Uvalde National Fish Hatchery and Cook's Slough

Here in South Texas, west and south of San Antonio, public areas with extensive hiking trails are pretty scarce.  It is probably due to the history of private ownership of virtually all lands in Texas prior to statehood, and, hence, the absence of Federal lands.  The State has acquired public lands for state parks, and Texas has some beautiful ones, often centered around camping or fishing.  But, here in Uvalde, the opportunities for hiking seem limited.  That is why we were happy to find two natural areas within a few miles of the center of Uvalde.  Neither was large enough to support a long hike, but the two together would be a good day's outing.

On Tuesday, April 2nd, we started at Uvalde National Fish Hatchery, which is just one of the many field stations of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service whose mission is working with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats. Since 1871 the National Fish Hatchery system has been at work improving recreational fishing and restoring aquatic species that are in decline, at risk, and are important to the health of our aquatic systems. Across the country the network of National Fish Hatcheries work with states and tribes to conserve, restore and enhance the fish and aquatic resources of America for future generations.

Constructed in 1935, the Uvalde National Fish Hatchery was operated by the U.S. Department of Interior’s Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife. The original mission included the stocking of ranch ponds in southern Texas, as well as large reservoirs in New Mexico, Arizona, Oklahoma, and Kansas. Species raised at that time included largemouth bass, sunfish, and channel catfish. Historically, the hatchery has reared Florida-strain largemouth bass, Guadalupe bass, striped bass, paddle fish, Yaqui catfish, blue catfish, northern pike, walleye, Tilapia, and gar. Today the hatchery is operated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and focuses on propagation efforts to promote the recovery and or restoration of threatened and endangered species. Currently, the hatchery works with nine threatened or endangered species and raises channel catfish for recreational fishing.  Some of these include the Texas Blind Salamander, the Fountain Darter, the Comal Springs Riffle Beetle and the Peck's Cave Amphipod.  The species that interested us the most was the Comanche Springs Pupfish --

-- because we had been introduced to the Devil's Hole Pupfish, a similar species which is also endangered, when we visited Death Valley in February 2016.  The hatchery has well-defined roads and paths which circle the various ponds in which its species are nurtured, and it was easy to move from pond to pond:

The plant life proved more interesting than the fish, because the fish were hard to spot in the ponds.  Cactus have begun blooming.  The cactus below had a whole litter of buds just ready to burst into color:

There were some other animal species around, such as this herd of wary deer.  Most of the wildlife was not habituated and fled as soon as they became aware of us; this made it difficult to get good photographs.

The ponds are supplied with water by a series of streams and canals which appear to have originally served for irrigation of the land that is now the hatchery.

Less than half of the ponds are in use.  Those that are occupied are full but tend to be very shallow.  We are not sure why they are shallow, but guess that it has to do with the needs of the species being nurtured -- need for light, warmth, plant life (and bugs, hence, food), and so on.

The ponds that were not in used were overgrown with grass, brush, bushes and trees.  There was a small additional group of ponds which, while not in use, were being actively administered to reconstruct and re-equip them for use:

The hatchery boasts opportunities for birding.  While there were songbirds prevalent, the most numerous birds were waterfowl, such as these perky coots --

-- and this lone white duck:

Some "wildlife" turned out to be of the manmade variety -- probably meant to provide a harmless scare to visiting schoolchildren:

Walking along the banks of the pools, we occasionally scared turtles, who had been sunning themselves on the grassy banks.  We heard the loud splash before we had a chance to spot them swimming away frantically from us:

Historically, game fish were also hatched here, but it appeared to us that the game fish efforts were on pause, possibly due to the current drought facing most of Texas' rivers and lakes.  These hatchery tanks (as well as all the others we spotted) were dry:

We finally reached one of the pupfish ponds -- notable because they are lined with black vinyl barriers that preumably help duplicate the dark rocky environments of the springs where the pupfish reside.  However, we weren't able to spot the little critters.

We stopped for lunch at a picnic table in an area that apparently had once provided staff housing but today seemed unoccupied -- presumably because of cutback in hatchery operations.  

After lunch we worked our way back to the hatchery visitor center and drove over to our second stop, Cook's Slough Nature Park:

The park is home to thousands of migratory and nesting birds and other wildlife from fall through spring, including sandhill cranes, painted buntings, collard plovers, quail, bobcats, blue indigo snakes and softshell turtles. The 25 acre park features two miles of hiking and biking trails and eight viewing areas.  It is administered by the City of Uvalde, Texas to provide natural filtration and treatment of wastewater through a series of ponds and estuaries, an increasingly common means of handling water treatment and nurturing the environment at the same time.

The park is ringed by a dirt road that does double-duty as a hiking path around the ponds.  Paths exist between the ponds but seem to be rarely used, because they were quite overgrown and in some areas not desirable for foot travel.

Even though birding is promoted here, we did not see much bird life.  Again, it was the plant life that diverted us, including this cactus that had actually already started blooming:

Here is a closer look at one of the blooms:

We first walked out a boardwalk to a shaded observation deck that looked out over one of the ponds.  No much wildlife was evident, but it gave us a chance to get oriented in the park and decide on a route around the ponds.

Working our way around the ponds, our first wildlife encounter was these anhingas, part of a larger flock that had taken possession of a small island and its dead logs and branches in order to sun themselves, dry their wings and look for their next meal:

Here too, as at the fish hatchery, we saw the remains of irrigation canals that had served the area when previously operated as farmland:

Working our way around to the back side of the ponds, we came across another pergola.  Interestingly, it shaded nothing but a concrete pad on which might have previously rested a picnic table.  The only seat in sight was a bench with a view of the pond, but it boasted full sun.  On such a nice day, with balmy temperatures, we gladly took up the bench's offer.

There is at least one more area we'd like to hike near our campground in Uvalde: Garner State Park, which has a network of trails that appear to offer some hiking treats.  While most of the rest of our stay here this coming week will center around the Solar Eclipse and the social rituals attendant to it, we may find enough time to explore those trails.  Stay tuned!