[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Coddle Creek Reservoirs - a.k.a. Lake Don T. Howell



"Just one question for local Charlotte folks: Who on earth was Don T
Howell and why do we have to suffer his name (with its middle initial)
on a lovely lake which already had a perfectly pleasant and very homey
name: Coddle Creek?"

Politics, my dear Shantanu (if I may be so familiar).  Simply arcane
politics. And please don't feel left out if you do not understand
American politics - especially SOUTHERN American politics.  None of us
sane and honest folk do. <G>  As for who DTH is/was... I'll have to
leave that for someone else to answer.

Actually, the "lake" is a reservoir created in the early nineties by the
construction of the dam that you can see from Hwy 73 (Davidson Hwy) just
E of Macedonia Ch. Rd.  The reservoir is a municipal/industrial
water-source swelling of the previously lazy Coddle Creek, and was
called Coddle Creek Reservoir.

Cheers!
Tomm "the quinquagenarian thespian" Lorenzin
Mooresville (Lake Norman), NC
skytomm(at)1000plus.com

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 Life is a moderately good play
 with a badly written third act. 

     ~Truman Capote 

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
visit me @ http://www.1000plus.com/Cataract/ 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu 
> [mailto:carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu] On Behalf Of 
> Shantanu Phukan
> Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 21:19
> To: carolinabirds@duke.edu
> Cc: gyrrlfalcon@hotmail.com
> Subject: Charlotte birding results
> 
> 
> Dear Carolina (and especially Charlotte) birders:
> 
> Besides all of you who responded about Charlotte birding 
> sites I also have INS to thank for getting me out of the 
> house for a great day of birding which yielded 8 year and two 
> state birds. And any day that yields two state birds is just fine.
> 
> Recently I discovered (just as I was getting ready to plan my 
> India trip) that my Alien Registration card was in need of 
> its 10 year renewal and that the only INS center in the 
> entire state was in Charlotte. Now, a visit to the 
> Immigration is never an occasion for joy, but this was as 
> close to a joyful visit to the INS as I have ever come. The 
> secret: combine it with birding. Hence my query yesterday.
> 
> I zoomed out of the house at 5 this morning and hit Lake Don 
> T. Howell just as the sun was trying to warm the thin crust 
> of ice that had the lake in its grips. I was first in pain 
> and then gradually benumbed as I tried focussing on the 
> waterfowl, but the GW Teals and Ruddies seemed to be having a 
> ball. The great find, however, was this incredible patch of 
> brambles by a farm field at the north end of the lake. I have 
> never seen a White Crowned Sparrow in N Carolina and was 
> thinking that when I do finally see one it will be just 
> that--a lone individual mixed in with a flock of White 
> Throateds. But no, this patch was bursting at the seams with 
> them--all ages and all sexes. In fact, just as I was 
> beginning to be sure that Song Sparrows are THE most numerous 
> bird around here in the winter along came this battalion of 
> White Crowneds and wiped out any such notion. There must have 
> been at least 20 White Crowneds that I counted (and probably 
> many more in the brush). For once the Songs were outnumbered. 
> And the more I pished the more the brambles spewed forth a 
> constant stream of White Throateds. I know that people see 
> White Throateds in the piedmont but aren't they a relative rarity?
> 
> Then to INS, which was miraculously swift. So swift, in fact, 
> that I emerged in a shock and stumbled over to Mc Dowell 
> Prairie. It was really great to see an emerging grassland and 
> I talked to the rangers there who showed me a little pond 
> they have created (besides the one already there). It was a 
> great, isolated little pond that I imagine will throb to the 
> songs of spring peepers in just a few months. Obviously the 
> rangers are very busy cutting down the dense hardwood forest 
> and opening up the landscape here. I would love to return in 
> about three years and see the grassland. There were hundreds 
> of Savannah Sparrows here, but the prize for me was a Vesper 
> Sparrow which I have also never seen in N carolina. It sat 
> and posed and showed me every field mark on itself. This 
> brings my N Carolina total to 240. I am creeping up on my 
> California state list which will soon be dethroned. Watch out 
> Golden State.
> 
> Thanks to all who responded. Judy, I have a suggestion. The 
> Macedonia Church Road access to lake Don Howell is no longer 
> as it is described in the website. In fact the Road does not 
> even have a sign on it. From Davidson Highway (exit 55 off of 
> I-85) you have to make a right onto something called Gateway 
> Drive (which is an entrance to a bleak Industrial Park being
> planned) and then an immediate left onto a little unnamed 
> road (which is Macedonia Church Road).
> 
> Just one question for local Charlotte folks: Who on earth was 
> Don T Howell and why do we have to suffer his name (with its 
> middle initial) on a lovely lake which already had a 
> perfectly pleasant and very homey name: Coddle Creek?
> 
> Shantanu Phukan
> 
> 
>  
>