STA2 and Fish Eating Creek

I went down to Labelle to spend the weekend with David. He had to work on Saturday morning, so Wes was kind enough to invite me along on the STA2 trip to see the Flamingos. The pix of the Flamingos came out terrible (bad lighting and they were really far away) but at least you can tell they are really Flamingos, unlike the last time when they were little pink dots in a rain storm! On Sunday I got to go to work with David at Fish Eating Creek. It was an adventure, and I thought for a minute I was gonna be alligator bait, but as I told David, being alligator bait with him is still better than being anything without him. Here's the pix.

 Me and Wes getting ready for the Flamingo trip.

I have seen more dragonflies this year than I ever remember seeing before.

They were just everywhere.

I didn't even try to guess how many or what species were out there.

My first shot of a flamingo in flight. Look at how crazy long that neck is!

Here are 2 coming in for a landing.

There were also a whole mess of white pelicans out there.

At one point the dragonflies were resting and there was one on almost every stick. I don't have a wide angle lens, but trust me, there were way more than this.

More shots of the flamings.

 More flamingos

To quote the Violent Femmes: You're like a flamingo, baby, hatched from an egg...

 ...you lift your leg up so delicately over the sea...

and when it comes down, it comes down on me...

Yeah, you're like a flamingo, baby....

Or, to quote Manfred Man from the song, "Pretty Flamingo, "Out of reach, and out of site!"  Maybe they will be closer to shore next time!

 Today, we got up at 4 am to head out to Fish Eating Creek on a swamp buggy.  The sunrise was amazing.

The trees popping up through the fog looked like Brigadoon.

Just too pretty.

When the colors started showing up, it was even prettier.

I didn't play with the color on these at all - this is what Fish Eating Creek looks like at dawn.

It was cool when we started, but once the sun came up the fog burned off quickly.

One last one of the fog and sunrise.

Make sure you click to enlarge this one - it was amazing. There was dew all over these plants, and it looked like they all had those little sparkly white christmas lights on them.

We picked up a hitchhiker on the swamp buggy. I took his picture for posterity, then let him go back to play with his little spidery friends. Not sure of the species.

A little raccoon came out to say Hi to us.

I totally thought I was taking a picture of spiders, but when I downloaded it, I realized that it's just a milkweed type of thingy.

 As always, my favorite siting of the day.

The spider webs all looked like they had left their christmas lights on too. I don't think anyone was home in any of these pictures, but the webs were so pretty and sparkly.

 Click to enlarge, you can see all the individual drops of dew that make it look like lights.

One last spider web.

Alligators... so very many alligators. We got the swamp buggy stuck in the mud at about a 45 degree angle, with my side being the one closest to the ground. David wasn't worrried, but I thought for sure I was going to be alligator food. I think the reason David wasn't worried is because he knows he can outrun me. But, a nice guy from FWC came and got us unstuck. Sorry Mr. Gator, no DeeTreats for you today!

And finally, I took this picture for my friend Amy. In case you ever wondered why they are called Cattle Egrets. They really do hang out together!