Tiny baby owl and sunset

On April 1, 2024May 12, 2024 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography5 Comments

It was the middle of January and it was blasting windy and cold but I still made it down to Fort Desoto to see the new baby great horned owls. They had nested right on the top of a dead palm tree. This was a late day shoot so you weren’t shooting right into the sun so I was there late in the afternoon. Not long after I arrived Mom was sitting on the nest with feathers sticking to her beak. What was she eating?

The little baby had been hiding under Mom’s wing but it made a brief appearance and Mom gave it a few bites. I hated that big branch that was in Mom’s face but if I moved over to the right then the baby was hidden by Mom’s wing. There was another baby hiding under the back of Mom but since it was so cold and windy it stayed there.

Mom continued to eat and we realized it was a laughing gull. Some photographers that had been there earlier said Dad flew in with a laughing gull and left it.

What a look!

There’s an osprey nest right by the owl’s nest. Dad flew right over my head with a fish and landed on the nest platform. He dropped the fish and took off. Mom must be sitting on eggs. There are currently 34 osprey nests in the park so it’s going to be a busy baby osprey season.

The nest was near the boat ramp parking lot so I walked over to the water. There wasn’t a single boat out this late afternoon. This is what I love about the cold weather here, the quiet stillness at the parks.

After the Mom owl finished eating I headed over for a quick walk on the north beach. The tide was super low and the sand went on for miles. I didn’t stay long since it was hard standing up straight in the wind.

Ending the year and starting another with injured birds

On February 17, 2024February 16, 2024 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography4 Comments

Look at that beautiful face! This poor barred owl had been shot but was making a quick recovery. In late October I picked him up at the Raptor Center of Tampa Bay in Brandon and drove him down to a rehabber in St. Pete. Soon he will be ready to fly free.

A vulture also made the trip. Penny was pulling him out of the back of my car and checking him over. He was found sick and should be released soon.

So many vultures were either sick or getting hit by cars. They feed in the roads eating roadkill so they are sometimes risking their lives for a meal. No one slows down anymore. I made several trips to pick up injured turkey vultures to take to rehabbers in early November.

The above river cooter had been hit by a car Thanksgiving week. A good samaritan picked her up and brought her to the Raptor Center. Overnight she laid an egg. The next morning I drove the cooter and her egg to the Swamp Girl Adventures near Orlando.

This poor red shoulder hawk had an injured eye. Someone found him in their yard and brought him into an emergency vet who called the Raptor Center. I picked him up right away and drove him to Penny in south St. Pete.

The week of Christmas this common loon was found on the ground in the middle of Florida, no where near water. Loons winter here in Florida but in water. I see them often in the gulf or bay on my walks. Loons don’t have the ability to take off from land so if they are on land they are stranded for some reason. He might have gotten blown off course by a bad storm that had recently hit Florida. I drove him from the Raptor Center to Seaside Seabird Sanctuary on Indian Shore beach. They are loon experts and will hopefully have him swimming in the gulf in no time.

I had some time before heading home so I did a quick walk around the seabird sanctuary and followed the above pelican out to the beach. The sanctuary gets a lot of wild birds hanging around looking for a free handout. It was a beautiful but cold windy morning so I got a very rare shot of an empty stretch of beach.

I made a quick trip back to Penny, the rehabber, on Christmas eve with another injured vulture.

The day after New Year I drove a great horned owl that was about to be released down to Penny’s as well as a tiny bat that was found on the ground in someone’s yard. He was named Pop Tart because he was brought in to the Raptor Center in a Pop Tart box. Bats can’t take off from the ground. They need to drop down a few feet to get lift before taking off so if a bat is on the ground it’s probably sick. They eat their weight in mosquitos every night so they are very beneficial to have around. Many people put up bat boxes in their neighborhoods to keep the insect population down. We have a box nearby and I love going out to get the mail right before dark and seeing they flying around.

Critter transports in mid-September

On December 23, 2023December 19, 2023 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography, Florida animals3 Comments

More rescue transports for the Raptor Center of Tampa Bay. These are from the middle of September into October. I got a text in the middle of September that a baby squirrel needed a ride from an emergency vet to a rehabber. Emergency vets will take in wildlife but they usually don’t treat them. They call rehabbers to come and get them. This teeny tiny baby needed to get warmed up and fed so I made the trip and brought it to the Raptor Center. It’s better if the parent raises the babies but someone had found it in their yard and the Mom never came back.

A few days later I headed over to the Raptor Center to take a box full of squirrels and an injured crow to Penny, the rehabber in St. Pete.

