Drowned Lands Swamp

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The marshy habitats and forests at Drowned Lands offer an excellent opportunity for watching birds and other animals!

In the marshy habitats, Green Herons can be spotted with their vibrant green feathers, a reddish-brown neck and chest, and dark grey wings. They don’t wade into the water like other herons; but wait at the edges and strike at fish and amphibians. Another wetland bird you may spot is the Canada Goose, known as “Kaháks” in Algonquian. During the fall, you may spot Canada Geese flying to warmer climates in a “V” formation. That pattern helps Geese to save energy on long flights. When in V formation, the birds benefit from lift by flying in the updraft created by the bird in front of it. The bird at the front of the flock doesn’t get that benefit, so you will often see them switching places, so they can rest! Other birds found at Drowned Lands include Marsh and Carolina Wrens, Least Flycatchers, Veerys, Swamp Sparrows, American Redstarts, and Yellow Warblers.

In the Drowned Lands, one can find Muskrats, “Moskwas” in Algonquin, a prized and seemingly endless source of meat for the Northeastern Algonquin peoples. The site is also home to Beavers, who use their large orange front teeth to gnaw through wood to build these structures. Lodges are often constructed away from shore and can only be entered from underwater, but often have multiple entrances. When the weather gets cold and the water freezes, the Beavers live as family, with up to ten in their lodges, warm and cozy above the water line.

The beautiful landscapes and plants at Drowned Lands are part of a rare wetland known as the Harlem Valley Calcareous Wetlands. This habitat supports regionally significant rare reptile and plant species, as well as federally and state-listed species of concern like Swamp Birch, Handsome Sedge and Marsh Valerian.

Within this wet habitat, you are likely to find Bulrush and Cattails. Traditionally, the Eastern Woodlands people would use Bulrush to make twine into mats and bags by twisting them over each other. Similarly, Cattails were used to make less elaborate but thicker waterproof mats that were used to cover smaller traditional houses called “wikwahman” or wigwams. The lightweight Cattail mats could be easily removed and rolled up for transportation if the residents wished to temporarily move to another location during hunting or fishing seasons, leaving the pole frame behind for use another time.

There are several perennials you are likely to find at Drowned Lands including Wild Geranium, a small pink-purple flower that forms patches that attract bees and butterflies. It is native to woodlands in North America, where it blooms in clumps from April to June. Blood Root is another plant you may spot which grows 8-20 inches tall and has one large leaf with 5-7 lobes. The flowers bloom from March to May with 8-12 white petals with yellow stamens at the center. Each flower stem has a leaf clasped around it, which opens once the flower dies and falls away and their seeds are spread by ants.

The largest Mohican community in this region was called Taghkanic – an area of over 1,300 acres of fertile soil along the Roeliff Jansen Kill, called “Sunkehnak,” which possibly means “Stony River.” The Drowned Lands Swamp is a great example of the wetlands that once dominated this region.

In his 1714 journal, Robert Livingston noted the presence of an important wetland where Mohican women from Taghkanic gathered rushes to weave into mats. He documented the area’s name as Tapasksit, likely derived from “Tupaskwsiik,” meaning ‘Place of Twining Grass.’

By the first half of the 18th century, the Livingston family claimed much of the watershed as their Livingston Manor. The tract of land they claimed was large, twenty miles wide from the Hudson River to the Massachusetts border on the east. They, and other Dutch patroons, relied on the labor of indentured people and enslaved Africans to manage these large tracts of land. Ships from the West India Company used the Hudson River as a way to transport enslaved peoples. Once manumitted, those original Black families continued to live, work, and create a vibrant community that survives to this day.

The Livingston land claim was hotly contested by the nearby Mohican descendants of the original sellers. They rightfully believed that the boundaries had been grossly exaggerated. The Mohican people were subject to genocide, coerced into assimilation, and forcibly removed from their homelands to what is now known as Wisconsin. They continue to retain their unbroken status as a Sovereign Native Nation. Despite removal, they continue to hold relationships with their homelands and settler communities.

In more recent history, prior ownership includes the White family in the 1920s. Local folklore recounts that Old Croken, now known as the Summit Trail, was used during Prohibition to signal to potential buyers when new batches of brew were available – because it was not forested at the time it provided a way to look for law enforcement vehicles in the vicinity. County Route 3 ran at the base of the hill until the 1940s and would have helped the bootleggers keep an eye out for police. Eventually, the Rothvoss family purchased the property in the 1980s.

In 1995, ownership was transferred to the Salisbury Bank and Trust Company of Connecticut, which generously donated about 100 acres of land to the Columbia Land Conservancy, creating the Drowned Lands Swamp we know today. CLC opened the property to the public the same year.