Turtles and Floods Return

The rain started about 5 AM this Monday morning - a good hard freshet, strong gusting wind, thunder and lightning, about an inch of rain in about an hour. Then all morning a long, soaking, gentle additional inch before lunch. At 7 in the evening I went to the Woods to see what the storm had brought.
Entering by the SW gate the trail was not flooded under the big bur oaks; but the flood had risen to 10 meters north of the trail junction. I set out with knee boots walking east along the South Boundary Trail and then heading north to the Two Friends Trail and up over the W Dune trail. The South Boundary trail was flooded just ankle deep; but on the north side of the dune, the Main SW trail was flooded 2/3 to 3/4 of the way to the top of my boots. The Woods there are getting a good long deep drink, enough to fill all the interstitial fissures and spaces below the big ash trees. I sloshed carefully down to the beaver dam and found that the water was flowing out. It had been since about noon that the rain had stopped. Heading north up around the west side of the Tree Loop and down to Island Crossing, I was delighted to see a nice 18 inch-long snapping turtle waiting quietly in the flowing 4- inch deep flowing water. It may have been two years or more since I last saw a snapper in the Woods.
Returning west the East Pond had risen to 2.36 feet deep and the NW Pond was full at 2.50 feet and flooding south into the cattail swamp. I left at 8 with darkness coming on.