Fall was finally here.

Posted on March 14, 2024 by dinajohnston

We know it’s winter in central Florida when the coots show up at our ponds. It looked like they were eating the grass they pulled up from the bottom of the pond.

I was up on the observation tower at Chesnut Park when I saw this osprey in the trees across the boat canal. The spanish moss has taken over these trees.

The spatterdock was blooming under the boardwalk.

The trees around the lake were finally turning colors in late December.

The bald cypress trees and red maples were finally showing off. We do get a fall here in the Tampa Bay area, just not until some time in December. This year it was really late.

The view from the top of the tower.

A two park morning

Posted on January 1, 2024 by dinajohnston

It was mid-October and I finally found some red leaves at Chesnut Park. We had just a touch of fall here in central Florida if you look for it. Although I think this is poison oak which turns red early.

The spatterdock blooms almost all year round here.

A few of the usuals posing for me. A Carolina chickadee and a blue jay with a snack.

I caught a glimpse of a male common yellowthroat. He was hiding and didn’t want to come out and pose like the usual birds do.

I didn’t stay too long at Chesnut Park. After a quick walk I went to Folly Farms Gardens in Safety Harbor before heading home. There were lots of things blooming here.

The butterfly garden has a lot of fun artwork for the kids.

The 17 foot gnome has been finished. It looks like they used the moss from the trees for his beard and eyebrows. I can’t decide if it’s funny or creepy.

More of the same

Posted on December 11, 2023 by dinajohnston

More of the same from my walk in late September. I was heading into Chesnut Park for a quick visit and I saw a fawn walking towards the woods. I snapped the above quickly through the window before it was gone.

When I got to the area to park there were several deer hanging out in the playground. I had just parked and they started walking towards me (I was between them and some woods). They slowly walked by and headed into the woods. They were not in a hurry.

I immediately found several female American redstarts on the boardwalk. They were not shy and came down pretty low in the trees.

Some of the usual birds, a blue jay and a blue gray gnatcatcher.

You would think it was fall by this picture but I think the maple leaves were turning red due to the extreme drought. It was still so hot in late September. They were pretty though.

A squirrel eating some yummy berries.

I ran into some more deer as I was walking the trail through the woods.

It still looked and felt like summer everywhere else in the park but the trees provided some much needed shade. Most of the trails and boardwalks here are shaded which makes it a good spot to walk when it’s sunny and hot.

Most of the small docks over the lake have roofs which also keeps the heat down.

We’re heading into the middle of December and now it’s much cooler here. Even if it warms up to 80 degrees in the late afternoon the mornings are in the 60’s and it’s so nice to be out this time of year. It’s that time of the year when people are posting pictures of snow in their yard and we are just happy to be wearing long sleeves!

A quick walk at Chesnut Park

Posted on November 25, 2023 by dinajohnston

It was the end of August and I kept missing all of the fawns this summer. I finally found one with Mom at Chesnut Park. The baby was getting pretty big but still had spots. I only saw them for a minute and they took off deep in the woods.

I found the osprey eating a fish right off the parking lot. I snapped a few pictures and she looked over at me like “I knew I was being watched.”

A scruffy looking female cardinal was eating seed that someone had left on the boardwalk rail.

Reflection of a green heron.

The eagles were back for the winter. I found one hanging out near the restrooms.

The sun was coming up over the trees.

As I was leaving I saw a couple hanging just outside the fence. I pulled over and watched them for a few minutes from the car.

A hot morning walk with the usual critters

Posted on October 30, 2023 by dinajohnston

All of the usual big birds were at Chesnut Park for my morning walk in late June (anhinga, yellow crowned night heron, limpkin).

The wood duck babies were almost fully grown.

Birds were flying overhead (royal tern, osprey).

Things were blooming in the swamp.

Deer and bunnies were easy to spot.

I don’t often see barred owls here but this one was very visible, taking a nap along the boardwalk.

A cardinal was eating the seed that someone had left on the boardwalk.

