Patuxent Research Refuge

Author's Comments

I came here the first time by accident, looking for somewhere quiet after a week of shooting in the city, and I have been back probably a dozen times since. Patuxent does not announce itself. There is no iconic view, no postcard angle, no moment where you crest a rise and gasp. It is a working refuge, built for research rather than spectacle, and what it offers instead is time. The Cash Lake loop is where I spend most of my mornings. The blind on the lake itself is worth every minute you are willing to sit in it. Waterfowl move through on their own schedule and the longer you stay still the more the place opens up. I have watched wood ducks come in at first light and great blue herons stalk the shallows while the mist still hung on the water. A 300mm lens is the minimum. Longer is better. Spring and fall are the seasons, and golden hour is the hour, but what I really come for is the quiet. The refuge sits not far from the Baltimore-Washington corridor and yet once you are a half mile down any of the trails the traffic disappears entirely. The hardwood forest in late October goes a deep, muted copper that does not photograph like Shenandoah and is not trying to. The wetlands hold light differently in different weeks. You learn the place by returning to it. This is not a location I would send someone on a single visit expecting to come home with a portfolio image. It is a place to build a relationship with. The photographs come slowly, and they are the better for it.

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