from Gettysburg in Adams County in an arc across the Susquehanna River east towards the Iron Hills of Lancaster and Chester Counties. It's hard stuff and farmers did everything they could to clear their fields of it or risk breaking plow blades. By the Depression Era, farmlands in the area had been exhausted and much of the landscape was secondary scrub, overgrown and run-down. In the 1950s the state acquired the farms and began constructing the first metropolitan part in the growing state park system. By 1960 it was open for business including public swimming beaches, trails, playgrounds, and small boat launches. It was a tradition growing up with "Pinchot" summers. See Notes (below).

Vernal pools and citizen science!

Stopping by for a frog check

Cattail and pond lily marshes

By the time we reached the far side of the lake the rains were really pouring down. We checked out the marshes for ducks but could hardly see through the downpour. My binoculars stayed dry and unused in their drybag in my pack but everything else on me or inside my pack (even with a rain cover) was drenched. Oh well. It was warm enough not to have to worry much about getting cold as long as we didn't stop for too long. We crossed the bridge into the woods through the old Weller Farm wall gate and soon emerged into the day use area with its fields of picnic tables, grills, picnic lawns, and playgrounds. Time for a snack break in the pavilion but as winds increased even under roof, the rain found us. 

Old Weller Farm gate 

Drenching through the farm site

Snack break in a driving rain

The open fields of the day use area really drenched us. Once back into the woods following the yellow blazes I noted how much rain the canopy overhead intercepted from our direct battering. Amos was happy to be under cover again, but now the trails really were becoming small rivers and lakes. He kept looking back at me as if to express his worry of a wet belly. 

   

 

White Jelly Fungus

Skullcap

Ghost Pipes 

As we progressed towards the ravine where the dam was built in the 1950s to create the lake, the trails became completely submerged. All that water was running down the same hill we were hiking down. I heard the wet-foot stream crossing long before I saw it. Normally this little stream is a hop-skip across smooth ledges to continue the trail on the other side, but not today! Amos was very nervous about approaching it, even if just for a minute to get a picture. Turn around! Don't drown! We high-tailed it back up the hill to the nearest intersection with a bridle trail and slogged through some very deep mud horse trails out to the road. We rerouted for a two-mile walk around the ravine valley. 

Turn around! 

A little road walk...

... past the Maytown Schoolhouse...

...and Benders Cemetery.

Died 1844, 80 yrs. 

Road walking has its joys, too. We found the Maytown Schoolhouse and explored the Bender Cemetery along the Alpine Road to the dam parking lot and the next access to the Lakeside Trail. In the graveyard we found many birthdates before 1776. Some of the markers had flags and I wondered if they were Revolutionary War veterans? A nice lady pulled up alongside and asked we if needed a ride. I told her no, thank you, we were hiking in the rain on purpose. She gave a big smile and said "Atta girl!" and waved goodbye as she pulled off. 

Crossing over (not through) Beaver Creek

Spill way into Beaver Creek

Mason Dixon Trail and Lakeside Trail combine

Alpine and Mason Dixon Trails combine

The rain finally subsided after mile 8, which would have been mile 6 were it not for the 2-mile road walk (which was delightful) and we strolled past the great diabase boulders and rocky overlooks, slowly drip-drying as we went. Like meeting up with an old friend, the robin's egg blue of the long-distance Mason Dixon Trail joined the Lakeside Trail and I decided to stay on the MDT and divert off the Lakeside Trail. Around mile 10 we cruised through the disc golf area where we met a soaked but happy player who offered me a free throw (!!) and past a little boat launch where Amos told me he was extra hungry. At mile 11.8 were back at the truck with a deep toweling off for Amos, dinner, and a well earned hound's nap in the back of the truck. 

Let's go eat!

Amos snoring in his comfy bed by 5pm. 

Both the Mason Dixon Trail and Pinchot State Park are like old friends to me. When hiking pal Kim and I finished our MDT section hike in 2016, I remember coming through the park feeling like a homecoming. How many times have I followed the blue blazes through this park - first with my dad and then with friends and many dogs over the years. My first time to Pinchot was when I was eleven. Soon I'll be 65 and thankful I can keep coming out to walk these trails even in the pouring rain.

Notes: 

Pennsylvania's First Metropolitan State Park  Pennsylvania Historic Preservation blog; PA State Historic Preservation Office. July 31, 2024 

Road walk = orange dots / loop travel  = clockwise / 12 miles