The Swamp of Swimming Tires

I visited Circle B Bar Reserve in January of 2023. However, I saw no circles, no bees, and no bars.

The park is a chaotic collection of dry grassy areas, dry wooded areas, wet grassy areas, and wet wooded areas. On the border of Lake Hancock are tall cypress trees that allow long shafts of sunlight through the hanging moss onto the cloudy water below. It has all the right combinations of hiddenness and openness that make me want to dress up like an alligator and live there.

In a few places, the path runs along waterways filled with birds. I saw cormorants, ducks, anhinga, wood storks, ibises, little blue herons, great blue herons, sand hill cranes, and many others I do not know the names of.

These gallinules walked right up to me.

I also saw these strange-looking pieces of rubber on the sides of the path, sitting perfectly still. Did someone blow out their tires and then dump them here?

I counted ten total. There were even more tires floating in the current! Who keeps littering?

Finally, I saw this wooden animal with its head poking above the water. It didn’t seem bothered by the swimming tires at all. I should be more like this animal.