Thousands of American lotuses carpet the water's surface, faces turned toward the morning sun. Bright yellow warblers flit among cypress trees along a creek bank. A paddlefish jumps as a motorboat rounds a bend.
The Mobile-Tensaw Delta — a lush, vibrant and surprisingly intact over 400-square-mile (1,036-square-kilometer) expanse of cypress swamps, oxbow lakes, marshland, hardwood stands and rivers — is teeming with more aquatic species than almost anywhere in North America. It's considered one of the world's most important delta ecosystems, yet its ecological riches are only a part of the even more diverse watershed that includes much of Alabama. And the delta is the only place 77-year-old Lucy Hollings has called home.
As a kid, she swam daily across the Tensaw River, gathering a mouthful of grass to prove she’d made it to the other side. Hollings — known as “Ms. Pie” — still fishes daily for white perch and largemouth bass.
She's sole proprietor of Cloverleaf Landing, a boat launch that offers anglers from far and wide access to the river and delta. “I know I live in the most beautiful place in the world,” says Hollings, who cools off in the shade of towering sweetgum trees draped with Spanish moss and watches dazzling sunsets from her deck. “It's a piece of heaven to me.
” The delta is a critical conduit between the rest of Alabama and the Gulf of Mexico — “a dynamo" that continually exchanges energy between the river systems and the Gulf, says Bi.