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Posted by Bryant Roberts on 17:33:14 06/27/06
I spent a couple of nights camping in Everglades National Park last weekend with a run down to Key Largo to go on Larry Manfredi s pelagic trip. The birding offshore was great but on land it was a little slow so I spent a good deal of time getting reacquainted with the butterflies and dragonflies in and around the park.
It was about nine AM Friday (6/23) when I got to Lucky Hammock and it was already getting warm, a couple of Swallow-tailed Kites were patrolling very low over the weedy fields, the only other interesting bird was a Cave Swallow which briefly joined a small group of Purple Martins patrolling high over the fields. In the lee of the hammock there was a mixed swarm of juvenile dragonflies which also contained a few Wandering Gliders, my first this season. Over the puddles in the dirt road across the street there were a couple of brilliant Scarlet Skimmers among a few other puddle dragonflies.
The birding was slow at Royal Palm Hammock, no waders or aquatic birds were to be seen along Anhinga Trail just singing Common Yellowthroats and a few Pig Frogs grunting from the marsh. In the hammock a Black-whiskered Vireo was singing and there was an interesting large Dragonfly, a Prince Baskettail. There were plenty of the usual butterflies around, Large Orange Sulphurs were common and I got a good look at a Red-Banded Hairstreak.
I set up camp at Long Pine Key Campground where to my disappointment I never heard the Antillean Nighthawk that was so vocal a few weeks ago. All nighthawk activity was down since my last visit when about two dozen could be seen over the pines around sunset but this weekend only five or six could be seen at any one time. All the other usual summer birds were around: Northern Bobwhite, Brown-headed Nuthatch, Pine Warbler, Eastern Bluebird, Eastern Towhee, and Chuck-wills-widows were calling after sunset and before dawn. There were still a couple of Variegated Fritillaries in glade southwest of campground on Friday afternoon and a bike ride on the road west of gate four turned up one more as well as the best butterfly of the weekend, a Florida Duskywing. West Indian Lilacs (Tetrazygia bicolor) are still blooming and Devil s-Potato (Echites umbellata) is starting to bloom but otherwise the wildflowers in the glades and pinelands were sparse.
On the way down to Key Largo on Saturday (6/24) to meet the boat for the pelagic trip I made a stop at the Card Sound Bridge but didn t hear or see any Yellow Warblers however White-crowned Pigeons, Gray Kingbirds were seen and Prairie Warblers were singing. At Dagny Johnson Key Largo Hammock Botanical State Park I got good looks at Black-whiskered Vireos but there was no sign of Mangrove Cuckoos.
The pelagic trip produced the best birding of the weekend and Larry has already posted a detailed account so I ll keep this part brief. Once we got out past the reef we got good looks at Bridled and Sooty Terns as well as Greater, Audubon s, and Cory s Shearwaters. At the Marathon Humps Band Rumped Storm-Petrels were seen and after some time spent chumming we saw a total of three Band Rumped and two Wilson s Storm Petrels along with very close looks at Greater and Cory s Shearwaters. The highlight of the trip was getting to see the Black-capped Petrel that passed within a couple hundred yards of the boat. After the pelagic trip I headed back north, the rain started soon after I returned to the mainland and was to be a major factor for the rest of the weekend.
There was distant lightning and thunder in the southwest before dawn on Sunday (6/25), a Great Horned Owl hooted a few times east of the campground as I was getting ready to head down to Flamingo. My first stop was about a mile past Mahogany Hammock to check for Cape Sable Seaside Sparrows, two were calling west of the highway and four or five from the east side. I got a good look at one of these that was about seventy five feet off the road. The Deerflies were ferocious and after getting a good look at the sparrow I ceded the roadside to them after inflicting many casualties. At Paurotis Pond the Wood Stork rookery was still going strong, all of the young I saw had lost their head down and appeared to be almost ready to leave the rookery. Three recently fledged Eastern Kingbirds were making a lot of noise in a tree by the parking area and a parent bird was busy catching dragonflies for them.
A dark cloud was hanging over Flamingo and the rain started before I reached West Lake. This put a hold in my plan to bike down Bear Lake Road and walk down Bear Lake Trail so I spent most of the morning watching the bay from the breezeway and looking for Shiny Cowbirds around the parking area. A dozen or so Marbled Godwits stopped by the sandbar on there way west and a Reddish Egret put on a good show but the cowbirds weren t cooperating that day.
