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Posted by Vince Lucas on 21:32:57 06/13/08
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of showing some of "our" birds to visiting California birders Madeline Bauer and Ed Snyder. We left Naples at 6:00 a.m. and headed east out the CR846 --> CR833 --> CR835 route into Hendry County to begin tracking down birds to add to Madeline's life-list. We saw some great birds during the half-day outing beginning with six Black-bellied Whistling-Ducks at dawn as we stood in the parking lot of the Seminole Casino in Immokalee. Definitely unexpected and a good find for Collier County. A couple of Purple Martins were also flying over the parking lot at the casino while I waited for the two of them to use the bathroom facilities (best in Eastern Collier County BTW!). From then on we started adding some nice birds to the day list including (in no order) Common Nighthawk, Swallow-tailed Kite, Purple Gallinule, Snail Kite, Great White Heron, White-eyed Vireo, Least Bittern, Roseate Spoonbill, Wood Stork, Caspian Tern, American White Pelican, Mottled Duck, Burrowing Owl, Limpkin, Black-necked Stilt, Purple Swamphen, Common Ground-Dove, Eastern Meadowlark, Loggerhead Shrike, Osprey, Sandhill Crane, Glossy Ibis, White-winged Dove, and many others -- most of them lifers for the two visiting birders. We also saw some great mammals, reptiles, leps and odes. The highlight for Ed, an avid photographer, was photographing a roadkill alligator that was being devoured by a horde of Black Vultures. The stench from the decaying reptile in the 95-degree heat was overwhelming save for the plague of flies that the rotting carcass attracted. A Kodak moment for sure!
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