28. Swyer Preserve

Distance:	Dayhike
Difficulty :	Easy for children
Distance :	1 mile, round trip
Hiking time :	1 hour
High point/elevation gain :	15 feet, 15 feet
Hikable :	March-December
Map :	USGS Hudson North

There's not a lot kids like better than a boardwalk, and the Louis A. Swyer Preserve is nothing but a 0.5-mile-long boardwalk running along Mill Creek. The icing on the cake? This boardwalk ends in an elevated observation platform looking out over a tidal marsh.

From New York City, take the Thruway (I-87) north to Exit 21 in Catskill. Follow the signs for the Rip Van Winkle Bridge and the city of Hudson. On the east side of the bridge, continue approximately 2 miles on NY-23 to the intersection with NY-9. Follow NY-9 north (toward Hudson) for approximately 14 miles, to the junction of NY-9 and NY-9J in the town of Stuyvesant. Bear left onto NY-9J and follow it for 7.3 miles. Look carefully on the left for the sign marking the entrance to the preserve; it will come up just after you cross Mill Creek. If you come to a railroad overpass, you have gone 0.5 mile too far. The parking area for the preserve is a pullout on the left (west) side of the road just north of the entrance.

The Nature Conservancy acquired the preserve site in 1989 from Conrail; boardwalk construction began in 1991. The preserve is named in honor of Lewis A. Swyer, a former trustee of the eastern New York chapter of The Nature Conservancy.

Walk in past the entrance sign and step onto the boardwalk. You'll come almost at once to an information kiosk, followed quickly by an observation deck that looks out onto Mill Creek. If you're here when the tide is low, you'll probably see footprints in the mud, made by the various animals that live here. A footprint with five toes, including a "thumb" pointing out, is from a possum; raccoons also have five toes, but they all point straight ahead. You might even see the track of a mink; look for four toes and a heel mark. Tracks with three toes facing forward and one facing back are made by birds.

The boardwalk meanders along the bank of Mill Creek, and in 0.25 mile you'll arrive at another observation deck. Notice how the swamp is now opening out—there are fewer trees and more shrubs, grasses, and low vegetation. The swamp is turning into a marsh, but why? Closer to the mouth of the stream, the tide comes in with more force and tends to carry away seedlings from trees. Beavers in the area have also helped keep the area open by cutting down saplings. If you're fortunate, you might spot a beaver here, especially late in the day.

Continue on the boardwalk for another 0.25 mile until you arrive at the two-story observation platform at the end. Climb up to look out over the Amtrak railroad tracks to the tidal mud flats where Mill Creek empties into the Hudson River. The area in front of you was once an open cove; it has been filled in both by mud dumped here from dredging the river channel and by the reduced water flow caused by the railroad tracks.

Trains will pass by here fairly often. The platform puts you at eye level with the train engineer. Wave as he goes past—you might get a wave and a toot of the horn in return.

If you've timed your trip right, you will be able to see the tide turn from the platform. If it's low tide, a mud flat is visible to the left of the mouth of the creek. As the tide comes in, you can see the mud flat gradually disappear.

A freshwater tide washes up Mill Creek twice a day, covering much of the land area of the preserve. The very rich, fine soil of the swamp is constantly being built up by the sediments deposited by the tides.

The tide can rise as much as four feet here. During spring tides (the highest tides of each month, which occur when the moon is new and full), the water can flood over the boardwalk. As long as they don't mind having "wet feet," a wide variety of plants flourish here. The dominant ground—cover in the preserve is skunk cabbage. This plant, which grows as tall as two feet, is the first green thing to appear in the early spring. In fact, because skunk cabbage actually generates heat as it grows, you can see this plant pushing its way up through the snow in March. Another easily seen plant in the swamp is arrowhead, with distinctive flowers composed of three round white petals around a yellow center, growing in and along the streambed; when the tide is in, just the arrow-shaped leaves are visible, floating on the water. Arrowhead is also known as swamp potato, because the Native Americans dug up and ate the tuberous root. The most common tree in the preserve is the swamp white oak; other trees to look for include basswood and black ash.