A look at the weather radar on the computer in the marina store office showed that the worst of the weather was staying within ten miles of Florida Bay and not likely to end soon so I gave up on Flamingo and headed north. The rain ended around Nine Mile Pond and on the spur road to Mahogany Hammock I met up again with a couple from Virginia who had also been looking for the cowbirds at Flamingo stopped by the road with their scope out, they had spotted a Snail Kite. While we were watching the kite flew back out over the marsh and caught another snail which it carried to a tree by the road and ate while we watched. The mosquitoes were as bad as I ve ever seen them at Mahogany Hammock and I gave it a quick walk through without seeing any birds. There was another Snail Kite along the main park road north of Mahogany Hammock and I made another stop at Pa-hay-okee. The view was more spectacular than usual with the storm clouds sweeping up out of the southwest as over a hundred Wood Storks passed overhead towards the south. A stop at the Pineland Trail didn t produce any birds of note but the Liguus Tree Snails were taking advantage of the wet weather and feeding actively. A drive down Research Road didn t turn up any new birds but the rain had rejuvenated the amphibians and Oak Toads, Southern Cricket Frogs, and Southern Chorus Frogs were calling.
Birds observed in Everglades National Park, Lucky Hammock area, Upper Keys, and offshore to the Marathon Humps from 6/23 to 6/25/06
Black-capped Petrel 1 (offshore)
Cory s Shearwater 5 (offshore)
Greater Shearwater 3 (offshore)
Audubon s Shearwater 10 (offshore)
Wilson s Storm-Petrel 2 (offshore)
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel 3 (offshore)
Brown Pelican
Double-crested Cormorant
Anhinga
Magnificent Frigatebird
Great Blue Heron
Great Egret
Reddish Egret
Tricolored Heron
Little Blue Heron
Snowy Egret
Cattle Egret
Green Heron
Wood Stork
White Ibis
Glossy Ibis
Black Vulture
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Swallow-tailed Kite
Snail Kite 2 (Mahogany Hammock area)
Bald Eagle
Red-shouldered Hawk
Northern Bobwhite
Black-necked Stilt
Black-bellied Plover
Killdeer
Marbled Godwit
Willet
Laughing Gull
Least Tern
Bridled Tern 75 (offshore)
Sooty Tern 25 (offshore)
Brown Noddy 10 (offshore)
White-crowned Pigeon
Eurasian Collared-Dove
Mourning Dove
Common Ground-Dove
Great Horned Owl
Common Nighthawk
Chuck-will s-widow
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Great Crested Flycatcher
Eastern Kingbird
Gray Kingbird
Purple Martin
Cave Swallow
Carolina Wren
Northern Mockingbird
Eastern Bluebird
Loggerhead Shrike
Blue Jay
American Crow
European Starling
White-eyed Vireo
Black-whiskered Vireo
Pine Warbler
Prairie Warbler
Common Yellowthroat
Eastern Towhee
Seaside Sparrow (Cape Sable race)
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird
Eastern Meadowlark
Boat-tailed Grackle
Common Grackle
Brown-headed Cowbird
Butterflies Seen:
Giant Swallowtail
Palamedes Swallowtail
Great Southern White
Large Orange Sulphur
Barred Yellow
Sleepy Orange
Dainty Sulphur
Mallow Scrub-Hairstreak
Red-Banded Hairstreak
Cassius Blue
Gulf Fritillary
Julia (Heliconian)
Zebra (Heliconian)
Variegated Fritillary
Phaon Crescent
Pearl Crescent
Red Admiral
Common Buckeye
White Peacock
Viceroy
Ruddy Daggerwing
Queen
Soldier
Dorantes Longtail
Florida Duskywing
Tropical Checkered-Skipper
Fiery Skipper
Southern Broken-Dash
Delaware Skipper
Dragonflies seen:
Regal Darner (Coryphaeschna ingens)
Prince Baskettail (Epitheca cynosura)
Needham s Skimmer (Libellula needhami)
Roseate Skimmer (Orthemis ferruginea)
Scarlet Skimmer (Crocothemis servilia)
Band-Winged Dragonlet (Erythrodiplax umbrata)
Eastern Amberwing (Perithemis tenera)
Blue Dasher (Pachydiplex longipennis)
Eastern Pondhawk (Erythemis simplicicollis)
Great Pondhawk (Erythemis vesiculosa)
Wandering Glider (Pantala flavescens)
Four-Spotted Pennant (Brachymesia gravida)
Halloween Pennant (Celithemis eponina)
Toads and Frogs heard or seen:
Oak Toad
Greenhouse Frog
Southern Cricket Frog
Green Treefrog
Cuban Treefrog
Southern Chorus Frog
Pig Frog
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