enlarge Courtesy Scarborough Historical Society

One of the essential tools for gathering hay from the Scarborough Marsh was a bog show.

enlarge Courtesy Scarborough Historical Society

A sluiceway gate.

enlarge 2002 Press Herald file

The Scarborough Marsh is a place of beauty that once was a place of business, as well.

Snowshoes for horses?

If you were cutting "salt hay" on Scarborough Marsh centuries ago, your horses would have had something similar on their feet.

"Bog shoes" were basically boards affixed to a horse's hoof to stop the animal from sinking into the muck while out on the marsh. Some 17 varieties of marsh grass or "salt hay" grow and were once harvested on Scarborough Marsh.

You can view an old bog shoe and pose questions about local traditions here to members of the Scarborough Historical Society on Snowy Egret Day this Saturday.

Maine Audubon and the Friends of Scarborough Marsh organize this annual event, sometimes referred to as "Marsh Day." Early morning canoe tours, guided bird walks, a used book sale and nature crafts for children are among some of the day's events.

"Marshland is considered very fertile land," said Bruce Thurlow, historical society member and board member of Friends of the Scarborough Marsh. "It's second in the world only to the rain forest. Early agricultural reports state that an acre of marshland was as good as 3 acres of other land."

Cleared, fertile pasture with hay ready for the taking was like a dream come true for early Europeans, who went to work harvesting the native marsh grasses to feed their livestock.

The animals liked the salty flavor of the grass, and it was widely believed at the time that the salt provided extra nutrition to the hay. But many say the nutritional value of the hay was overrated, stating that animals simply prefer salty fodder, similar to their being drawn to a salt lick.

In the 19th century, Scarborough salt hay was exported to Portland and Boston.

"Settlers owned marsh lots much as later-day individuals owned woodlots," said Becky Delaware, historical society member. "Owners often rented marsh lots; people as far away as Gorham and Westbrook would come and hay sections for the grass."

Before Europeans, Sokokis Indians took advantage of the abundance of the area. They fished, dug clams, hunted and trapped at Scarborough Marsh, which, at 3,100 acres, is Maine's largest salt marsh.

The first Europeans arrived here in the 1600s. They soon altered the land to suit their needs. Much of the Scarborough Marsh was drained with ditches, or sections were dammed with elaborate dikes and sluice gates to facilitate the production and harvesting of salt hay.

"They learned this from their homelands in Europe," said Thurlow of the early dike builders. "They used oak logs as dams and put in gates or sluiceways to keep the incoming seawater out, as well as to allow for draining rainfall from the area."

The remnants of "staddles" – elevated wooden structures where early farmers piled their hay to dry so it would not be washed out with the tides – can still be seen in some areas. Sites of staddles include the area behind the Clam Bake restaurant and near the Scarborough Marsh Audubon Center on Route 1.

According to the historical society, Robert Southgate built the first dike here in 1804, near the present-day Route 1. It was financed in part by the sale of salt hay and leasing tracts of marsh to farmers. Eventually, following the Civil War, the Southgate Dike Co., then run by Southgate's heirs, became a large-scale operation.

When the railroad came through in the late 1800s, disputes were common between dike owners and rail companies.

"Dike owners wanted to use the rail bed as one of their dike walls," said Thurlow. "But the railroad didn't want any part of it."

The old rail line is now referred to as "The Eastern Trail" and is used as a bike path.

The glory days of haying the marsh were in the 1800s. The practice continued through the 1920s, when the automobile increasingly replaced the horse.

Residential development slowly replaced the old farmsteads; the marsh became increasingly seen as an area to protect and conserve. Until about 25 years ago,...