Spanish Horses & Spanish Moss

It was a splendid late morning day in early June and we were exploring the lagoons along the border of Virginia and North Carolina. The temperature was comfortably cool, the heat and stifling humidity of summer not yet a reality. There was a fine, thin layer of clouds that diffused just enough of the sun to soften the harsh shadows. The marsh grasses bowed ever so gently with the slight breeze and it was in every way a perfect morning. 

I push poled slowly along an island in the dense marsh. The water was only a foot deep so the motor was of no use. The shallow water glowed a soft yellow from the reflection of the sand on the bottom and was strangled with grass from top to bottom. Under the surface there is as much grass unseen as there is seen above it. In summer, there is but one way to travel by boat in these shallow waters, and that is slowly. Throughout the marsh are clumps of trees - high spots in this otherwise flat landscape. Live oaks and pines draped in Spanish moss conceal the shady interior of the islands. These are wild places and wild things watch you through the moss.

I see wild horses often in these wetlands, but there was one shot I have been trying to get for some time. Poling along the island, I finally found what I had been searching for for seven years - the descendants of Spanish mustangs grazing in the marsh under the Spanish moss. 

Schedule your ecotour to explore this environmental wonderland.