Springer's, Savannas, and Spungs of Shamong, a PBX Hike

Teegate

Administrator
Site Administrator
Sep 17, 2002
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All,

Back on November 26 all the members of PBX received the below email from Bob outlining our next PBX outing that I designed. I wanted to visit area's of Wharton that very few people know about, and as we found out today, that is true except for hunters.

Boys, you have do yer Christmas Shopping over the next two weekends if you want to make this trip! When she reminds you that you promised to take her to her mothers on the 18th, pretend like you don’t know what the hell she’s talking about!

Because on Saturday, December 18th, we are going to hit the woods and swamps once again, in order to explore the day away. The title of this trip is…. “Springer's, Savannas, and Spungs of Shamong”. That name is very telling boys, because we’ll be visiting them all. We’ll be just east of route 206 in Shamong Township. Read ‘em an weep boys if you can’t make it, cause we are ending at the Pic, and by God, any man that makes it all the way will just have to get a cold one! It ‘taint overly long boys, less than 5 mile. So if you’re willing, and it don’t snow a foot, and your old lady don’t care, then meet us at the Picca-Lilli Inn at 8:45am on Saturday, the 18th of December. Give me a shout via email if you can make it.
Happy Trails boys….!


So after being told by the good folks at the Pic where to park, we met there this morning as planned. Then off to the start of our hike much further north in wine country off of 206. We soon were traveling in very old bogs which we did for most of the day.


Bog bank.

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The boys checking out animal tracks in the snow.


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One of the many frozen meadows we visited.

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An old weir between the bogs.

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Close-up

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Another one.

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Mickey pondering the route ahead.

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ATVs have invaded almost every one.

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Jeff in a hole :)


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An impromptu group photo. From left to right Chris, Tom, Mickey, Bob in the distance, and Jeff.

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And we visited Shangri La. A wonderful meadow surrounded by cedars where we ate lunch in the sun under the canopy of the cedar trees. Notice the lack of vegitation on the bottom of the cedars. This is the result of deer feeding on the trees.

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In the middle of Shangri La there was a small icy area, and we were amazed to see that coyote have been spending quite a bit of time there. Maybe playing, or maybe fighting, and every mark you see in the snow made by them. Jeff may be placing a game camera there one day.


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A wonderful place for lunch. Warm and inviting.

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More ATV damage in a meadow.

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And we had to stone search and here was our first find. A very solid and semi large stone.


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Chris using the facilities we found. There were cock roaches on the wall.

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At one point we had to make sure we were on Wharton property, and I knew we had a small easement of about 70 feet where we legally could make it through to our destination. So we searched for the evidence to keep us where we needed to be.

The stone on one corner.

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And the stone on the other corner. This one is buried in a road and I had to poke around to find it. At this point we could see people in their yard watching us, so we had to find these to continue on without trouble.


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And just before the sun set we arrived at our final destination coming through the woods from behind it. It was time for dinner at the Pic, and Bob, Tom, Chris, and I did just that.


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As we always do at the end of a hike we all gave our opinions of the day and a rating. With 10 being the highest you can see how the day fared.


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Now, here is a photo that some of you may not want to see so if you don't want to see a dead deer DO NO CLICK ON THIS LINK! It had tried to make it through a fence and became stuck, and other animals had taken advantage of it's predicament.

Again, do not click this link if you are disturbed by dead animals.

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Now to the video's.

Here is Jeff making his way across a canal.


And this shows the aftermath of a huge tree falling in the woods.



Guy
 

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,552
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59
millville nj
www.youtube.com
thats has got to be the biggest root mass I've ever seen! Was it red maple?
That was quite the daring jump Jeff made,I have had a few nasty dumps from jumping onto wet wood,especially without the bark on it and I think I'd of chose wet feet first before attempting that.
I may be able to make the next one.have sundays off now and in a few weeks I'll have full weekends off for a few weeks.
al
 

Hewey

Piney
Mar 10, 2005
1,042
109
Pinewald, NJ
It was another great trip in the big woods of Jersey with the PBX crew. We saw some real nice areas on this trip and I got to eat at the Pic for the first time, my lips are still burning from the wings and ears!

