Port Susan Bay Preserve

After hiking Four Springs Lake Preserve, we drove to the Port Susan Bay Preserve which is at the end of Boe Road in Stanwood. This preserve is owned by The Nature Conservancy of Washington. There is a sign at the entrance with a phone number to get information and permission to walk the area. (360-419-3140) A gentleman who is a member of the conservancy was just leaving as we arrived , and he gave us permission to walk the dike. The Nature Conservancy of Washington has just completed a tidal marsh restoration that reconnects 4,000 acres of tidelands at the northern end of Port Susan Bay in Snohomish County to Puget Sound. The project included taking out 1.3 miles of a sea dike which was built in the 1950's to make more farmland. The conservancy then built almost a mile of new dike which goes to the Stillaguamish River which spills into the bay mixing freshwater and saltwater. At the beginning of the walk we saw a snowy owl on a log about 50 yards away. We could see another white head in the far, far, away distance and it was another snowy owl! We must have been in the right place at the right time as when we returned an hour later after walking the dike, we did not see the owls. We saw eagles, harriers, gulls, ducks, a few snow geese flying overhead, a bittern, and the 2 snowy owls. The dike is flat with farmland on one side and mud flats on the other. The tide was low so most of the shorebirds and ducks seen were in the distance.