The bittern and some limpkins

Posted on October 28, 2023 by dinajohnston

Earlier in the summer I kept stopping by Chesnut Park to see if I could find the baby limpkins that had been spotted there. I kept missing them and I thought this trip would be a bust too. I first saw movement in the reeds along the boardwalk but it was just a green heron.

A little ways down the boardwalk I saw an adult limpkin.

I found them but they were almost fully grown at this point. There were 4 babies and they still had a little fuzz on their heads and were making that “baby is hungry” low screeching. They had just come out of the reeds and were looking around.

Mom headed into the water and found a yummy snail.

The youngest looking baby quickly swam over to her and got a bite.

I stood and watched for a while as they were busy preening and picking up empty snail shells, pretending to find a snack. They were acting like little toddlers, curiously getting into everything.

Mom continued to look for food and she ignored that little blue ball.

As I was watching the limpkins I saw movement from across the water. A least bittern came out from the other side of the reeds. He was still for a few minutes and then stood up several times as if to say “Here I am”. I thought that was a type of mating dance but I didn’t see another one anywhere. It could have been hiding deep in the reeds though.

All of a sudden it was almost noon and time to head home for lunch.

A park and a bike ride

Posted on August 26, 2023 by dinajohnston

In late April I made a quick stop at Chesnut Park to see if there were any migrating birds hanging around. Over the years I’ve seen a lot of warblers come through here during migration but the only thing I found was the usual titmouse. They come really close because people feed them here. They come down close to the boardwalk to see if you have snacks. Once they realize you aren’t carrying they head back up to the tops of the trees.

The squirrels are also being fed here so they check you out as well.

I came home and it was still to early for lunch so I hopped on my bike and went for a quick pedal around the neighborhood. The first thing I saw was a bunny. A brown thrasher flew in front of me as I was taking a picture of the bunny. Was he posing for me?

I found a limpkin in the pond down the street from our house in the same spot the limpkin babies were last year. The water was much lower this year and at first I only saw the adult. He was calling to another limpkin that was farther down the creek.

I left my bike in the bushes and followed the creek along the golf course (no one was playing at the time) and saw another adult limpkin far in the woods. I could just barely make out a baby in the sticks. They stayed pretty hidden and eventually worked their way down behind the houses so I couldn’t follow them any farther. I’m assuming they were farther back since the water was a little higher there.

And, a random alligator that I saw in the neighborhood. This was taken with my 300mm lens and cropped so he was pretty far away.

A walk through the swamp

Posted on December 8, 2022 by dinajohnston

The sun was just coming up over the trees at Chesnut Park in late October. I was out for a walk with just my phone and the weather was perfect. It was all blue sky out on Lake Tarpon.

The rest of the walk was through the swamp (although I was on a boardwalk for most of it). The back boardwalk area was flooding after all of the rain we got from Hurricane Nicole coming through.

There were also some dry areas along the trail as well. The sun was making weird shadows through the trees and my phone picked up some alien looking light forms in one of the shots. Was it just tricks with the lens or was I not alone???

It was a beautiful morning to be out.

You can always find alligators along the ponds and lakes here. This morning I only found this tiny one.

Traffic jam on the trail

Posted on November 19, 2022 by dinajohnston

It wasn’t a four way stop but even if it was the deer was coming out without stopping. I paused as I was walking down a back dirt trail at Chesnut Park when I saw the deer stepping out on the trail. She wasn’t alone.

She had 4 friends and instead of crossing the trail like they usually do they kept on going down the trail. I followed them for a while. They would look back at me but kept going at a slow pace.

At the other side of the park I found a Mom and a young one.

Watching me as I sat in my car watching her.

More shots from deep in the swamp (taken from the boardwalk).

A busy fawn season

Posted on October 1, 2022 by dinajohnston

These must be the same deer that are being feed I was walking on the back trail at Chesnut Park and several deer walked right up to me I took the above with my phone.