Backyard birds - hawks and an osprey

Two weekends ago I was driving into my driveway right before dark when I saw the above hawk flying into a tree on the side of my house. I ran into the house and got my camera. I walked right up to the tree and took this picture. This juvenile has really gotten used to people. It just stared at me.

When the juvenile hawk flew off, it past the above red tailed hawk flying by. The red tailed landed on a light post a couple of houses down. It only stayed for a few seconds before taking off. This is the first time I've seen a red tailed hawk in our neighborhood. We have tons of red shouldered hawks around.

The next morning the resident osprey was on our neighbor's sailboat mast eating a fish. It was too nice of a morning not to go out a take a few pictures.

The osprey decided it didn't want me around for breakfast so it took off down the channel.

As I was going back in the house the juvenile hawk flew into our grapefruit tree in the backyard. It hung out there a while before taking off.

Birds and other things at Circle B Bar Reserve

My first bittern. Yea, I scratched this one off my list. But really, these pictures aren't too great. It was too close to the trail and didn't move for a half hour.

The bittern finally started creeping around under the brush.

This woodpecker was screaming to have his picture taken.

Lazy limpkins hanging around the booms in the lake.

Some type of water snake that had just crawled out of the lake.

There was a raccoon family high up in a tree. My thanks to Philip (one of the semi-regulars to the park) for spotting these guys. He sees everything.

These blue winged teals were too cute. They would bob under the water at the same time.

My New Year's Eve trip to Circle B Bar Reserve in Lakeland was pretty productive. I finally saw my first bittern. It almost looks like a green heron but without the pretty colors that the green heron has. They blend in well with the dead reeds in the marsh. I might have just walked right by him if a group hadn't already been standing there watching him. It's amazing the amount of limpkins there. They were everywhere.

I am disappointed about Bubba though. One of the park's largest alligators, who lived in the main pond at the big intersection of trails, was relocated. I'm not sure if it was out of the park or a different section of the park. She was very visible in her spot and would lay right on the edge of the trail. The section was roped off and there were big warning signs not to bother the alligators but apparently some kids were seen throwing rocks at her so the park moved her. She was a little too close but I liked to see her laying there on my visits.

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Limpkins eating at Kapok Park

I seem to be lucking out on the limpkin mealtimes. I feel like I've seen more limpkins in the last month than I have in the last 2 years. There were a handful at Lettuce Lake right before Christmas. There were at least 6 at Kapok Park and on a recent trip to Circle B they were everywhere. Was this past spring a banner year for limpkin babies? I have never seen one. Limpkins eat apple snails and freshwater mussels. They will also eat insects, worms and frogs if their main diet is scarce. There was a group of white ibis hanging around the limpkins. I think they were hoping the limpkins would drop something but they never did. I'm going to be on the lookout  for limpkin babies this spring

Kapok Park in December

"Can someone please clean up my home?" says the night heron.

Warbler

Loggerhead shrike posed in the tree.

I couldn't find this duck in my Florida Audubon app. It was a surface feeding duck. I've never seen this one before.

My first kildeer shot. There were 3 of them but they are very skittish and I couldn't get them all together.

Muscovy ducks don't get much attention. This guy was watching me for a while when I was taking pictures of the kildeer so I turned around and snapped a few of him.

A quick pre-New Year's walk around Kapok Park provided a few new birds for me. This was the first time I had seen a kildeer that close and I had never seen a loggerhead shrike at Kapok before. Still trying to figure out what type of duck that was. It was all alone feeding near a group of limpkins and ibis. There seems to be a lot of trash in the lake. The only way to clean it up would be to get a boat in there. I'm sure with cutbacks there's no one maintaining these small parks. 

Drive home from work - Skywatch Friday

The Thursday before New Year's I left work a little early and decided to stop along the Courtney Campbell Causeway before heading home to see if there were any birds hanging around. I had not been in a while because now it's dark when I leave work. Clouds had rolled in and it was just starting to get dark. There weren't too many birds around. I saw 2 groups of ducks floating out in the bay. They looked like lesser scaup. They were disappearing ducks. One minute there would be 4 or 5 ducks floating around and then there would only be 1. Lesser scaup are diving ducks which dive for their food. They kept doing it all at the same time. They are very skittish and would not get too close to the causeway. As I was leaving the access road on the causeway, I saw the above osprey sitting on a lamp post. At first he was turned facing the main road but when I stopped he turned around and looked down at me. He almost looks comical.

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

If you can call this snow.

Views from my in-laws front porch in Atlanta. Early Christmas morning my sister in Birmingham called me all excited "It's snowing here." I knew it was headed for Atlanta (isn't everyone's worse fear being snowed in at the in-laws?). It started around lunchtime. We were hanging around the house with hubby's family doing Christmasy-type things.  The women hanging around the kitchen talking, the men on the couch watching sports. By the end of the day it was pretty outside and luckily it wasn't sticking to the roads so they weren't frozen. It snowed on Sunday as well but we were able to get out and head back to warm sunny Florida on Monday morning.

Atlanta birds in the cold - My World Tuesday

Woodpecker and friend sharing the feeder.

American robins were everywhere.

Not sure what the birds are with the stripe on their wings. I don't think they are red winged blackbirds. I didn't see any red. There were some grackles mixed in.

Sparrow was waiting to get to the feeder.

Female cardinal at the feeder.

People say there are robins in Florida in the winter but I have never seen one here. I've only seen them in Atlanta. I forget about them until I visit the in-laws. On my Christmas eve walk around my in-law's neighborhood I found a handful of birds in the cold. One house had a bird feeder that had quite a few visitors. I was glad I had brought my 300mm lens with me. I almost didn't thinking it would be too cold to be outside (for me and the birds) but both myself and birds were out a good bit.

Go and check out more MyWorld images at the MyWorld Site!  http://showyourworld.blogspot.com/

Also,check out more birds at World Bird Wednesday below.