The great marsh - David W. Harp

Is it still possible to make a voyage of discovery in Maryland, the US's fifth most densely settled state? In this volume, David W. Harp's photography and Tom Horton's prose produce a portrait of one such journey in an intriguing and endangered habitat.;Into this remarkable territory - whose shrinking dimensions frighten every naturalist and ecologist - Harp and Horton embarked on a canoe trip exploring, documenting and photographing the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge in Dorchester County. This volume, at its core, is the story of a single crossing of the Blackwater's length, east to west. Separate "sidebar" essays discuss how the marsh functions as a refuge for migrating butterflies, the wetlands sustain a lonely trapper, and the bogs yield archeological treasures - remnants of American Indian hunting forays and colonial boat building - to careful investigation.;The edges of the Chesapeake Bay offer Americans some of their loveliest (and most sensitive) wetlands. The fertile waters and soggy vegetation provide a home to ducks, geese, eagles, and dozens of other species of birds; muskrats, squirrels, foxes; and of course insect varieties almost too numerous to count. The environmental importance of the marshes lies in their filtering pollutants, retarding erosion, and helping to maintain a natural balance among the critters.