PURE FLORIDA

EASTERN DIAMONDBACK RATTLESNAKE

2012-01-30T03:00:00.000-05:00

I put the video at the top this time, because I knew you would go there first ...

When my daughter Katie spotted this snake far ahead of us, I thought it was going to be a big branch. We had just passed a truck full of people coming from this direction only moments before.

I couldn't believe they had missed this snake.

This Diamondback must be living a charmed life to have avoided being run over by one vehicle and then to have us be the next vehicle upon it.

'Cause WE are going to make sure it makes it safely off the road.
It's what we do.

Out here, in the middle of a 6,000 acre Wildlife Management Area, this snake was exactly where it was supposed to be.

It's why I wear my $100.00 Cabelas snake boots when I am truly bushwhacking in this area.

When you are a guest in someone else's home, you should dress appropriately for the occasion.

We blocked the road and I photographed it as it slid into the brush ... where it immediately disappeared, as you no doubt saw in the video.

Did you notice how she "locked and loaded" even as she picked out an escape route and took it.

That message was crystal clear to me...

"I will defend myself if you force the issue, but my intent is to go on about my business."

Words to live by.

A PARADEY AQUACULTUREY POST

2012-01-28T09:16:00.001-05:00

It was homecoming week at our little island school. When you are too small for a football team, basketball season becomes the season of the traditional highschool homecoming events.

Of course there was a parade.

Recycling is HUGE in Cedar Key. I didn't get a picture, but just in front of this recycling "float" was a pod of people dressed in plastic bags.
Recycling and energy conservation is ingrained, even in the kids. More than once I have had them get on to me because I left the lights on in the aquaculture lab.

Sweet!

Of course, we do have some problems out here ... giant seagulls for instance.

The water tower osprey probably had the best seat in the house for parade watching. The parade was short, fun, and full of flying candy as all parades should be.

Last night was the big game, homecoming king and queen coronation, and dance.
Good stuff.

Even though, it still resembles a construction site in some ways, we have been making good progress in the aquaculture lab.

We have the giant freshwater prawn (the black one) tank up and running, so I will be ordering Macrobrachium rosenbergii postlarvae this week.
The grey barrel holds dechlorinated tapwater for tank top-offs.

The rectangular mark on the floor with the vertical wood panel is where an old wooden aquarium stand had been for years before I got here. It was "tired" to say the least and was falling apart.
It needed to go, but an electrical outlet was attached to it with stripped, rusted screws.
So I took it apart piece by piece, leaving the upright panel you see until I could get back and make it right.

Last Sunday, I loaded up my trailer with a bunch of tools and lumber, and built a tough, rigid power station to replace the wobbly rotten version. I also did some other carpentry and construction that will show up in later posts ...

This is what I built.
I will probably add a slightly larger top to it so a large air pump can be securely mounted there.

Each kid in the marine science class will be managing their own large aquarium and growing the species of their choice.
We are lucky to have a good assortment of 50-60 gallon tanks, but the accessories are expensive, so we have been scrounging those up ... you know, the pumps, the filters, the gravel.

The photo above and below shows how we siphon tanks.
The siphon is started using the small black hose.
Then the drain end of the small hose is inserted into the larger black hose.

The drain end hangs out the lab door and onto the ground nearby.
Works like a charm and we don't have to use any sloppy, sloshy bucket brigade.

This small moray eel inhabits one student's tank. The PVC pipe in the picture is it's "cave".

There was a tremendous amount of cleaning and redesigning to do when I got here. That started last summer and took way more time than I expected.

(I teach 5 sciences, not just marine, so don't picture me doing this kind of stuff all day)

I WISH!

Anyway ...

We have lots to do still, but finally the kid's tanks are up and running and they are choosing their species.
A couple will be growing baby red drum (redfish) provided by the FWC hatchery.
One will be growing freshwater tropicals that are on an FFA aquaculture contest list, so she and her team can study the real things instead of just pictures.
Some will be growing local species that we will capture. I would like them to try and breed some gulf killifish, since these have excellent live bait potential for our local bait shops.

