Around the house

Posted on September 12, 2022 by dinajohnston

We had stacked up the outside chairs next to the hanging plant when we were having the house painted and the squirrel found it really easy to sit there and eat the plant. Half of the purslane plant had been eaten before I realized what was going on and caught him red handed.

This guy visits the backyard occasionally. I call him Notch.

I hadn’t seen a northern parula in a couple of months and then this guy showed up in early August. I was able to get a shot through the window right after it stopped raining.

This young cardinal had caught a lizard.

We had a lot of Carolina wrens in the backyard in early spring when they were nesting and then they disappeared. Then in early August we had a few show up again.

I was out riding my bike with my camera and saw this guy crossing the street. I was able to get a few shots of him with this huge meal before he took off down the creek so I don’t know if he ate it. I would have never thought there were fish that big in the small pond nearby.

Front yard skies in early August.

Alone in the drizzle

Posted on April 22, 2021 by dinajohnston

The wind was blowing hard at Fort Desoto on a Saturday morning in late February. I was the only one there on the fishing pier along with the pelicans.

The views from East beach.

Someone dropped their breakfast on the beach. It looks like a laughing gull. There are eagles that cruise this area and a nest on the other side of the park so it might be one of them.

A wall of rain was coming in off the gulf and it was already drizzling so after snapping this I headed home.

Shorebirds at the beach

Posted on January 5, 2021 by dinajohnston

These birds are not social distancing even outside. There were so many crammed into this tiny spit at low tide. Mostly terns and gulls in the front but all of the brown in the far back were red knots.

There were lots of different shorebirds early in November at Fort Desoto. Several times something spooked them and most of them took off.

I turned around and saw these marbled godwits fighting.

Willets and dowitchers on the shoreline on Outback Key.

A great egret came in for a landing right in front of me.

One of my favorite spots at the north beach.

A storm was moving in so it was time to go home.

The fort at Fort Desoto

Posted on December 28, 2020 by dinajohnston

There is an actual fort at Fort Desoto Park. The fort was finished in 1900 and was used until after World W 2. Pinellas county bought the fort and surrounding area later and in 1963 it opened as a park. I don’t usually spend a lot of time there but one day in late October I wasn’t quite ready to go home for lunch so I thought I would climb the path to the top of the fort to see if there were any birds around.

You can rent bikes next door and I thought the bright colors popped against all of the green and blue.

Looking around the fort area, it reminded me of a picture I had seen looking through the old family photos.

Apparently I had been there when I was just a tot running around. It must have not been opened as a park long when we went because I was born in 1963. I must have less than a year old.

After the fort, I stopped by the fishing pier to watch the dolphin show.

At this point a storm was moving in and it was starting to drizzle so I quickly headed back to my car.

Skirting by

Posted on November 19, 2020 by dinajohnston

How do you get a big beached sailboat back out into the water? Very carefully with a big truck. For many people in the Tampa bay area, we were really lucky when Hurricane ETA skirted by us last week. It was a little nerve racking on Wednesday night as Brett and I were trying to go to bed and 70 mile winds were blasting through our channels. There wasn’t a lot of wind damage to the area but a lot of flooding. We kept getting up and peeking out the window to see how far the water had gotten into our yard. High tide was around midnight and by 10:30 we had water over our seawall and a few feet into our yard. We had some minor damage to our dock but many people had flooding in their homes. Even people who didn’t live near the water had flooding in their streets and ended up with flooded homes.

The news was saying there were sailboats beached in the small town of Gulfport in south St. Petersburg. I was out running around on Saturday morning and stopped by. I had heard there were 12 boats beached but by Saturday there was only 6 left on the beach. They were craning one of the boats to put back in the water. That’s a big task.

It looks like there is just minor damage to these boats. Mostly lots of dings but I’m sure that expensive. Some of these boats had people living on them so they have been displaced until the boats can be fixed. Gulfport doesn’t sit directly on the gulf. It’s a small bay off the intercoastal waterway and many boats stay anchored in this area.

