St. Petersburg at twilight - Skywatch Friday

Sailboat lessons going on in the bay. They were just coming into the sailboat basin when we got there. I noticed later when I downloaded the pictures that there's a dolphin coming up for air in the lower left corner.

Sailboat class in front of the pier.

The new Salvador Dali museum. I haven't been since the new building opened.

The sun going down on yacht basin.

The airport across from the St. Pete Yacht Club.

Clouds across the bay.

The St. Petersburg Pier at night.

Some views of St. Petersburg, Florida, from the bay side.

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A morning with some pelicans

Goin fishing!

Gotta mouthful of fish.

Cruizin for fish.

What a headrush!

Snoozin time.

Flyby in the big city.

"Yuck, that fish gives me the burps."

Gotta itch.

Another mouthful.

One of the best things about the St. Petersburg Pier is all of the pelicans. You can buy bait fish and feed them yourself and have your picture made doing it but it's more fun to watch them dive for fish. There's always a few crashing into the water head first. The docks are full of pelicans sleeping, yawning and scratching. They live their lives in full view for everyone to watch. I saw 2 pelicans sharing a pole and kept rubbing beaks. I'm guessing they're a couple. I didn't see any real hanky pank going on but baby season is over for a while. The closer it got to lunchtime the less they were feeding and most of them were settling down for a mid-day nap.

St. Petersburg Pier

Great blue heron sitting on the sea wall.

Flowers around the pier.

Scruffy looking grackle with a green grasshopper.

Great blue with his army of white ibis.

Sailing lessons in the bay.

It's always fun to watch the kids taking sailing lessons in the bay near the pier. They follow the leader in the small boat and practice zig zagging around the area. The wind was blowing pretty hard this morning. But, it was warm air so it still felt hot. My highlight of the morning was watching the grackle trying to eat the grasshopper. I didn't see him catch it. I walked up on him with it in his mouth. It took him a while to get it in his beak correctly to swallow it down. Or, maybe he was just trying to decide whether he really wanted to eat that wiggly bug. Maybe I should have offered him some ketchup to help it go down. The best thing about the pier is all of the pelicans that hang around. More on those later.

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The St. Pete Pier - Skywatch Friday

Pelican flying in front of the Vinoy hotel.

Stretching. Notice the tangled fishing line around his leg.

Red bellied woodpecker in the parking lot.

Two loggerhead shrikes getting frisky. I was surprised to see them hanging around the pier. The couple were chasing each other around the fence near the the sailboat basin.

Loggerhead shrike sitting in the grass.

I hadn't been to the St. Petersburg pier in a while I so headed out on a recent hot Saturday morning. This was right before the non-stop rain moved in. It was sunny and hot. It was a quiet morning around the pier. Not many birds hanging around but I was excited to see the loggerhead shrikes. I didn't expect to see them in populated place right on the bay. As I was writing this I was thinking I was glad I didn't see any tangled or injured birds on this trip. Then as I made the pictures larger once they were downloaded, I noticed the pelican with the fishing line tangled around his leg. I didn't see that when I zoomed in to take the picture. I won't even start my "fishing should not be allowed on fishing piers" rant.

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Florida foliage at the Pier.

On our walk around the park at the Pier I noticed how pretty all of the flowers looked for August. I guess all of the rain has helped perk up the overheated foliage. The purple flower had a bee trying to get some pollen. He looked stuck but I'm sure he was able to get out. The bottom picture was some type of fruit hanging on a palm tree. I would assume it's not edible but the orange and green on the tree looked pretty.

Pelican taking a bath at the Pier.

We were walking back to our car from the pier and saw this pretty pelican swimming around in the water. All of a sudden it started flapping it's wings and seemed to be taking a bath. It must be a young pelican based on the pale color and lack of any wear and tear on it.

St Pete Pier - Skywatch Friday

The above picture was taken on top of the the soon-to-be torn down St. Petersburg Pier. It's over 30 years old and falling apart so the city recently voted to tear it down. No word on what will replace it yet. A storm was moving in over the oh-so-small downtown St. Pete. A few of those tall buildings are new condos that are probably more than half empty. It's fun to go hang out at the St. Pete Pier. There are lots of picture taking opportunities. I grew up visiting it as a kid with my family so I'll miss it when it's gone.

For more skyscape photography from around the world, visit http://skyley.blogspot.com/.

The inverted building at the end of the pier.

There's an outdoor restaurant on the top of the building so there's always grackles and cowbirds hanging around.

There's always lots of activity around the pier. This morning there was a sailboat class for kids.

The yacht basin has a few nice boats in it. There are usually dolphins and manatees swimming around in it but I did not see any this morning.

Baby squirrel

My friend Carrie and I were walking around the park near the St. Petersburg Pier and noticed something squirming under some overgrown mangrove trees. It looked like a baby squirrel had fallen out of the tree. It still had it's eyes closed but was moving around pretty good. There were several adult squirrels running around close to it. We decided to leave it alone and walked around for a while. We came back a little later and it was gone. We think the parents must have hauled it back in trees. There weren't any other animals around that could have gotten it. The parents were really watching us and came down close to the ground. Hopefully, the little squirrel was okay. I've never seen a baby before.

Pelicans at St. Petersburg Pier

These are just the beginnings of pelican pictures for the summer. They are such a fun bird to take pictures of. When it's really hot and all of the other birds have gone north for the summer these guys will be out diving (or begging) for fish all day. There's always a handful of pelicans hanging around the bait shop at the Pier in St. Pete. They sleep all over the pilings, railings and the top of the bait shop. In the morning they are usually pretty active flying around looking for fish. You can buy fish at the bait shop to feed them. They have a platform to stand on so you don't get attacked but it makes for great tourist photo opps.