Deep in northern Jefferson country, the LaRocca CE (conservation easement) is 178 acres of rich hardwood forest surrounding Turkey Creek.
Oaks dominate here. Where the river, rushing fast and cool on a hot June day, cannot reach, the oaks proliferate. They are accompanied by maple, river birch, and loblolly pine. Along the creek floor, thousands of tadpoles pool like algae. They move slowly, ungainly with their plump heads and undersized tails. Despite their sluggish movements, they are growing at a breakneck pace. Their bodies will shift with the tide of summer. Tails will become legs and arms will spurt into existence. Soon after, they will gain speed. They will join the rapid bouncing of their kin along the shoreline and disappear in the long grasses.
But, for now, they stay along the bottom of the creek. Watching as we cross the water.
Reindeer lichen, small tumbleweeds of white, are plastered to the ridgeline between where the creek splits. They love the shadows of the forest; thriving best where young, shorter trees darken the forest floor. Here the terrain is intense; it rises, draped in loblolly pine trees and needles, and then crashes downward into endlessly deep gulleys covered in thick leaf litter. The creek follows as we walk, a constant companion in its fixed rushing, like the blood in veins moving with the sharp beating of a heart climbing a steep incline.
The old roads here are a maze. A sinuous course of grasses and warm sunlight stretches for miles, softening the lines cleared long ago for those who moved through here before. Mature pine and southern red oak stretch high overhead, blanketing the understory with much-needed shade and the quiet thrum of crickets. Down one of these grassy routes, we are met with a couple of surprising sights. First, an abandoned gazebo plastered on the edge of a cliff overlooking Turkey Creek. It is covered with leaves, old furniture still firmly planted on the sunken floor; a small sanctuary amid thick wilderness. Resting beneath its generous roof is a sleeping coyote, who has wisely escaped the heat for a nap. Our approach wakes the slumbering creature with a start. It darts off into woods, quick as fire.
We returned to the creek. It felt impossible not to go back to the rushing water, to its crisp coolness and the slight breeze the creek carried with it; a gift. River birch, its peeling strips of bark cutting through the dominant vista of oak and maple, accepts this gift too. Where we soaked in the chilled creek, valuing relief after a boiling day, the birch relaxes beside us. And, for a short while, we all watch the water together. Blood and water. Skin and bark. We watch the cresting white riffles, the turbulent flow. We watch the living art. The conservation of LaRocca ensures its rushing waters and reaching oaks are conserved for the seasons to come.
