Four Holes Swamp

Deep, dark, murky, forbidding? Not at all. Saturday afternoon was spent walking a boardwalk trail deep into the interior of a bald cypress/tupelo river system known as Four Holes Swamp, located in the rural interior of South Carolina. It is a place of soaring 1,000-year old cypress trees, and clear, tea-colored water flowing in braided channels through the bottomland to join with the main stem of the river/swamp system. It is an oxygen factory. The air is clean, and light filters down to illumine flowing water and sunken logs. Nothing is ever done by man to alter this pristine environment -- the last remaining such virgin stand of this type of swamp forest left in the world, spared decades ago by a far-sighted lumberman named Francis Beidler, for whom the protected forest is named.

The only sounds to be heard during my walk were birdsong. Approximately 140 species of birds have been found here as well as numerous species of trees, including an astonishing variety of oaks, hickories, and elms, many of which are suited to watery environments. But there are pockets of higher ground where upland varieties of hardwoods can flourish. It is a place of amazing diversity, a refuge for the soul and spirit. A visit there never ceases to lift me up and out of the sordid realities of the world outside with its work tensions, bad news in the media, traffic, congestion and pollution. Here you enter a realm free from all that. It has been left to the forces of nature, all 11,000 preserved acres of the swamp.

As I sat on a bench overlooking Goodson Lake, about half way down the trail, a man whispered for me to look up into the tree overhead. There I saw a nest with what appeared to be two fledging blue herons, quietly waiting for their next meal. What a sight to see in my binoculars! By this point there were occasional little breezes stirring the leaves, but only temporarily. It was generally a still day which only made the quietness of the place seem more pervasive. And it was not hot at all for this time of year in South Carolina. It was, in fact, a very pleasant day. I can’t say I’d want to be walking this trail in mid-July, however.

One of the amazing things about this place is the water that flows across the swamp in narrow braided channels or else in flatter sheets with just barely perceptible movement, at least at this time of year. In summer it will all be dry except for the main swamp channel. From the boardwalk you can look down when the sun if out from behind the clouds, as it was intermittently Saturday, and see perfect reflection of the trees and foliage in the water. With a slight wind, these reflections shimmer and then become still again.

All those who love this place -- and people from all over the world come here -- are watching the results of court and other actions designed to stave off two area developers who have taken advantage of non-existing zoning laws in the rural county this swamp flows through and are attempting to build a major motor speedway for car races just one mile from the borders of the preserve. It has been a two-year fight thus far, and, as of now, the end result seems hopeful for the preserve. It is inconceivable that someone would want to destroy the ingegrity of this place with noise and pollution from cars spinning around a track, but that is what has happened. There is no limit to the depths to which some people will sink in their contempt and utter disregard for the natural world and those who care deeply about it. To them that pristine forest is nothing but a bunch of woods and swamp that should be drained and developed. Nothing is worth saving to them.

As I walked the remaining half mile or so of the trail up through slightly higher ground in the swamp, past huge overcup oaks and soaring tulip trees, I saw half a dozen egrets, take flight from their watery perches and fly off into nearby trees. Then there was silence once again.