Animals at Chesnut Park

This squirrel was taking a nap in the sun. He didn't move when I walked by but eventually he left when more people came by.

The only shot of a deer far off in the woods. I stood there for at least 15 minutes hoping they would wander closer to the boardwalk. Just as they were about to hit a clear spot in the woods a bunch of loud people came walking by and spooked the deer and off they went deeper in the woods.

I think this is a yellow rumped warbler.

Male cardinal sitting pretty. They love to pose.

Pileated woodpecker.

I try and get out fairly early in the morning. I hit Chesnut Park around 8:30 am. I know that's late by most birder standards but I need my sleep. It was a little cool out (cool for us Floridians anyway) and there really wasn't too many people out. I try and walk quietly so I can hear the birds calling. I don't know any of the tiny birds by sound but at least I know they are there and where to look for them. I know the bigger bird sounds such as red bellied woodpeckers, pileateds, hawks, cardinals and herons (I love the way great blue herons honk when they fly off). I hear some little peeps high in the trees and quietly wait for them to get close. Just as a raise my camera and try and get a shot, here come a bunch of loud walkers. The ones in the back want the ones in the front to hear what they are saying. Off flies the little birdies before I get a shot.  Later down the boardwalk it happens again only this time its a group of nordic walkers banging their walking sticks loudly on the boardwalk. Or better, someone walks by with their barking dog when there are large signs that say "No dogs on the boardwalk." I do love Chesnut Park. It has a lot of great wildlife for such a busy park. It's the only place close to my house where I can see deer and not get shot at. But it can really challange a photographer's patience.

Sunrise birds at Circle B Bar Reserve

Just before the sun came up, birds were flying everywhere.

Limpkin in the early morning light.

There's plenty of woodpeckers everywhere.

My only eagle sightings of the day were from far away.

This was the most photographed bird of the day. He must have sat in the same spot all morning as all of the photographers walked down the trail. Everyone at the photo walk that morning got the same shots.

Fish crows doing a blast off.

Pretty flowers everywhere.

All of the above where taken on my photo meetup walk at the beginning of November. There wasn't much bird activity out that day. After the exciting sunrise, we walked the trails and saw very little in the way of unusual birds. Everyone got excited seeing the red shouldered hawk and started snapping away. We saw several eagles from far away. At one point, two eagles were chasing each other high in the sky. It was cool to watch but then we were like "Did anybody get any pictures of that?" It happened so quick nobody got a shot. Things are picking up at the reserve. The yellow flowers are out in full force and a few migrating ducks have arrived.  More on those later.

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Boyd Hill on a beautiful day

There's always an anhinga sitting in this spot.

Life imitating art.

Snowy egret flying in.

Another eastern phoebe.

Based on the short bill, I'm going with a Downy Woodpecker.

Boyd Hill Nature Preserve was pretty quiet on a recent Saturday morning. The few migrating birds I saw were high up in the trees and I couldn't get any shots of them. The eastern phoebe was the only one to get a little lower and sit for a portrait. I was a little disappointed  that I didn't see any raccoons, otters or alligators there. I know there are tons of them that live there but they were being scarce that morning. It was a little bit cooler and very windy. I left the house with a jacket on but had it off after my first 30 minutes there. The weather here has been perfect. Anywhere from 70 - 80 degrees and a cool wind blowing. I love this time of year. When it's sunny and 70. Sorry all you folks up north already getting snow. It's time for a visit down south.

Nothing new at Circle B Bar Reserve

Black bellied whistling ducks says "Oh no, here come the photographers".

"Get my good side".

Red bellied woodpecker says "I'll stop for 4 seconds so you can take the picture. Then I'm back to banging on this dead tree."

Great blue herons says "I caught one this big."

Red shoulder hawk says "I'd be king of the jungle here if it wasn't for that annoying eagle."

Circle B Bar Reserve in Lakeland was calling my name. I hadn't been there since mid-May. It was still miserably hot there at the end of September but I had heard there baby limpkins there. There's no better reason than that to drive 50 minutes across central Florida. The reserve was pretty quiet. It's still a little early for many of the fall birds so there wasn't too many photographers out there. I didn't see the eagles flying around. I saw very few small migraters such as warblers. But, I did find the baby limpkins. They were so cute! More on those later.

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  Our World Tuesday

A Sunday in the backyard - Skywatch Friday

A hawk was sitting on my neighbor's sailboat in the morning.

Blue jay screaming at the hawk.

Blue-gray gnatcatcher sitting in the grapefruit tree. It's the first time I've seen a blue-gray in our backyard. I think he was watching the blue jay at the top of the tree.

