Greenbrook Gardens Day 2 Part 1 Boat Ride

While leaving the barn animals there was a big fuss.  These snakes came out of the hen house after eating eggs.  They were together, I'm thinking mating, but who knows.  Were told they are rat snakes.  We had to leave before the rangers came to take care of the situation.  Not sure what they would do.  Maybe remove and relocate.

These beauties were growing in the outside eating area.  We were sitting eating lunch and two moms with under school aged boys were sitting at the table next to us.  They were all eating and one of the boys said to his mom, "Look there are hot dogs growing out of those flowers".  LOL

We were told by our boat guide that these are flowers from the mallo family and they grow in the marsh so they must be, marshmallows.  LOL

This was our boat.  It was a great day and wonderful lazy trip down the river.

These are nest boxes for wood ducks.  The collar under the box keeps predators out. He says the mom duck flies into that box at 35 mphs.  Hope she does not miss.

Yellow-bellied slider turtles.

 

These fields were man made.  This area had many cypress trees.  The slave cut them down with hand saws and big knifes.  The trees were to heavy and big to move so they would burn them on the spot.  It took 7 yrs to clear 100 acres. This opening is where they dug the soil out and  they would pile it up and spread it out to make the rice fields.   The ditch is deep and wide, but over time has filled in and/or  the plants grew in.  The slave women would plant the rice, planting was considered women's work.  When the rice was harvested they would ship all of it over seas.  So it would not spoil as it was transported over the ocean they had to process it to remove the outer haul.  This is were the sweet grass baskets ( I wrote about before) were made and used.  After the rice fields were abandoned nature took over.  Trees began to grow on the river banks and the native grasses took over the fields.  This field was big, you can see the other side were the trees are growing.

Wild gator in river

Trunk gates that let water in and out of the rice fields.  They had to regulate the times that they watered and amount of water.  


The Gardens are over 9,000 acres, including 4 plantations.


There are two more blogs on the second day at the gardens.  The blog will let me only load so many pics.  So scroll down and see butterflies, and scroll down again and see the farm animals of the plantation and the zoo, animals of South Carolina.