We will all be growing the prawns as a class project and we might work that into some aquaponics.

I can feel this thing gelling and I'm totally loving it.

DUNE RESTORATION

2012-01-24T03:00:00.000-05:00

Aren't pneumatocysts great!

Shadows in beach sand caused by ...

... a dune restoration project.

The concept is wonderfully simple. Snow fence slows the wind as it whips across the beach. Once the wind slows down, it's load of windblown sand falls at the base of the "snow" fence and a dune begins to form.

Throw in a windblown, (or maybe in this project, a planted ...) sea oat plant and dune stabilization begins anew.

Of course, a simpler idea is to never build homes, motels and condo's directly on the beachfront.

Then, none of this is necessary.

The beach can ebb, flow, flex, and bend as nature intended.

No input from us required.

CAR 54 WHERE ARE YOU?

2012-01-23T02:00:00.000-05:00

IF you remember that TV show, you might be as old as me.
And yes, ... sigh ... there is an age hint in the title.
It's also Miss Elaine's birthday!

HAPPY PREMORNING PUREFLORIDIANS

2012-01-20T09:05:00.003-05:00

DUSK, DUCKS, DOLPHINS

2012-01-18T03:00:00.000-05:00

I worked late yesterday ... later than usual.

In the tiny parking lot, I tossed my stuff in the JEEP, hopped in ... and immediately hopped back out.

Directly in front of the JEEP, an osprey sat bathed in golden late day light.

I took a few shots, cruised around the fenced in water tower area where he perched, and shot a few more on the better light side.

Really, that would have been enough.

On the skinny, bridge bisected causeway, rafts of migratory scaup were dabbling in a tide filled, but very shallow bayou.

I wanted them, but they were a little far out.

Plus you are not supposed to park on the bridge, or the causeway, blah, blah, blah.

All this mental debating about "was it worth it to stop, so late in the day" carried the JEEP over the number 4 bridge.

The mainland was just ahead.

I glanced out, still debating, and there was a dolphin feeding in golden sunlit water.

OK, I get the message.

I wheeled the JEEP around at the foot of the bridge and cruised slowly back over the bridge looking for the dolphin.

No sign of those flippery rascals.

Since I was pointed back at Cedar Key, I decided to turn around in the FWC Marine Lab driveway and maybe get a duck shot.

The light was rushing out like an ebbing spring tide, but the ducks were calmly feeding pretty close to the causeway, so I parked and slipped across the road to get closer.

I got a few duck shots ... nothing spectacular, but one or two were usable.

Did I mention the light was going, going, almost gone?

I must have had my serendipity ducks in a row though, because while I was shooting stills of the scaup ... the dolphins showed up!

How often do you get ducks and dolphins in the same video?

A TOXIC POST

2012-01-15T02:30:00.000-05:00

After the Christmas hubub died down, I dropped in on Mom and Dad to see if she had some errand or job that I could do. My plan was to try and do whatever chores I could for them and then, maybe, hopefully, get over to the beach.

I can cruise an almost empty beach from St. Augustine Beach to Matanzas Inlet in the JEEP during the winter.

I love that.

First, there was work to do.

Work.

But, I had my motivation.

Beach.

JEEP.

Mom's priority job was to just rearrange the shed a little so she could store the Christmas deorations downstairs instead of up in the loft.

I was all for that, since none of us want her climbing the pulldown, attic style, folding stairs at her age.

This job ... so simple on the surface ... became an almost all day challenge. Over the years, as Dad has gotten older and less active in the garden and yard, the shed has become a catch-all for lots of stuff.

Like a lot of people in their generation, a childhood spent in the great depression of the '30's shaped their attitudes about "stuff".

