We had a warm morning in early January so I headed out for a quick trip to nearby Folly Farms in Safety Harbor. The neighborhood community garden has a small butterfly garden and if there isn’t any birds around I can usually find some tiny critters. There was still enough blooming to keep the garden full of bees and butterflies. The fun catch was the ladybug. I don’t see them very often.
It was early August when I visited Bok Tower Gardens in Lake Wales. I knew there wouldn’t be a lot of birds there since fall migration hadn’t started yet but I was ready for a road trip. There were a lot of other flying critters though so I had a fun morning torturing myself trying to get pictures of little things buzzing around.
I found this spiny orb weaver with a bee in his web.
I think this lizard was flirting with me at the Botanical Gardens in Largo.
Tiny critters were buzzing around the butterfly garden.
A few of the butterflies in the butterfly garden. I was expecting to see many more than this. I didn’t see any yellow ones. I keep saying I am seeing less and less of them every year. I wonder if it’s all of the spraying that is being done. Spraying for invasive plants, spraying for mosquitoes.
A soft shell turtle swims by under the bridge. I was only able to get his funny shaped head in the shot. He almost blends in with the brown lily pad leaves.
A young moorhen walking around the spatterdock lilies in the pond.
A few of the flowers blooming in early June.
There’s something magical about standing in the middle of sunflowers.
There were all types of sunflowers here at Sweetfield Farms in early May. Some had yellow faces and some had black faces. Some had big faces and small petals and some had small faces with long yellow petals. I grabbed a pair of clippers and went out to pick a bunch to take home but it was tough to decide which ones to pick. I ended up with a bunch of different ones.
Most of the faces had bees on them but when you clipped them the bees flew off. If you are really afraid of the bees, you can buy the ones in the barn that are already picked. Either way they were $2 a stem. I really didn’t feel like there were a lot of bees swarming around me though. There are plenty without bees as well.
There were other critters on them as well.
It was a beautiful morning out and I was loaded down as I was walking to the car with my camera, zinnias, sunflowers and a few vegetables I picked.
I looked outside the back window one morning in late April and saw these beauties walking around so I had to run out and get some shots. They were heading off the golf course and into the woods before the golfers come through.
Early one morning I saw this guy and went outside to take this. His face was all muddy. He was in the shade and didn’t stay still so it was hard to get a good shot of him.
I took these outside as well. He was napping on the hanging basket.
Squirrels being cute in the backyard. Taken through the window.
A wasp on the bird bath when I was cleaning it out.
A swallow tail kite cruising along the golf course. I took this through the window as well. I knew he’d be gone by the time I got outside and on the course.
We always have white ibis feeding through.
Several brown thrashers were feeding on the ground for several days. They must be nesting somewhere nearby.
These crows are very annoying. There are several that hang out in the backyard. They usually stay high up in the oak trees but recently they have been coming to the bird bath. They must have found some trash or someone was leaving food out because they were bringing food to the bird bath to soak before eating it. It looked like mostly bread but one day I ran out and chased one off the bath and he had an open pack of cheese crackers that he left as he flew off. I finally dumped the water out for a few days until they left.
We’ve been getting a lot of woodpeckers at the feeder lately. They grab a sunflower seed and take off. The other little birds usually leave when they are on it.
This beautiful hanging orchid plant was blooming in mid-April at the Florida Botanical Gardens in Largo.
I love these spikey pods that bust open and are filled with fuzz. I still can’t figure out what these are.
A butterfly had landed high up on this silk floss tree.
Tiny critters in the butterfly garden. There were a lot of monarch caterpillars on the big milkweed plant. I think the bottom caterpillar is an orange barred sulfur butterfly.
Usual birds here are the dove and the brown thrasher.
And of course I can’t walk by and not take pictures of the wood ducks floating around. This time I also saw some on the fence.
A crow flying by with an egg in his beak. Probably a turtle egg.
I stopped at nearby Largo Nature Preserve after leaving the botanical gardens and it was pretty quiet there. I did notice some heads sticking out of holes in some dead trees near the parking lot. A screech owl had been nesting in one. I never made it back here to see if there were any babies. A red bellied woodpecker was checking out the other hole. Probably just started to work on a nest.
Little critters at Chesnut Park.
You can always find cardinals on the boardwalk here. That first one is a very young one. He was hopping around from branch to branch but I don’t think he could fly far yet.
A very young northern parula with a snack.
A cormorant preening on the side of the lake.
Lots of titmouse coming to see if I have a handout for them.
The sun hadn’t made it over the trees yet when I was ready to go home in July. After an early quick walk it was too hot to hang around much longer.
The fields along the trail was starting to get over-grown in late May at Possum Branch Preserve. Once the grass gets knee high it’s a little creepy to veer off the trail and get close to the marsh.
Baby bluebirds hanging out in a dead tree. Looks like they were just learning to fly.
The usual.
This guy (male lesser scaup) should have already flown north by mid-May. Not sure why he was still hanging around but he wasn’t there the last time I was at the preserve.
The view from the edge of one of the ponds.
I stopped by the local eagles nest on the way home that’s in a utility tower. I was checking to see if I could see any juvenile eagles hanging around but only the adult was sitting on the tower. Any babies could have been gone by then.
Lots of tiny critters in the flowers at the Florida Botanical Gardens in Largo.
The squirrels were busy eating.
A young mockingbird sitting high up in the trees. Not many other birds out in early September.
A flock of anhingas go flying by overhead.
It was hot. The gardens were very quiet with only a few tiny flying critters but I got a good 2 hour walk in that morning.
Little critters at Zoo Tampa in late July.
Even though it was hot the gibbons were swinging back and forth and hooting.
Some of the other fun faces at the zoo.
A bird of paradise almost in bloom.
A cloudy almost rainy day is a good day to go to the zoo in late July. It’s too hot to go on a sunny day. Most of the animals were out moving around the morning I visited for a quick walk. There’s always something different there to see each visit.
