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Ridge Riches

(Click on images to enlarge, click again to zoom.) Our timing was good. Driving through the fringe of the city limits in the dark of pre-dawn is sometimes a harrowing experience. Drivers tail-gating, anxious to pass at the first opportunity, or in many cases, making their own (dangerous) opportunity. They either love their jobs so much they just can’t wait to get there, or they overslept again. We suspect the latter. On… Read More

Category: Birds, Fauna, Flora, Florida, Insects, Photography Tags: arbuckle tract, bachman's sparrow, blackroot, eastern cottontail, elliot's milkpea, grass-leaved ladies' tresses, grassleaf lettuce, lake wales ridge state forest, palamedes swallowtail, pinebarren aster, pricklypear, red saddlebags, roserush, white-eyed vireo, whitemouth dayflower

The Ridge (3)

Header Image: Great Crested Flycatcher We had been spotted by a gang and were soon surrounded. Either side of the path was covered with dense Saw Palmetto as far as the eye could see. Our only choice was to forge ahead and hope we would not be assaulted. Late summer in Florida. Some of our smaller avian citizens begin to form in mixed groups as they prepare for long migratory flights to… Read More

Category: Birds, Flora, Florida, Insects, Photography Tags: arbuckle tract, blackroot, blue dasher, blue-gray gnatcatcher, great crested flycatcher, lake wales ridge state forest, peelbark st. john's wort, pricklypear, sandweed, shrubby false buttonweed

“Then it doesn’t much matter which way you go.”*

Header Image: Gulf Fritillary (Agraulis vanillae) on Brazilian Vervain (Verbena brasiliensis) Sweet, tart and juicy slices of tangerine were refreshing as we rested on the shore of the lake a couple of hours after sunrise. We had already seen a lot. New bird babies, morning flowers in bloom, ducks flying overhead and now that the dew was drying from the grass, insects were beginning their day. Earlier, we entered the Tenoroc Public… Read More

Category: Birds, Flora, Florida, Insects, Photography Tags: bald eagle, brazilian vervain, carpenter bee, eastern amberwing, eastern towhee, gulf fritillary, indian blanket, lantana, man-of-the-earth, osprey, pricklypear, red saddlebags, showy rattlebox, tenoroc public use area, water moccasin, wild bushbean, xylocopa

Sweet Spring

Header Image: Pricklypear In Bloom “As age comes on, one source of enjoyment after another is closed, but nature’s sources never fail.” – John Muir “Where would you like to go?” “Out.” The morning air was cool and Gini almost wished she had worn that sweatshirt. Almost. As it always does, the sun rapidly rose above the line of cypress trees on the eastern side of the small lake. Residents of this… Read More

Category: Birds, Flora, Florida, Insects, Photography Tags: cedar waxwing, clasping venus' looking-glass, fungus, heartwing dock, osprey, pileated woodpecker, pricklypear, salt marsh moth larva, spring

Our Natural Places

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