On the way from Brandon to St. Pete I stopped at an emergency vet in South Tampa. Someone had found a Cooper’s hawk laying down in their driveway. I was crushed when I picked up this beautiful hawk and saw how sick he was. He had either been hit by a car or had eaten a poisoned rat. Either way he had a tough road ahead. If it was a poisoned rat he will probably not make it.

A week later I made another trip from the Raptor Center to Penny, the rehabber. This time it was a young squirrel and the cutest baby bunny.

A few days later I made another trip with the same type passengers. This baby bunny was even tinier.

Early October brought my first gopher tortoise passenger and there were 3 of them. Two had been hit by a car and one had been found lost on a construction site. They made the trip from Raptor Center to Swamp Girl Adventures in Kissimmee, near Disney World. Kim at Swamp Girl specializes in rehabbing all types of turtles/torts and other reptiles. Gopher tortoises have Florida state-designated threatened protection due mostly to loss of habitat from over population and building. They are listed as a rare species in this area and there are several programs trying to re-introduce them into the wild. These guys were very special passengers.

The next week was a quick trip. A great horned owl with an injured eye had been picked up by a rescuer near my home and I picked it up from her and drove it out to Raptor Center in Brandon.

In mid-October I had a car full of critters that I had picked up at the Raptor Center and drove down to Penny in St. Pete to finish rehabbing and eventually release. An osprey with an injured wing, the same owl with the injured eye I had picked up days before, an injured screech owl and a tortoise. The tortoise was not a gopher but someone’s pet that had an injured shell. A dog had bitten through the young shell and the tortoise was surrendered to a vet. I’m not sure what Penny will do with it once she fixes the shell. Maybe it will get sent to a zoo or sanctuary.

It just keeps getting worse.

On April 9, 2022April 8, 2022 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography6 Comments

More from the great horned owl’s nest. These were all taken in late February, before we lost one of the babies to rat poison.

These were the only pictures I got of all 3 of the babies together. They were usually all over the place. The first one was taken early one morning, with the youngest trying to hide behind the moss.

One of my last visits at the end of February, they were flying to the nearby trees and really working those muscles.At the end of the day it was dark and cloudy and about to rain and they were very active but it was hard to get good shots in the bad light.

Here is where the problem is. They eat a lot of rats. Most restaurants, apartment buildlings and stores use those black rat poison boxes and don’t realize the impact it has on the other wildlife. If a rat eats the poison and doesn’t die right away, the owl is going to get it and eat it and die as well. There is a campaign to educate the people in the area about the side effects of using the poison. You don’t need it when you have owls, eagles and hawks living in the area. Plus there other non-poisonous traps to use. We also lost the Mom as well. She was found a few days after the baby. Both had necropsys done and they came back positive for rat poison.

I made a quick stop a few days later and Dad was raising the 2 remaining babies. I found the Dad and the babies were both high up in the next tree. I’ve heard they were doing well and flying all over the park since then. Edit-One of the remaining 2 babies was found dead at the park this week from rat poison and the Dad was found yesterday. So now there is only 1 remaining owl out of a family of 5.

Guess what’s for breakfast

On May 8, 2021April 27, 2021 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography3 Comments

Mom was digging around in the nest early one morning in February and pulled up a rat. I’m going to be repetitive about using rat poison. Owls love rats. When people use rat poison the rats don’t die right away. They wander off and the owls pick them up and eat them. Owls can easily die from a rat that has eaten rat poison. You don’t need to use it. The owls (eagles and hawks as well) will take care of the rats.

I spent a good part of the morning waiting for the baby owls to wake up and then watching Mom taking turns feeding the babies. Doesn’t that look yummy!?! It was an overcast day, I was using my long lens and these are extremely cropped up so they aren’t quite as clear as I would have liked. But that’s okay. I’d rather be standing half way across the beach than too close. I didn’t make it back out later to see these little ones completely grown. On a sad circle of life note, I heard that one went missing and a team of people spent all morning looking for it. They think it may have fallen during the night. The area has a lot of coyotes that we don’t see during the day so one of them or an eagle could have gotten it.

Bok Tower Gardens

On May 4, 2021April 15, 2021 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography2 Comments

Even though chipping sparrows are not rare, I don’t see them often.

I found a female ruby throated hummingbird feeding in the english garden at Bok Tower Gardens in late February. It almost looks like she was molting around her face.

