Letters from the Past

I’ve been walking Theler Wetlands for a several years now, before they breached the dike and flooded the farm to provide better habitat for young salmon. I’ll have to admit I was skeptical of the project, particularly because I hadn’t seen the kind of transformation that I expected at Nisqually after they breached the dike.

Despite that skepticism, I’ve been encouraged by the kinds of changes I’ve seen at Theler Wetlands. Although some species of birds have obviously suffered from the changes, there seems to have been a number of positive changes, too. One of the biggest changes has been the increased number of small shorebirds passing through, like these Least Sandpiper.

LtrFrmPst2

Although I took these shots mainly to positively identifying them, looking at them got me thinking of what the Puget Sound must have been like before people started filling in wetlands to build farms and, more recently, mansions.

For me, these Least Sandpiper were letters from the past,

LtrFrmPst

reminding us what we need to do to preserve our natural heritage and pass it on to future generations.