This Land, Your Land

Lake Mattamuskeet, the largest natural lake in North Carolina at 40,000 surface acres, is the heart of the Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge in Hyde County. It is best known as a wintering spot on the Atlantic Flyway for hundreds of thousands of migratory waterfowl, including Tundra swans (below), Canada geese, snow geese, ducks and coots.

The refuge is also open to fishing and crabbing, and hunting for waterfowl and deer in season.

We visited last Saturday and joined one of the annual tram tours of wetland impoundments on the lake's eastern shore.

Except for ducks and coots in the canal along the dikes the tram followed, the tour mostly provided the opportunity to see birds from afar. The refuge provided a spotting scope at one stop.

Most of the refuge's levee system is closed to the public from November through February, but roadsides and observation decks provide several spots for bird watching. The causeway bisecting the lake, which is a part of N.C. 94, has several places to stop.

A gazebo on the causeway, below, is part of the Charles Kuralt Trail, a series of similar spots on the 11 refuges in North Carolina and at the national fish hatchery in Edenton dedicated to the North Carolina-born journalist's fondness for out-of-the-way points of interest.

Lake Mattamuskeet attracts birds because its waters are shallow - ranging from half a foot to 4 feet deep and averaging 1.5 feet deep - and clear, Stanton said. The Fish & Wildlife Service also allows farmers to plant 125 acres of cropland on the refuge, and some corn is left unharvested to feed the birds.

The group of Tundra swans below includes two juveniles, identifiable by their gray plumage.

A small visitor center has a few exhibits, some merchandise for sale and staff offices. Across from it, the quarter-mile New Holland Trail provides a scenic walk through a stand of bald cypress and open marsh.

Beyond the New Holland Trail, the dike passes one of lake's two state-operated boat ramps on the Central Canal, below, and ends another quarter-mile away at a photo blind on the lake shore.

Find our entire report, with additional photos and video, at Carolina Outdoors Guide - Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge.

Environmental groups are fighting plans for an 11,000-acre wind energy farm to be built near the Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge, saying the farm's 492-foot windmills threaten thousands of migrating birds, The News & Observer reports this morning.

The N.C. Utilities Commission will hear arguments for and against Pantego Wind Energy's plans at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday in room 2115 of the Dobbs Building, 430 N. Salisbury St. in Raleigh.

Several environmental groups claim that giant blades of the Pantego Wind Energy farm's turbines, which would spin at more than 100 mph, "will bat birds out of the sky as they fly to surrounding farms to forage during their winter migrations," The N&O says.

The wind farm would consist of 49 turbines rising 492 feet to the tip of their blades. Some are to be built as close as three miles from the refuge while others would be more than 10 miles away.

Invenergy, the parent company of the farm, expects the 80-megawatt Pantego project to generate electricity between 25 percent and 36 percent of the time, according to the Friends of Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. Invenergy currently operates 1,200 turbines on 26 domestic wind farms.

The same groups complaining about the wind farm - the Southern Environmental Law Center, Sierra Club and Friends of Pocosin Lakes NWR - stopped the U.S. Navy from building an airfield near the Pocosin Lakes refuge a few years ago.

The refuge attracts more than 100,000 wintering snow geese, tundra swans, and many species of ducks, as well as tourists who travel to the Beaufort County refuge to see them.

The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission has also suggested that the rotating blades could pose a danger to bats, songbirds, bald eagles and migrating waterfowl in the area, and the wind-energy company is counting birds until the end of the migration season in the spring, the newspaper says.

Many area landowners have already signed leases to let the company build turbines on their land, The N&O says. One quoted in the report says area farmers whose crops have been eaten by the wintering birds for years are looking forward to payments from the energy company.

Swans flock to the Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge in a News & Observer photo from 2004 below.

Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge begins taking reservations tomorrow morning for next month's guided tours to see wintering waterfowl at one of the best birding sites in North Carolina.

Four one-hour tours in open-air trams are scheduled for Saturday, December 17. The refuge got "overwhelming positive feedback" after offering the tours last year, a news release says.

Lake Mattamuskeet, North Carolina's largest natural lake, has significant wintering populations of ducks, Canada geese, snow geese and tundra swans (below). Bald eagles also winter at Lake Mattamuskeet and are frequently seen perched in trees along the shore, the release says.

Tours are set for 7:30, 9 and 10:30 a.m., and 12:30 p.m. Refuge staff will begin taking reservations, which are required, at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday (November 29) at 252-926-4021.

"Unless the weather is so bad it poses a safety hazard, the tours will go on, rain or shine, windy or calm," Refuge Manager Deb Pierce says in the news release.

"It is critical that participants dress for cold weather, including heavy coats that will break the wind, scarfs, gloves, and especially hats," the release says.

Tundra swans at Lake Mattamuskeet on the Mattamuskeet National Wildlife Refuge near Swan Quarter. Click on the photo for more information.