Otherwise, it was a beautiful morning and you would never know a bad storm came through 2 days earlier if it wasn’t for the sailboats sitting on the beach. I could see the pink hotel across the bay (Don Cesar Hotel) that sits on the beach.

The Christmas tree was up in front of the beach. I’m assuming someone put this here the day before since there wouldn’t be any balls here after that storm. The restaurants in front of the beach were opening up for breakfast. They had spent the last 2 days cleaning up the sand off the floors.

Summer storms in the morning.

Posted on September 19, 2019 by dinajohnston

I realized why there wasn’t any little birds around the firebushes early one Saturday morning at Crescent Lake park. A hawk was keeping watch.

You can usually see monk parakeets hanging around the ball park there.

No birds but plenty of moths.

This dog looked bored when I was taking his picture. He was standing guard while his human was fishing.

Starlings are everywhere.

I got all the way across the lake from my car and it started raining. Luckily I had thrown my tiny umbrella in my backpack so I stood under a tree for a few minutes hoping it stop quickly. It was raining on one side of the park and the sun was on the other side. After 15 minutes I just walked back to my car and was soaked from the waist down.Typical Florida weather. By the time I got to my car the rain had stopped so I decided to head over to the North Shore beach park in nearby downtown St. Pete before heading home.

When I got out of the the car there were a few parakeets eating on the ground in front of me. They were chomping on the ground covering.

Meanwhile, this squirrel had found a piece of pizza in the garbage can, probably left over from last night’s picnic. He seemed pleased with himself.

There were still storms out in the bay so I headed home for lunch.

No rain or sunset on Honeymoon Island.

Posted on September 2, 2019 by dinajohnston

Late on a Saturday night, Brett and I were heading to Honeymoon Island for a party at the end of June. Seeing the clouds on the way in, we were expecting rain.

The rain was far off in the gulf and stayed out there the entire night.

Crazy grackles hanging out at the pavilion we were at.

The sun peaked out right before it went down creating an orange glow.

A few more clouds rolled in right before dark but the rain held off all night.

Typical Florida weather

Posted on October 6, 2016 by dinajohnston

I took a walk on the walking bridge across Tampa Bay recently on a Sunday night. I was traveling light and only took my phone so all of these are phone shots.

Occasionally you see some critters swimming by. I think this is a cow nose sting ray. They are pretty common in the bay.

A storm was moving into downtown Tampa but behind me the sun was still out.

A brief glimpse of the sun before the clouds moved in.

Then it got bad so I snapped the above and headed back to my car right before it started pouring. This was pretty far away and the picture is cropped up. I would not want to be out on that bridge if the lightning was any closer.

Around the neighborhood

Posted on October 1, 2015 by dinajohnston

Ducks at the neighborhood pond. I haven’s seen a creme colored one around here before.

Another morning of having to wait for ducks to cross the road on the way to work.

My neighborhood osprey finally came back. He’s been gone since March. I’m assuming he’s been off nesting and raising babies. He usually comes back in early July but this year it was late August. Now he sleeps on my neighbor’s sailboat mast and eats his meals on my neighbors dock.

Stormy night through the kitchen window.

View from the backyard. After the storm, the sun peaked out right before it went down.

Close by where I live, a phone pano of a storm coming in.

A few things around the neighborhood in early September.

The sunset and the storm

Posted on September 24, 2015 by dinajohnston

We met family for dinner in Dunedin, a sleepy little town in the Tampa Bay area on the water. It poured the entire time we were eating. Right before dessert, it stopped raining and the sun started to peak out. We decided to walk off the dinner with a short walk down to the marina. Looking across the water at Clearwater Beach, the sun started to go down. We stayed for a few minutes and then headed back to the car since another nasty storm was heading that way. It was a perfect dinner and sunset. I even snuck in a selfie. All of the above were taken with my Iphone 5.

Dina's Wildlife Adventures

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