Pecatonica Wetlands Forest Preserve Sunday 9-26-10

This is where I had planned to hike Saturday but the weather changed my mind. It appeared from the fresh mud puddles that it had indeed rained there Saturday, so I guess it was a good decision to head elsewhere.

Pretty good hike. Lot's of water, birds, wild flowers, and butterflies, but not all that much access to the water for the creek beagle, but she still had a good time. About 5 and a half miles according to the map and my pedometer. About 3 hours and 40 minutes. I lost some time doing some unproductive bush whacking, and took a couple of short breaks at some conveniently located benches. I was pretty tired afterward, but Wilma was still raring to go.

I was planning to follow the main trail in a loop, however, shortly after trail marker 4, the trail just ends. The trail map shows a trail segment continuing east along Blair Rd, but there is no trail. There is what may be the remnants of a trail, but no trail.

I backtracked and went around and came up on the other side (marker 6), and it too just stops at the road. The section of trail going east/west shown on the trail map that is roughly between marker 4 and 5 just does not exist.

It would not have been so bad to walk along the road, but there are locked gates and a fence making access to the road difficult. I ran across a couple hiking in the preserve and in talking with them mentioned the missing section of trail. They said they have been hiking there for several years and they have not seen that trail segment. They just climb over the gates and walk along the road.

To me, it seems like all but forcing people to climb over a gate is just asking for someone to get hurt. Maybe a revision to the map is in order, removing the non-existent trail segment, and indicating there is no access to the road. Or some way to more easily get past the gates. I sent an email to the FP district Sunday evening, but as of Tuesday evening had not gotten a response.

Granite monument at the trail head.

 Sign at trail head. The little bird house on the sign post has trail maps in it. B&W copies of what I downloaded from the FPD web site.

 Much of the trail is like this. Maybe a ten foot wide berm made of gravel and dirt. Pretty uneven and lots of big chunks of gravel. Glad I had some ankle support.

 There are a lot of fallen and dead trees throughout the wetlands part of the preserve.

 The hiking trail goes along the snowmobile path as it goes through the fields of weeds.

 There are periodic trail maps along the trail. The orange signs are for the snow mobile trail.

Lots of water all around, but not much access.

 The trail forks here. This gate was open. If it had been closed this sign would have been visible from the trail.

 This is the private club. Not sure what it is.

 Marker 2. Fairly typical of the trail at this point.

 Lots of wild flowers all around. I could not ID most of them.

 Besides trail maps, there are benches along the trail periodically. Handy for taking a breather.

 Marker 3 is in the background. It is just before the trail enters a nice wooded area.

 A bench in the wooded area where I took a breather and took a picture of an island.

 A fork in the trail. To the left is a spur that goes about 50 yards to the bank of the river. No water access, but I guess you could fish from there.

Just after marker 4, the trail leaves the wooded area and enters an open field again.

 The trail just ends here at this gate that was locked. That is Blair Road on the other side of the gate.

 This is the field looking east from the trail near the gate. There is what appears to be the remnants of a trail, but no trail. There were a fair number of home made trails so we bush whacked it to the east across the field to see what we could see.

 We got to this body of water and Wilma finally got to play in the water. It was pretty muddy and not all that great as far as she was concerned. But she got a drink anyway.

This is after we started backtracking. We walked over this coming in as well. It is some kind of concrete structure near marker 4. Not sure what it is for. It kind of looks like part of an old driveway. 

We continue along water control berm.  

 We find access to the water, but lots of mud. The mud does not deter the creek beagle.

 Continuing on we come across a fork in the trail. A little white dog appears on the trail. He runs back up the trail, and soon returns with his two humans. An older couple who tell me about having to climb over the fence to walk along Blair Road. Wilma and I head north to see if we can find marker 6 and then 5. We find 6.

We find more water access. Muddy, but access. Wilma scared up a bunch of good sized frogs here. Must have been a couple dozen of them that took off from sunning themselves on the bank when she went down to the water. We also saw geese and ducks in this area as well as other water birds I could not ID.

The trail just stops at the road again, with another locked gate. It never makes it to marker 5.

We back track and head to the parking lot. Mostly along the snow mobile trail.

[update 9-29-10]

I got an email back from the FPD this morning saying they are going to update the trail map, put up signs indicating the trail dead ends at the road, and  make some kind of access at the road that does not require climbing over the gate. Can't ask for more than that.