I spotted this little black snake at Mom & Dad's house on Easter. I got off a couple of shots from up above, but as I was repositioning to get a better shot than this, he disappeared. I have no idea where he went, but he must have gone there awful fast. I looked away for an instant and he was gone. So that's why you only get this shot of his head.
I spent a few hours yesterday hunting down an old watering hole we used to visit as kids, a place called Lithia Springs near Brandon, FL. But before I show you any of the pictures of the main reasons I went there, here are a couple of little pictures I shot of a black snake I saw. I heard something in the leaves, louder than a lizard, but quieter than a squirrel, so I started looking, and sure enough, there he was. He gave me the evil eyeball for a few seconds, just long enough to get a couple of shots, then he took off down behind a tree and I couldn't find him again. I'm sure he must have had a hidey-hole back there for just such an occasion.
OK, so he's not really in the grass. But "Snake In The Leaf Litter" just doesn't have the same ring to it. Usually when I see snakes in the wild, they take off in such a hurry and go so far that I can never get much of a picture, but this guy only went a little ways, and I was able to follow him and get a couple of shots. I think he's just a plain black snake, but you never can tell. Like many of the other critters I've shown you today, I spotted him along the nature trails at Hillsborough River State Park on Saturday. It was an unusually productive day for animal photography.
Here's a bit of unintended wild adventure I spotted at the Cleveland MetroParks Zoo last year. This little finch had found a snake, or perhaps the snake found him, I don't know. I came across the events already in progress, but I stuck around for a bit.
These two seemed to be in a knock-down drag-out for dear life. The bird didn't seem to know that he should try to grab the snake right behind the head, so he wound up getting nipped a couple of times.
But the bird had the advantage of flight. When things got a little hairy, he'd take off into the air! Unfortunately, it didn't go on for too long. A group of tween girls showed up, and they broke up the action. I couldn't tell if they felt sorry for the bird or the snake, or if they just didn't like true-life adventures very much. But there wasn't anything to shoot after they arrived.
I don't know what kind of snake this was, but he sure does have some nice markings. If he were a little darker and maybe a little bigger I'd think rattlesnake, but his head's not shaped right, either. I'm sure someone out there will let me know what this is exactly.
I had a chance to get out and shoot today, and I got lucky when I stumbled across this red rat snake. For some reason, he was hanging out in a tree right by a pretty popular nature trail near the beach. I don't think there was anything to eat up there, but I suspect he scared a tourist or two. I tried to grab him and pull him down out of the tree, but all I got for my trouble was a handful of red snake poop. I got a couple of decent pictures out of the encounter, though, so I guess the handful of poop was worth it. I can't think of the last time I got decent shots of a snake, they are pretty few and far between.
The very first day of hurricane season, and we get a storm. Well, the storm formed on the first day, we got hit the second day. Nothing much, really, just a bit of rain and some wind. But the wind was all coming from off-shore, which made for a particularly high tide. I made it out to the beach not long after high tide, and there was an ocean of water trying to get out of Sarasota Bay anyway it could. I got lucky and caught this unlucky snake above as he was whisked out into the gulf under a bridge. I watched him as long as I could, but he didn't make it to land. There were some surfers taking advantage of some large waves that he was headed towards, but I didn't get to see anything exciting happen.
This spit of land is usually a couple feet out of the water, even at high tide. As you can see, it's being overrun with the water. Oddly enough, most of this sand was washed up during one of the hurricanes back in 2004. It will be interesting to see how much remains after this weekend.
One of my favorite waterfront houses is this little house with the big dock on Longboat Pass. Look close and you can see that the water wasn't far from covering the dock and the porch. This is why, as much as I may like the house, I could never bring myself to live in such a place. No sirree, Bob!
Here's a pair of pictures I got Sunday. The great blue heron above has gotten a small snake for dinner. The one below has caught a large fish (with a little help from a human fisherman) and is about to swallow it whole. This makes me appreciate the can of soup I had for dinner so very much more...
Stop three was way out in the boonies at Crowley Museum & Nature Center. This was one of the places I had previously not been to. It's way out in East county by the Myakka River. It's a nice little place to go and look around, but I don't know if it's any better than the Myakka River State Park which has an entrance about a mile or so down the road from this place. And it was probably a bad time of year to go. Stifling heat and flooded trails made for a limited visit, not to mention the mosquitos. But I braved it out for a while, just to be able to show you some pictures of the creepy crawlies I found around the place. Above is a stink bug that I found hanging out on an old flower.
This little rat snake was holed up in a tree watching all the tourists climbing the observation tower. I say little, but I don't really know how much of him is curled up inside that hollow tree.
Not so creepy, but certainly crawly is this lizard. He didn't seem at all shy about posing for a few pictures. I won't tell you who's hand that is. You don't know him.
I had already pretty much written this whole weekend off due to the passing tropical storm, but I was pleasantly surprised to wake up Saturday morning to blue skies. I drove all over town hunting down things that needed their pictures taken and my last stop was sunset at South Lido Beach. Sunset was a bust, but I got a few interesting animal shots for my trouble.
This handsome fellow is a Reddish Egret. They aren't the most common of egrets, and I didn't even know they existed until I wound up with a photo of one, and it didn't look like the egret I thought it was when I photographed it. You can see the reddish color of the neck feathers, which are also rather shaggy, the pink base and dark tip on the bill, and even the blue legs that tell you what species this is. There were two of these fellows feeding in a tidal pool this evening. I don't know how to tell the sexes apart, so they may have been a pair.
This crab claw was washed up on the beach, possibly a limb lost by a victim of the on-going red tide in the area. The beach was also littered in dead fish, some of them up to two feet long. But none of them were as photogenic as this colorful little carapace.
This little sneaky snake was pretty lucky I came along when I did. As I pulled into my parking spot, I spotted a great blue heron picking at something in a puddle. Before I could tell what it was, another car scared off the heron, so I walked over and found this guy who had narrowly escaped becoming supper. He was a little shocked from the experience, lacking the energy to even run away when I tried to pick him up. He made a couple of half-hearted attempts to bite me, but he mostly just curled up around my fingers and enjoyed the sensation of still being alive after having been pecked at by a giant bird.
I took over 800 pictures today, so I'll be posting stuff throughout the week from my adventures. Stay tuned for more fun!!!
