The view from my beach chair - Skywatch Friday

Hubby and I try and head to the beach at least once a month if not more depending on the weather. This trip we spent most of our time in the water. It was just too hot to sit and read a book. I didn't even feel like walking 30 minutes down to the fishing pier to take pictures. Since I had my camera with me I pulled it out and snapped a few pictures to show you our view each month.

We had 2 oystercatchers feeding right in front of us for a while. They hung out along the water's edge. I took this from the beach chair.

I realized when I got home that I have seen this one before. He's got the TT bands on each leg. I reported him on a banding site earlier in the spring.

When I turn around in my beach chair, this is what I see. There's a small trail through these sand dunes to get to the parking area.

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Two cool birds at Kapok park

Tricolored heron coming in for a landing.

Tricolored herons sometimes act like reddish egrets. They seem to use their wings to shade the sun so they can see the fish better in the water. Or maybe he's just doing his eagle imitation.

Off he goes giving me a look as he flies by.

As I wandered around under the big trees, I looked up and saw this big thing staring at me.  I don't see many red tailed hawks. We get a lot of red shouldered hawks.

As I crept around the big tree, he was watching my every move. I wandered off down the path but kept my eye on him for a while. He never moved. It was starting to get dark so maybe that was his sleeping spot.

Birds and dragonflies at Kapok Park

Female anhinga stretching out. I love it when they do this. I guess that's why they are also called the "snakebird". Anhinga is just a brazilian word for snake bird.

Juvenile blue heron's got a scratch. It's got just a little bit of white feathers left. Soon it will be all blue and look like the one below.

Adult blue heron. It could be the parent of the one above.

"Just me and my shadow." sings the dragonfly.

Pretty red one.

I am not a dragonfly expert. Most of the time they all look alike to me. There are hundreds of different species and my head would explode trying to learn them, work full time and take pictures of birds. I admire people who can learn them all. But they are so pretty. And when there's not a lot of birds around in the hottest months of the year, there's tons of dragonflies to try and take pictures of. I took another trip to Kapok Park after work recently. It's a challenge to find unusual birds this time of year. All of the babies have grown up and it's still a little too early for fall migration. I'm not sure if that juvenile blue heron is the same one I keep seeing there. I've only seen one. His feathers keep getting bluer and bluer each time I'm there. Soon I won't be able to tell him apart from the other adults.

Check out more birds at

In memory of Klaus Peter.

I'm preempting my usual post about nature to talk about one of the most beloved bird photographers in central Florida. I did not know Klaus well. I met him in December of 2009 at my first Florida Outdoors flickr meet up at Circle B Bar Reserve. I had been following his pictures long before I met him.  Later, I would run into him on my trips to Circle B Bar Reserve and Gatorland and he was always so friendly talking about what he had seen out on the trails. He died recently of an illness. I don't think our meetups will be the same without him.

I spent a morning walking the trails with him in December.  Below was my post on the walk.

Post on my walk with klaus

Below is his blog. You can see his amazing pictures here.

Klaus's website.

Below is a picture of Klaus (on the left) with a friend at Circle B Bar Reserve in Lakeland Florida.

Pretty flowers and a cute little snake

Where did all the birds go????  I headed out to the Florida Botanical Gardens in Largo for a long walk on a recent hot Saturday morning. The rain was coming later in the day. The only birds I saw there were mockingbirds and moorhens. Did all the birds fly north for the summer?  Don't they know it's hotter up there than it is down here?  There were some beautiful flowers there so I was glad I brought my small lens along. I changed lens for the morning since I didn't need my 500mm. I wished I had also brought my close up filters to use. It was really to hot to focus on getting some macro shots though. I had to keep moving. If I stopped for more than 30 seconds I felt like I was going to pass out. My last stop was the car before stepping over the little black snake on the trail back.

Almost night in the backyard - Skywatch Friday

Right before it got dark, I peaked out the window and saw this night heron sitting on our dock. He's been hanging around the channel a lot lately but this was the first time I've seen him not hiding underneath someone's dock.

One of the frogs living in our shutters. I wonder if he's a young one. He's prettier than the other ones I've seen. I love his little round fingers.

The clouds were moving out just as the sun was going down. Story of our lives. It rains all day and just as it's about to get dark, the clouds leave and the sun peaks out.

Another night in paradise.

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Big red dancing

"I'm going to have a nice quiet morning fishing all by myself."

"Uh Oh, here comes some photographers."

"I better start doing my dance so they can get good pictures."

"I'll make this a good one and then maybe they'll all leave so I can eat in peace."

"They're still here? I'm leaving."

If you want to know where to find bird photographers, head to Fort Desoto beach on a sunny morning and look for the reddish egret. I was there on a recent Sunday morning and was walking around looking for something to snap and was thinking I was the only one there. I walked around the corner and saw a group of people all knee deep in water and mosquitoes. There's a handful of reddish egrets that hang out at the beach. Most people call them "Big red". They are not a common bird here in the Tampa bay area. I think Fort Desoto is probably the only place I've seen them. They are the most active bird when feeding. They run back and forth stalking the fish. They raise their wings to shade the water so they can see the fish better. From a distance, it's looks like they are doing a dance. Or maybe a drunken stagger depending on how comical they get. They are fun to watch and are fairly tolerate of the crowd watching them. Luckily I had taken a handful of shots before a kid went running up to it and scared it off. Talk about pissing off a group of photographers. What can you do, it's a public park.