Memories of Pigeon Dock

I grew up in a  coastal area of Essex, UK with the closest water being a creek off the Blackwater River known locally as Pigeon Dock.  It is outlined in red in the image, with our house indicated by the yellow oval.

The habitat of Pigeon Dock was saltmarsh surrounding bare mud (at low tide) in the main body of the creek.  The marsh only flooded at spring tides (the highest recorded being 3.2m), but the Creek filled on every high tide (typically about 2.6m)  This meant the mud in the creek was pretty oozy. It could be crossed as long as you kept moving but you left deep footprints behind: stopping would probably teach lessons about quicksand although I don't recall anyone ever getting drowned there.

To my surprise it is a recognised name outside the area - this gives a view of the current appearance of the creek at mid-tide.  A bit more information about the site is in this.  One site said that the dock was still in use by the barges (collecting hay for sale in London) in 1950: we moved to the area in 1952.

While trudging down memory lane I decided to read about the 1953 floods, which we watched going over the sea wall from my bedroom window.  That article suggests the storm surge was 5.6m AMSL - compared with higher than usual spring tides of 3m.

So how it this relevant to Mallacoota?  It relates to an area of marsh opposite the end of Angophora Dive.  On Wednesday I happened to notice a lot of avian action at the Southern end of the area so put on my wellies and set off for a tour.

 This shows the vegetation on the terra (more or less) firma section of the marsh.

 Looking into the Inlet shows a mud bank exposed (this was at mid-tide) and a group of visiting swans.

There were lots of these bivalve shells washed up.  All empty, so I presume there are some fat fish out there!  It is proving a tad difficult to identify the bivalve (and there are many options for the little pointy job next to it).

A small group of ibis were cleaning things up a little.

When they took off I manged to get a flight shot one, noting with some surprise the black wing-tips.

The small vegetative matter - possibly some sort of samphire - is regenerating well after its recent immersion.

The water in the Inlet looked quite clean.  That left behind in puddles in the marsh, less so.    I recall a comment made by a hiker on Cradle Mountain "I don't like brown water.  Green water is fine as at least something is a;live in there."

Here is where the Pigeon Dock memories really happened.  I was wearing wellies as I was unsure about the supportive qualities of the mud.  It was in fact quite good until about 650m from the end, where an innocent looking bank of shell-grit turned out to be rather colloidal in nature: fortunately strategy 1 from Essex kicked in and swift movement got me out of there.