A Day at Kellys Slough

Kellys Slough is about 100 miles east of Sullys Hill NGP. It is one of the refuges in this complex where we have volunteered to drive to to take care of the area as well as replace some of the signage.

This is the sign box where everything one needs is at the ready...all organized. The signs we put up here are put up using rivets and a rivet gun. Now, this is not the first trip we have made here. Our first trip, we discovered the rivet gun was broken. They knew this but did not share that with us. We now have one that works. Wallace likes installing the signs this way over bolts and nuts. Now, all the bad signs have been replaced.

Does this sign need replacing?

Yep.

Wallace also replaced the waterfowl signs. For this he had to put on waders to cross some of the ditches. Maybe I need to do a post on some of the difficulties we go through to get the jobs done. This one is minor, but there have been some doozies!!!

While Wallace weed whacked the parking area, I worked on the restroom...putting in toilet paper, sweeping, and picking up the trash...one little trash can inside the restroom. I make sure all the spider webs are swept down off the walls, inside and out.

Then I move over to the trails leading to the overlook.

Wormwood is an invasive, the plant you can see to the left of the photo. I have time to pull these. After that, I birded while I waited for Wallace to finish.

Not a bad view from the overlook where I watch the waterfowl. There are Canvasback, Common Merganzer, Redheads, Canada Geese, Lesser Scaup, etc. An eagle flew over menacing the ducks.

The birding has been phenomenal!!! Here is a Western Flycatcher posing for me.

North Dakota has changed our opinion...we are really liking the area.


This is a ten hour day...but we don't mind. Wallace was bone tired and slept well last night.

Kellys Slough doesn't get visited much...there is no one there manning the area. It is a unit of the Devils Lake Wetland Management District (WMD). The 1,270 acre refuge is surrounded by 2,500 acres of Waterfowl Production Areas (WPAs) which were purchased with Federal Duck Stamp funds. Twelve species of ducks nest on the refuge with mallards and gadwalls making up about half of the ducks.

Until next time...