Posted by Bob Duchesne on March 18, 2004 at 07:34:20:
Well, in spite of my best intentions, family obligations kept me from joining either of the last two TAS trips. I actually visited the Three Lakes area a week after the TAS trip and it sounds like I had better fortune. I ran into a number of birders who were hoping to find the whooping cranes on the Joe Overstreet Road. None were present on Friday night, March 12, but I tried again Saturday morning and ran into another birder who had seen them elsewhere. He described a cattle ranch on SR 523(Canoe Creek Road) just about a mile north of where the road crosses Florida's Turnpike. He said he had seen them there the previous year and again this year. Sure enough, there were two in plain view at the "Lucky Chance" Ranch.
Sorry I missed the panther on the March 12 trip. I saw my first and only Florida Panther just a few miles from there back in 1974!
I have now returned to Maine were the temperature at daybreak this morning was 12 degrees.