Wheeler: It's for the birds.

The Wheeler National Wildlife Refuge near Decatur Alabama is a great place to see water fowl during the winter. Even this december, after such a terrible drought, there was enough water to attract all kinds of ducks, geese, and even sandhill cranes.

The refuge is disjoint, with different areas and different trails seperated by several highways. For general information on the site, check their website here. Visiting the visitor's center is a must, for maps and information.

At the visitor's center are 2 trails. One leads along a loop begining and ending with a small cypress forest. Durng warmer months, this area is full of small songbirds. Beyond the cypress is a typical southern forest full of lower brushy undergrowth and muscadine vines. The loop does pass by a man made pond with a sheltered area, but though the people on dutey tell us that the birds do frequent this spot, we have never happened upon anything there, aside from some dragon flys and bumble bees in the summer. On the returning portion of the loop is a large stand of bamboo, and a persimmon tree with it's branches hanging low over the path. Once we visited in late summer, and, reading that the fruit was indeed edible, decided to try some. I can strongly recommend against doing this. The taste was extremely bitter, and seemed to instantly and permantently dry out the mouth. We later learned they are not full ripend until the first frost.

The seond of the 2 trails leads to a 2 story bird blind structure overlooking some wetland habitat. In the summer, this area has many common song birds, and the occasional hawk. In the winter, this is the chosen spot to view the wintering sand hill cranes. These lanky birds float like magic through the air to land, one after another, in the midst of the other birds, proceeding to either eat calmly among the cut crop fields, or to bicker with other cranes.

There are other trails throughout the area, each with a slightly different habitat, and accompanyment of birds that shifts throughout the years. Perhaps my favorite feature of this park is the complete lack of a crowd. Having visited in the off season of late summer, we had been expecting more of a crowd in winter, but were pleasantly suprised to find ourselves almost alone in the park.