JW: [Bulls] Island is between five and six miles long, and this section, Rudy, on the
north end maybe hasn't changed much in the sense of the trees, dead trees around us.
RM: Well, the trees have been here for a long time, but we walked out of a forest that was
beaten to pieces by Hugo.
And really when you look back in here I think you can see some of the damage - some of those
trees standing up - live oaks that aren't alive anymore.
Totally rearranged by that storm - the storm surge here was twenty-one feet, Jim - coming
up twenty-one feet with waves on the top - and leveling that forest except for what?
(JW & RM together): Palmettos!
RM: The palmettos, yeah, yeah.
They're, they're surviving, they bend a little bit better.
Although you can see down the beach here, now, that erosion is slowly but surely wearing
away the, the support for those trees and eventually they, uh, they topple down.
But if anyone wanted to know what a storm can do to a barrier island, a hurricane, this
is the perfect place to see it.
Scars still remain, and yet, you know, it's beginning to heal up.
And still the Atlantic Ocean is coming in slowly but surely, and rearranging the world,
and that never changes, does it?
It continues.
JW: I was going to say, twenty-five, perhaps thirty feet a year off the north end of this
island, (RM: Yeah.) because of erosion.
RM: That erosive force of the tides is amazing, and it's something that continues year after
year after year, day after day after day.
And this is a great place to see it, because really you see skeletons of that old forest.
This is sometimes, areas like this, are called the boneyards.
The skeletons of the trees.
And if you want to how powerful the forces at work here are, look at this live oak right
in front of us, that has been turned basically upside down.
Those are the roots (laughter) sticking out at the top where the branches are supposed
to be!
And again, the Atlantic working today, just like it was working back in September of 1989.
(JW: A ghost . . .) Not with as much force.
JW: A ghost beach.
RM: Yeah, a ghost beach, (JW: sort-of, yeah . . .) a ghost forest (JW: . . . yeah.).
Really, the the major maritime forest here, live oak, palmetto forest, has been rearranged.
Look right up here, too, now talking about just neat things, look at the, uh, sand dollars.
(JW: Oh, yes.)
The skeleton now, of that animal, since we're talking about skeletons, test it is called,
um, keyhole urchin is another name for it, waves come in slowly but surely, put sand
on it and take sand away.
Animal's been dead for a good while.
Typical animal, now, of these sandy beaches.
And just look down the way, I mean there's more and more and more.
JW: Look way down there, two, three, two three deer, a few deer out in the surf!
RM: White-tailed deer coming down to play in the surf.
I think that's a pelican riding the water behind them.
But white-tailed deer, for sure, coming off the high ground, getting down close to the
water, maybe getting a little sniff of that salty water then heading back in.
JW: In 1670, not so very far from this spot, the first settlers of South Carolina set foot
on Carolina soil.
RM: And some of the things that they saw then, we still see today.
Things change, and yet in many ways they remain the same.
And hurricanes certainly have affected this place, but nature bounces back.
I guess it's good to remind ourselves that nature isn't good, bad, right, (music comes
in) or wrong, that's just the way the world is.
And the system is a wonderful system - what a special place!
JW: It still is, even though the great maritime forest is gone, it's a great place to visit.
Thanks for coming with us to Bulls Island just northeast of Charleston, South Carolina.
And join us again, on the next NatureScene.