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Posted by Jeff "Hawker" Trotta on 20:19:31 08/01/10
This past week Mossy and I took her niece on the young lady's first ever Everglades wildlife tour. Over three days we used airboats on Lake Okeechobee and the "Trail", the tram at Shark Valley, a tour boat at Everglades City, the boardwalk at Green Cay, feet at Banana Grove Road (the east end of Fisheating Creek), and a snorkel boat at Key Largo, to facilitate the quest. Car miles driven were about 700. The days were long, beginning before dawn and finished well after dark.
We came up with the following note worthy species:
Black-Bellied Whistling Ducks - GC
Mottled Ducks GC
Roseate Spoonbills GC
Black-Necked Stilts - GC and BGR
Limpkin GC
Brown Thrasher - GC
Red-Tailed Hawk - Belle Glade
Least Bitterns LO
Snail Kite - LO
Sandhill Cranes, adults with their colt - on the way to BGR
Swallow-Tailed Kites, many in kettles; some fansatic low passes by individuals - BGR
Chimney Swift BGR
Crested Caracaras - one on the way to BGR, two more on CR846
Purple Gallinule - US 41 airboat tour
Everglades Racer Snakes (3) SV
Bottle-Nosed Dolphins - several jumping next to the boat and in the wake - EC
Magnificent Frigatebird - KL
White-Crowned Pigeons - we saw about 20 from the windows while eating lunch inside of the Mile Marker 88 Restaurant in Key Largo. These striking birds are not to be confused with the invasive Eurasian Collard Doves that blight the area.
Barracuda - KL
Queen Angelfish - KL
We also introduced our niece to fine dining at Coco Asian Bistro and Cafe Maxx in Broward County. Unfortunately, the comestibles at Mile Marker 88 are way down from the former toothsomeness and glory the restaurant possessed when it opened in the late 1960 s. However, for those of you who must drink and bird, it is possible to observe the white crowns, while indulging in libations and comfortably seated at the outside bar. Tropical, rum enhanced cocktails are their specialty. Beer is of course on ice. Please have a designated driver available.
Since the niece is not yet of drinking age, the three of us cooked a New Orleans style bread pudding with Amaretto sauce in our kitchen to toast her successful graduation, with honors, from Boot Camp for Beginning Birders.
The poor child was totally worn out and overstuffed by the time we loaded her weary body on the aircraft headed back to Indiana. Kids today are not nearly as tough as they used to be.
Hawker
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