I was standing on the path for a while under a pine tree waiting for the hummingbird to come back to the flowers and someone walked by and said “Look at the owl over your head”. I didn’t even notice him when I walked up earlier. I’m glad he didn’t poop on me!

Butterflies and flowers in the garden near the bell tower.

The door to the courtyard at the historic house on the grounds. The Pinewood Estate is closed for now but you can still walk around the grounds.

I found the Fairy Garden on this visit. I usually don’t venture into the children’s garden there but it was a quiet morning so I wandered in to see if there were any good birds back there. I loved the big oversize nest and the little houses made from nature. It’s so creative.

Spring is here

On May 1, 2021April 30, 2021 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography2 Comments

Trying to get a shot of an inchworm hanging from a tree is like trying to bite an apple hanging from a tree with your hands tied behind your back (I remember doing this as a kid at Halloween parties). The trees were full of these guys dangling and swaying back and forth in the wind. It’s not a sharp shot but you get the drift.

They were crawling around in the weeds as well. Every year in early March they take over a few of the parks here in the Tampa bay area. Harmless but annoying when they get in your hair.

The inchworms where hanging in the tree that is home to the owls at a local park. Dad was in his usual spot overlooking the big tree.

My first baby owl sighting of the year. He looks a little grumpy, like he just woke up. It was late in the day when I got to the park. The babies were just waking up from a nap and were ready for a snack.

Mom flew up to a branch over the nest.

The babies were watching Mom and one was climbing up the tree trying to get closer to her. Did I say “babies”? There were actually 3 and I eventually got pictures of all of them together but more on those later.

I was sitting at a traffic light on the way home and noticed an inchworm on the inside of my window. He had the nerve to poop on my window and leave a trail. When I got home I got him out and put in on a bush.

Cuteness overload

On April 27, 2021April 20, 2021 By dinajohnstonIn Florida animals2 Comments

A few days earlier I noticed two little squirrels hanging out of a hole in a tree near the owl’s nest. When I came back to check on the owls, I saw 4 squirrel babies hanging out of the nest. They were in a highly visible spot and everyone was going crazy over the cute babies hanging out of the tree.

Two of them kept slipping back into the hole. One of them climbed up to the top of the hole but then he quickly scrambled back down. Trying to be brave but realizing that it’s a big scary world out there.

Mom came in and brought some food. I couldn’t quite tell what he was eating.

He was so cute covering his mouth while he chewed. Probably didn’t want his siblings to try and steal it.

After Mom left, these two were busy preening each other.

The squirrels eventually went back into hiding, probably to nap so it was back to paying attention to the owls. Those baby squirrels had better hide from this guy who was only one tree over. He has babies to feed as well.

A brave Mom defending her babies.

On April 20, 2021March 6, 2024 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography2 Comments

It was drizzling on and off in early February when I first caught a glimpse of the baby great horned owls at Fort Desoto. The two babies huddled together and Mom stayed with them on the nest when I first got there.

After the rain stopped and the sun was trying to peak out, Mom flew over to a tree across the trail. Looks like she was trying to wake up and stretch.

The black hooded parakeets were flying by, being loud and annoying. The owl paid little attention to the parakeets buzzing around.

All of a sudden Mom sits up and looks at something close by the nest.

We all turned around to see what Mom was looking at. An eagle had quietly landed on a branch right near the nest. The eagle started screaming and Mom flew off the nest and chased the eagle away. It all happened so fast that I did not even got a shot of the confrontation.

After chasing the eagle off, Mom came back and landed on the nest. This time she stayed on the nest for a while. The baby popped his head up for a few seconds then went back to sleep. It’s going to be fun watching these guys grow up.

Great old trees

On April 19, 2021March 6, 2024 By dinajohnstonIn bird photography1 Comment

I had a quick walk at my local pond in early February. It was a quiet morning. Just me and the anhinga watching me take a picture of her.

The glossy ibis was still there. Maybe they’ll stay permanently.

A teeny critter flying around the clovers.

I stopped by another park close by to check on the owls. Mom was half asleep and there was no sign of babies. I had heard there were two but both were sleeping far down in the nest all morning (later there 3 babies so stay tuned for baby owl shots).

This squirrel had a mouthful as he was running across the parking lot.

The big oak tree where the owls nest. We had heard from a ranger that they were taking this tree down later this year. They say it’s getting rotten inside and could fall on a car or worse a person. Several trees nearby have come down in bad storms. It still looked solid to us. Everyone was freaking out and talking about signing a petition to keep the tree up but if it’s dangerous, it’s coming down. The ranger said the owls will find another tree.