Guy and a meadow.
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meadow and trees
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The reservoir for the bog system
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classic outhouse
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Chris
 

bobpbx

Piney
Staff member
Oct 25, 2002
14,153
4,258
Pines; Bamber area
This was a good trip. It’s neat to get out in these woods and realize it is not as cold as you think it will be, especially because the blood is pumping and the sun is shining. Get out there!

I think it’s always good to see different Pine Barren topography on our excursions, and this one was different than what we are used to. More deciduous forest in this one. Here is Jeff with a white oak in the lowland. There were many trees double this size.
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A cat tail explosion courtesy of Oji.
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An area of grasses and sedges, well hidden.
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Jeff, walking through unusually high leather leaf.
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Whoops!
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Guy in the spung among the leather leaf, glad to not be shopping at a mall.
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Tom in the big spung leads the way (circa 1952…well before this trip).
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Shang-ri-La
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Your eyes do not deceive you. This is briar in the Gum swamp as far as you can see. I am going to design a naked marathon for this, though a half-mile should do it, instead of the usual 26. Talk about an ironman.
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Here is a good perspective of that mammoth blow-down. That is Chris in stark relief. This blow-down consisted of one large (but not overly) tree and several smaller ones. The big one went down and took the others with it because the roots are tangled up in the big one, and since this is a swamp, none of them go real deep.
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manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
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millville nj
www.youtube.com
I saw cedar damage by deer like that in UP michigan.the damage was up to eight ft off the ground.I thought immediately Moose but not so.the park ranger told me it was deer and thats how high the average snow pack is there in the winter and the deer were on top of the snow eating eight ft off the ground.
al
 

RednekF350

Piney
Feb 20, 2004
4,944
3,080
Pestletown, N.J.
It really tore at me to bail on this one but I opted for an ice encrusted duck hunt with my son Mike and Hank his yellow lab. We did well but had a hard time maintaining our spread with ice flows grabbing our rigs and dragging them up and down the stream with the tides.

It looks like you guys found some real treasure in an area that many would pass by and never bother to explore.
The root ball photo is amazing and the shoulder high leatherleaf is also a great one.
It's a shame I couldn't make it out that way after the hunt to share some grape but we got back late.
See you on the next one.
 

woodjin

Piney
Nov 8, 2004
4,338
326
Near Mt. Misery
A Great Hike!! One of the best!!

Here is a different perspective on the uprooted tree. The tree Bob is leaning against is the one in the previous photos, you can see there is an equally enormous uproot behind it.

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Cat tail Tom
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Who says there are no mountains in the pine barrens

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Prints:

Weasel perhaps?
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these were larger than the previous. Mink maybe?
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Creepy huh?
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This stand of button bush was kind of creepy also
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The future looks good!
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Jeff
 

Teegate

Administrator
Site Administrator
Sep 17, 2002
25,602
8,180
Nice! The root photo shows how late in the day it was. The day really went fast when the hiking is great. We have to get back to that hill one day, and there really is more things to see going in different directions than we did so we just might :)



Guy
 

manumuskin

Piney
Jul 20, 2003
8,552
2,465
59
millville nj
www.youtube.com
Jeff,
I agree,definitely weasel family,feet look right and track pattern is right.without precise measurements hard to tell what species.long and shortails should be the same measurements I believe,of course a mink would be bigger and an otter bigger yet and they have obviously webbed feet and usually tail drag and sometimes belly drag and we have no marten or fisher yet that I know of.seen a fisher once in cook foest state park in nw pa.looked right at me for maybe ten seconds and then took off.he was about 30 ft away.i didn't even know they had em till i later read they were introduced into allegheny forest 30 miles away in the 60's.
al
 
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