Basically, if it looks like it might have some possible future use, you do NOT throw it away.

Also,

... stockpiling "extras", just in case, is standard procedure.

So, there was a lot of stuff, ... stuffed into this 12 X 16 foot shed.

Most of it had not been moved in a long time.

After getting basic guidelines from Mom, I pulled a fresh satsuma from the nearby tree, munched it, and then dived in.

I sorted out recyclable items, true trash, and organized the good stuff on to shelves and hangers.

When it was over, the place looked very different.

A huge amount of space had been opened up, including plenty of shelf space for the Christmas yard and home decorations.

And, I found all the toxic stuff you see below.

My folks always gardened both food and flowers when I was growing up. Once again, timing is everything, and the era in which they grew into adult gardeners was one filled with the promise of better crops through chemistry.
We are all products of our times and as a kid, I never gave any of this a second thought.

Grownups routinely sprayed pesticides over yard and garden, the Orkin man came and sprayed inside your house, and when the mosquito control fogger truck came through the neighborhood, you ran after it playing in the "fog". The fog was dense, all-enveloping, and a chemical brew of burning diesel and the pesticide of the day ... I'm pretty sure that I am old enough to have danced in DDT laced "fog".
Modern mosquito control trucks spray invisible clouds of Malathion "microdroplets" , not near as much fun to play in, ... and the kids all stay inside in the airconditioning during the summer anyway.
The grownups did frown on the whole running after the mosquito truck thing, but that's the thing about grownups, they can't be everywhere all the time.

Now, my folks have gotten much "greener" in their golden years, and most of this stuff represented an earlier chapter in their life, but there it sat ... a mini-toxic waste dump in the form of jars, bags, and bottles of every pesticide, fungicide, and herbicide you could think of.
Some were not even on the market anymore.
There were caterpillar poisons, mole cricket poison, snail/slug poison, fungicides, soil fumigators, dusts, sprays, ... malathion, dipthane, Dursban, Vapam ... I didn't see any DDT or Plutonium, but some of the bottles weren't clearly labeled anymore, so I'm not really sure ...

I boxed the whole noxious collection up, labeled it with the traditional poison symbol (my favorite) and a version of the trendy "Mr. Yuck ... Yuckface? ... whatever.
All of this will go to the correct disposal location during the next Toxic Roundup in their community.
This is a good thing.

All of this got me thinking about how different the message has been for much of my adult life. As a young adult, I used some of these same chemicals, but when I think back, I really moved out of them quickly.

My kids all grew up in a house where no Orkin man ever sprayed poisons along the baseboards or fumigated the yard. I think that's a plus for their long term health ... AND they got to meet interesting arthropods that Orkin homes never experience.

Not spraying involves some sacrifice, ... especially when it comes to growing tomatoes.

My tomato crop never lasted as long as my Dad's, because I never sprayed them with fungicides, which pretty much means they get sick and die early in the summer. Last year, I did get a much longer (no pesticide used) harvest by growing my tomatoes in containers with my "bubbaponics" system.

Florida is the worst possible habitat for tomatoes, warm, humid, fungusy.

Twenty-seven arthropods, 29 diseases and 10 to 15 weeds are pests of tomatoes in Florida ... and that's just the ones IFAS knows about.

Yes, we are a major producer of tomatoes for the nation, but only through the input of large amounts of pesticides. IFAS and the farmers keep working to reduce that, but for the moment, ... it is what it is.

Now ... I've rambled from cleaning a shed, hinting at a beach JEEP ride, childhood DDT memories, the Orkin "person", Toxic Roundups, and growing tomatoes.

This post is like one of those "broad spectrum pesticides" ...

Y'all wash your veggies good.

GoPro Underwater Fishing Video

2012-01-10T18:00:00.000-05:00

I love my little GoPro video camera. It's tough and so versatile. The underwater video on this post was shot with the GoPro and the surface video of the pufferfish was shot with my 6 year old Sony Cybershot point and shoot.

