The Birds Are Happy

Another beautiful day at J. Strom Thurmond COE.  It’s funny, but we’re finding we look forward to working, and we’re not even getting paid for it.  Volunteering has its own rewards, like personal satisfaction for a job well done.  Plus, we made birds happy.

We got our pickup truck, supplies and headed out. 

Yep, another day of sign washing and maintenance.  We like doing it, really.  We get out in the fresh air, see interesting sites, places and wildlife.  At the Thurmond Dam, we cleaned signs near one of the turbine rotors on display.  Water from the dam turns these rotors and generates clean, renewable electricity.

Some signs need their mounting bolts tightened up.  Others need to have the shrubs and trees growing near them pruned back.  Doesn’t do any good to clean a sign and have it hidden by brush.

Sadly, we found many signs that had been used as targets, this one only had one large hole in it, but a few were totally destroyed.  What causes people to vandalize things like this?

After five hours of scrubbing, pruning and polishing, we estimate we’ve cleaned about one quarter of the signs around here.  Thurmond COE Recreation Area is huge!

Now the birds are happy with all the clean signs, after all they like using clean bathrooms just like people do.  ;c)

Next job is back out in the woods, walking boundary lines and pin hunting.  Should be fun, we’re going out with Ranger Pepper, who is the best pin hunter here.  Hopefully, we’ll learn her secrets.

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