Florida January 2014 Part 4 - Wildlife

Before we leave Florida I have to mention wildlife. As a keen birdwatcher, I am always on the lookout for birds and other wildlife, although I must confess I had very low expectations about Florida. I didn’t even take my own binoculars, just Vivian’s small ones, because on the one hand I didn’t think there would be much to see apart from maybe an occasional alligator in the distance, and also weight was an issue with our luggage.

How wrong I was!  Superb  wildlife was everywhere, and I had the perfect companion in identifying it in Larry Beasley, our host.  On our first evening  I discovered that he also was a keen birdwatcher, and had in fact gone on expeditions to remote parts of the world such as the Peruvian Andes in pursuit of his hobby.

On our first day out, on our way to The Villages, he suddenly pulled the car over because there, on the side of the road was a group of vultures! How incredible, the nearest I had ever come to seeing vultures was observing my fellow club members at the breakfast buffet.   I had no idea there were vultures in Florida, but I was soon to discover that they were as common as crows are in the UK, doing a good job in tidying up roadkill. Once I recognised their flight pattern, I saw them in the sky virtually every time I looked up. There were two types, black vultures and turkey vultures, and they soon became so commonplace I hardly paid them any attention.

Black Vulture (not my picture)

Also on that first morning I was amazed by how common alligators are, and how close to civilization they are. Wherever there is a body of water, however small, you are likely to find alligators. There was even an alligator by a pond in the car park at Kennedy Space Center.  Later that day I was talking to Larry in his garden and I asked him how far away the nearest alligator might be. ‘About 10 yards’ was his response. They have a creek at the bottom of their garden which is likely to fill with water  after heavy rain, and it was not unknown for alligators to be found there. On the whole, they seem to present little danger to humans so long as they are left alone. Shortly before our arrival, there had been a tragedy on a nearby lake, where a group of small boys were throwing stones at an alligator, which suddenly turned and killed one of them. Local men were immediately out with their guns to kill the alligator, when the real lesson here was to teach children to keep their distance.

The manatees at Blue Springs I have already mentioned, but there were also some fantastic  A-list birds to be seen there. Birds such as the Mangrove Cuckoo, Yellow-Crowned Night Heron, Great Egret and Red-Shouldered Hawk were abundant.

                                                                                Yellow-Crowned Night Heron

Cape Canaveral turned out to be a wildlife paradise, mainly because NASA forbids any property development there, so there is mile after mile of pristine habitat, where I saw Sandhill Cranes, Anhingas, and even a Bald Eagle on its’ nest. Probably the best sighting of all was a Roseate Spoonbill which was pointed out by Larry as it flew overhead, just outside the Space center. I couldn’t believe my luck. Also, at the Space center, I worked out the difference between a Common Grackle and a Boat-Tailed Grackle. The Boat-Tailed Grackle is bigger!

                                                                                        Roseate Spoonbill

After our adventure in the wilderness (where, incidentally I saw a Pileated Woodpecker) we stopped at Lake Jessup, only to see probably a dozen or more Ospreys fishing in the lake. I have occasionally had the good fortune to see Ospreys in the UK, and it is a major sighting. But here they were everywhere, diving in and out of the water, sometimes successful, sometimes not. I felt quite privileged to be there.

                                                                                        Boat-Tailed Grackle

At Epcot, we saw White Ibises foraging for scraps around picnic tables, just like sparrows or chaffinches do at home. Looking at these magnificent birds pecking around a bench looking for crumbs, I felt like saying to them ‘Haven’t you got any pride?’

                                                                                          White Ibis at Epcot

Birdwatchers are inveterate list-makers, and Larry reckoned I would have a list of 50 birds by the end of our week in Florida. Well, I didn’t quite manage that, but I did have a list of 46, most of which I had seen for the first time ever.  If nothing else draws me back to Florida, the wildlife certainly will.