Links to Florida videos

Here are the links to my two successful videos I took in Florida. Laughing gulls at Flamingo in Everglades National Park and a large alligator at Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6twkX9smKI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylVd9iZn7Fk

Florida Egrets and Herons

Great egret on gator back at Gatorland

Southern Florida is definitely the land of wading birds! Everywhere you look you could soon find one- flying, feeding in the median, and prodding the pools along the roads and around the motels. Here is a sampling of the many many photos I took on the trip. There was never a boring moment watching them preen, hunt, fly, call, and just be. Green herons were surprisingly not-secretive. They were plentiful and out in the open, something we rarely see around here. Black-crowned night-herons are another bird that we don't see out very often. I don't know if yellow-crowned night-herons are secretive but in Florida, they weren't. Snowy egrets were quite common as were great egrets. Cattle egrets were around, especially in the road medians. Tricolored herons seemed more common than little blue herons. Reddish egrets were in select areas. At Gatorland we enjoyed the noisy young great egrets and noisy calling and arguing snowy egrets and tricolored herons. There was only 1 cattle egret and no other herons or egrets. Nesting in the Dahoon holly bushes would be a snowy egret and tricolored heron on two levels and the great egret at the top of the bush. I highly recommend the photographers special at Gatorland, other than that I'd avoid it as I'm not much for zoos and critters piled all over each other in a non-natural setting. The only "natural" setting was the one area photographers are allowed early in the morning. It is well worth it. Enjoy!

Green heron hunting at Everglades visitor center

snowy egret at Sanibel Island

Two snowy egrets following white ibis to pick up the scraps

Reddish egret. part of its dance.

You must go to you tube and search for the reddish egret dance!

another hunting green heron

great blue heron. check out that foot!



tricolored heron hunting

black-crowned night heron

great blue heron shaking its booty!

aroused green heron while hunting

great egret

yellow crowned night heron

little blue heron hunting at Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary

noisy snowy egret

great egret with young

great egret preening

pair of tricolored heron

cattle egret watching over the gators

great blue heron after eating a fish

3 Florida Threatened and Endangered Species

Here's the list of T and E species we saw on our trip-
West Indian Manatee- Endangered
Wood Stork- Endangered
Florida Scrub Jay- Threatened 

Florida, like other unique areas overwhelmed with human development, has a long list of T and E species and more to come with the influx of non-native species such as pythons which are currently eating lots of common species such as raccoons and bobcats, and have moved on to the already endangered species like the Key deer. We enjoyed three of the special species still hanging on.

Here's a selection of the manatee photos I took. Unfortunately the water was low so they didn't get close enough for excellent views and photos. No matter, this is the primary critter I wanted to see on the trip. How exciting to finally see this unique and gentle animal! The 20 we saw were hanging out at Blue Springs State Park. We also saw three at the Big Cypress National Preserve visitor center. One of them had a large gash from a boat propeller.

The dark ones near the cormorant are juveniles. Like alligators they don't do much but hang around in the water coming up for air periodically. That's okay with me, I don't need them to jump through hoops to get their reward. Just being in their presence and observing them swim, breathe, and interact with each other was enough of a reward for me! And for the perfect photos, I bought postcards.

For more details about the manatee check out this website: http://www.fws.gov/endangered/esa-library/pdf/manatee.pdf 

Wood storks are prehistoric-looking birds. We saw several of them during our forays. We didn't get to see the largest nesting colony at the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary, although we did see one pair nesting in a tree. I noticed that they use their wings and their pink feet to stir up food. Like the other wading birds they were tolerant of human presence making photos pretty easy. Ironic, since human impacts to their habitat are what's wiping out their nesting areas.

 For details on their life go to this website- http://www.fws.gov/northflorida/Species-Accounts/Wood-stork-2005.htm

The Florida scrub jay has lost most of their scrub habitat to development. One of the places left where you can be sure to see one is Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and the road to the Canaveral National Seashore. How wonderful to be able to watch these birds interact. This one replaced another bird that was perched in the same spot. The other flew low across the road- hence the warning sign. Like other corvids they often live in family groups and juveniles assist their parents in raising the next batch of babies. We didn't see a lot of these guys but being this close to one was a treat!

 For more details check this out-
http://myfwc.com/wildlifehabitats/profiles/birds/songbirds/florida-scrub-jay/

Feeling a little perturbed over something, this one fluffed itself up and raised its head feathers.

Florida-alligators

April showers are falling here in the Puget Sound area. They really bring out the sweet cottonwood scent and brighten the greens of the newly emerged leaves. Tme for alligator ramblings.

juvenile alligator

baby alligators and turtle I haven't identified yet

I saw my first alligator the first day we were out. What a thrill to see a wild alligator! We saw young alligators and huge alligators.  We saw them everywhere we went. I saw many along the Tamiami Trail (highway 41) canal and pretty much anywhere there was enough water for them to hang out in. I didn't realize how beautiful their eyes are. There is a presence behind them.

Mostly what they do is lie in the sun, lie in the water, waiting and floating seamlessly through the water. They were never threatening but like a bison one shouldn't get to close. They can run 15mph and I can't, so caution was at the forefront of my mind.

yes that's a gator behind me. there was one to my left also.

Gatorland group waiting for wading bird chicks to fall out of nests

Reading up on these fascinating reptiles I find that they have one of the most powerful bites in the animal kingdom. These guys can stay submerged for 8 hours in very cold water; mostly it's around 10 to 20 minutes. There are now 1 million in Florida. They were protected in 1962 and alligator farms were created to provide hides and meat. I can't even imagine killing one of these noble creatures to make boots or eat for dinner.

Being carnivores they'll eat pretty much whatever they can get those powerful jaws on. Seeing their scales close up I see that many smaller ones have yellow stripes. I never realized they had color to their armor. I'm guessing the color is on young and juvenile ones.

This young one may live to be 35 to 60 years old if it's living in the Big Cypress National Preserve area. The largest alligator ever found in Florida was 17 feet 5 inches. Florida has crocodiles,too but they're found in saltwater. We looked for them near Flamingo in the Everglades National park but didn't see any. We saw lots of alligators because we were mainly wandering around freshwater. I never got tired of them. I kinda miss them. I keep expecting to see them in the ditches around here. Enjoy the Mary Oliver poem.

Alligator Poem

 I knelt down

at the edge of the water,

and if the white birds standing

in the tops of the trees whistled any warning

I didn’t understand,

I drank up to the very moment it came

crashing toward me,

its tail flailing

like a bundle of swords,

slashing the grass,

and the inside of its cradle-shaped mouth

gaping,

and rimmed with teeth—

and that’s how I almost died

of foolishness

in beautiful Florida.

But I didn’t.

I leaped aside, and fell,

and it streamed past me, crushing everything in its path

as it swept down to the water

and threw itself in,

and, in the end,

this isn’t a poem about foolishness

but about how I rose from the ground

and saw the world as if for the second time,

the way it really is.

The water, that circle of shattered glass,

healed itself with a slow whisper

and lay back

with the back-lit light of polished steel,

and the birds, in the endless waterfalls of the trees,

shook open the snowy pleats of their wings, and drifted away,

while, for a keepsake, and to steady myself,

I reached out,

I picked the wild flowers from the grass around me—

blue stars

and blood-red trumpets

on long green stems—

for hours in my trembling hands they glittered

like fire.

~ Mary Oliver