Later, as the clouds moved in I noticed the downy woodpecker on the same (almost dead) grapefruit tree.

Another downy picture.

The resident osprey showed up later with a fish.

Creepy clouds moving in right before the sun went down.

Our grapefruit tree is going to have to go soon. It's about 75% dead. It covers around 25% of our backyard and has been there since the house was build back in the 60's. It's been great for shading part of the house and I'm going to miss it (except for picking up rotten grapefruit for half the year). I don't know what I want to replace it with. Something that's already half grown so we can get some shade fairly soon. We don't want another fruit tree since it's just too much work to pick up the fruit. Our soil is sandy and the tree would sit in between our house and the seawall. It would get lots of sun. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

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Wild things at the zoo

First thing I saw at the zoo was a red bellied woodpecker. It was right at opening and no one else was around. The trees were full of them. Later when I was leaving I noticed they were all gone.

The zoo was full of these yellow flowers, which were full of bees.

Another late bloomer.  The above baby moorhen was swimming around the gibbon exhibit.

More butterfly art.

Yes, that's a gibbon holding on to the wing of an ibis. I was standing there looking at the baby moorhen when I heard a screaming from a bird. I looked over and the gibbon had grabbed the ibis by the wing when the ibis had wandered to close to the edge. I guess the gibbon thought it would be fun to play with. It was the mother gibbon who grabbed it. The baby gibbon was standing to the left of her.

The ibis started to peck at the gibbon with it's beak. The gibbon let go and was holding a handful of white feathers. I was about ready to jump in the pool to save the ibis (I'm sure the zoo would have loved that).

The captured ibis flew over to the wall once it was released. It seemed to be okay, just missing a few feathers.

On a recent weekend I was on call for work and needed to stay close to home. Since the zoo is only 15 minutes away I ran in for an hour. I hadn't been in several months. The last time I was there the baby spoonbills had left the nest and all I saw were a bunch of empty nests over the alligator exhibit. They won't be back until January or February. It was a pretty quiet morning. The biggest excitement was when the gibbon grabbed the ibis. Everyone was watching. I didn't have the exposure correct on those pictures. I was focusing on the baby moorhen which was swimming in the shadows but when I heard the screaming from the bird I looked over and snapped a couple of pictures really quickly.  The manatee hospital had two newly injured manatees that had arrived. Both were injured from boat strikes. They were in the back pool being fed.

Backyard birds

At 6:30 on a weekend morning I hear a bang, bang bang several times on something outside. It woke up hubby and myself. Hubby says half asleep "What was that?" I said "It sound like a woodpeck trying to drill on the metal drainpipe." He said "No way". I got out of bed and peaked out the window. Sitting on a branch, staring at the drainpipe was a downy woodpecker. I went and got my camera and took a couple of shots throught the bedroom window. He must have tried to bang on the drainpipe and realized it was metal.

Our neighborhood dove was trying to take a bath in our dried up boat cover. When it rains we get a little puddle in the front of the cover. For several days we've had doves taking baths there but then it dried up. I told hubby to run outside and spray the boat cover with the hose so the dove could get wet. He said "I'm not getting up off the couch to spray the hose so a dove can take a bath." I guess a trip to Home Depot for a real birdbath is in our near future.

A family of house sparrows has been hanging our the boat dock. I wonder if these were the same ones that were born here earlier this spring here.

 

All of the above pictures where taken through the bedroom window. If I walk outside the house sparrows fly off and hide in my neighbor's bushes. They do that when a hawk stops by as well. I'm still waiting for hubby to build me a nice air conditioned blind to put in the backyard.

Kapok Park after work

Red winged blackbird yelling at me to get off his boardwalk.

Juvenile blue heron. He must be getting close to hitting that one year mark. Blue herons are born all white then over the course of their first year they change to blue.

Red bellied woodpecker getting a snack.

I was leaving and it was just starting to get dark. There's a deep ditch close by the small parking area. I heard the limpkin calling before I saw him. It was dark down in the ditch so I turned my flash on and took the below picture. I realized the ditch was full of snails. There were 3 limpkins in the ditch having a feast. This was right before the heavy rains started so the water in the ditch was pretty low.

One of the million dragonfly pictures that I will take. When birding gets slow in the heat of the summer I start shooting dragonflies.

One of the normal sights I see on my drive home. Osprey sitting on the light post. A couple of weekends ago, hubby and I were on our way back from the beach and counted 28 osprey sitting on lightposts on the big bridge across the Tampa bay. That broke the record of 22 from several summers ago.

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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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