I stopped by Lake Morton in Lakeland in early August on my way back from Bok Tower Gardens. I wasn’t expecting to see much since it was August and hot. Right away I found some of the young swans that were born earlier in the spring.
They were busy preening and ignored me.
There were several adult gray swans (I’ve heard they are kids of the mute and black swans).
There were also some juvenile wood ducks swimming close by.
Bathing beauties!
I found some very young mute swans preening at Lake Morton at the end of July. These young adults were born early this year and were acting like they own the place.
Juvenile male wood ducks. Just starting to get their male colors in.
I also found some female wood ducks.
This cute little limpkin family stole my heart. Both babies were staying close to Mom.
One of the juvenile swans born this past spring. They are the size of the adults but don’t have their white feathers yet or orange beaks. I only saw 4 there a few weeks ago. I thought I had read that 7 were released back to the lake. They may have just been sleeping under a bush somewhere else.
It looks like this one was posing.
“Hey, wait for me.”
They came close to me looking for a handout.
Getting a drink.
“Ha Ha, you’re funny lady.”
Last one of the four I saw that morning.
A mottled gray version of the black swan.
An adult mute swan taking a bath.
Black swans on the lake.
One of the two black neck swans at the lake. The other was a little farther back.
The morning was perfect. A decent breeze for mid-August over the lake. I hadn’t seen the juvenile swans since they were tiny babies so I had to go back before the winter to see them before they were all white. They were very curious, coming close to me. The lake was full of swans in all colors. Black, white, gray and fuzzy baby tan.
Linking to Saturday’s critters