Happy as an Oyster

Yesterday started with a very early 4:00 am wake up call in Charleston, South Carolina. Joy Brown –Marine ecologist and oyster specialist extraordinaire– would soon be arriving to pick me up at my hotel, which was on the way to the landing in nearby McClellanville. Although bedraggled and barely functional at that hour, I was really glad to be going out to the coastal marshes to once again document the progress of The Nature Conservancy's oyster habitat restoration project. We were blessed with good weather and the great company of U.S. House of Representatives Member Anne Peterson-Hutto and local fisherman Capt. Jim Yergin who were both very tolerant of my request for "Just one more photo, please..click...click...click...this time I really mean it....click...click!"

Here are some highlights of the morning. For background on this story, visit this earlier post.
A beautiful sunrise over the marshes as Capt. Jim guides us to the installation site.
First light revealed the new oysters that had colonized the oyster castles.
The oysters quickly colonized the man-made structures.
Local fisherman like Jim Yergin need healthy marine ecosystems to keep fish populations strong.
U.S. House of Representatives Member Anne Peterson-Hutto joined us on our trip to learn more about how the project works.
Joy demonstrates how the project is mapped via GPS for Representative Peterson-Hutto.
Joy Brown, proud defender of Oysters everywhere!

Bird's Eye View of Charleston's Marshes

I just returned yesterday from Charleston, SC where I was working with The Nature Conservancy to document their Oyster Habitat Restoration project being led by marine ecologist, Joy Brown. The flight time was donated by a wonderful organization called SouthWings whose slogan is 'Conservation through Aviation.' Although our pilot –a really nice guy named Hume Davenport– was held-up in Asheville due to fog, we were still able to fly, albeit somewhat later than we had originally planned. So much had gone into arranging the shoot that we felt like it would be best to go ahead and make the best of it.

I had never flown over South Carolina's marshes and coastal region before and I was amazed by the serpentine, almost circulatory patterns of the creeks flowing toward the Atlantic. Depending on the deposits in the water, the temperature (perhaps) and depth of the creek some of the water had a turquoise color which really contrasted with the pluff-mud and spartina grasses that each one passed through. One of the highlights of the trip was seeing Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge from the air. I could see Cabbage Palms growing naturally throughout the landscape and a 'skeleton forest' covering a rugged, untouched coastline. Joy tells me that this is one of the only places in the U.S. where a National Wildlife Refuge borders a National Forest (Francis Marion).

I will be posting more images when I complete my edit, but the image above is a sample of one the creeks that we flew over. The slow-moving waterways offer endless potential for abstract compositions.