The GoPro shoots HD video. The Sony, being older, does not.
One issue with the GoPro is a slightly soft focus underwater. It's a problem with the waterproof housing's domed lens cover rather than the camera itself. A flat lens on the housing solves the soft focus problem, but GoPro has not come out with one yet. There are some folks out there making flat lens housings, but I don't have one , so I am apologizing in advance for the slight soft focus on the submarine video.

When a fish was coming up, I would park my rod and hang over the side, dangling the GoPro in my hand ... mostly beneath the surface. The seas were calm, but that far out, there is a constant set of gentle swells. Occasionally, they lifted my hand clear of the surface.

The top video is a blend of about 4 or 5 short clips that day. At the very beginning, you hear Denny and I chortling unsympathetically over a boater out on the horizon who has run aground on the shallow flats. You can't really tell from the grey morning video scenes, but the tide was incredibly low Saturday.

This puffer was an accidental catch. He was picking at Denny's bait down below and the hook snagged his very tough side skin. He puffed up full of water, not air, and held it in the entire time he was posing for the pictures and the dehooking process.

I kept expecting to be sprayed with a stream of Gulf water while I was holding him for this head on photo, but this fish had great manners.

It's a Southern Puffer.

Nuff said.

It was Denny's catch, so after I held the puffer close for photos, I passed him back to Denny for release into the blue waters of the Gulf.

He didn't hang around long!

GET YOUR GROUP(er)ON!

2012-01-08T11:23:00.001-05:00

Don't let the gorgeous aquamarine Gulf water and light blue skies in the pictures below fool you.

This day started off cold, grey, and rainy.

A completely overcast sky dribbled a steady light rain on us as we pulled up to the Cedar Key boat launch.

It was dawn by the clock, but the grey curtain above allowed no sunrise.

Captain Denny turned to me as we loaded the boat in the rain, "Don't worry about this rain, it's only 10% water, ... the Weather Channel said there was just a 10% chance of rain."

I laughed and the movement caused some cold 10% rain to run down my neck.

Denny's glass is always at least half-full, even on a gloomy grey morning.

I think if victory favors the bold, it at least smiles on the optimist, ... and who is more optimistic than a fisherman?

We did not stay ashore.

We cruised out of Cedar Key in a cold rain, clutching a tarp overhead to defend us from the needle prick strikes of cold rain drops in a fast boat.

Before you knew it, Florida had faded over the horizon in the greyness and there was only the sea.

By 10:30 in the morning, we were peeling off parkas and rolling up sleeves under a sunny blue sky.

The newly bright sun lit up the deep blue offshore waters as we cruised slowly towards a secret spot of Denny's.

Beneath us, the depthfinder showed a typical flat bottom, occasionally broken by outcrops of rock.

We had not seen another boat all morning long, but as we approached our target site, the only other boat out in the Gulf was parked directly over "our" GPS coordinates.

It reminded me of that old tale ... in the early 1900's, at one point there were only two cars in the entire state of Kansas ... and they ran into each other.

Denny had another set of GPS numbers nearby so we cruised a little farther and anchored over a nice outcrop of limerock and live bottom.

The grouper cooperated almost immediately.
The water was so blue, so clean, so clear, that you could watch your bait sink almost all the way to the bottom, 8 fathoms below.

The fish in the photo above and below (with me) is a Gag Grouper. This fish is just over the legal size, but it's closed season for Gags right now.
So after a quick "happy fisherman" photo, we released it back into the Gulf, no worse for wear.
We are using circle hooks which almost always snag the fish in the corner of their bony jaw.
This makes for a quick dehooking with no real injury to the fish ... as opposed to traditional J-hooks which are often swallowed and wind up hooked into vital organs.

Fish and Evolved Fish.

Oh yeah.

Captain Denny with a nice Red Grouper.
We did catch one ... okay, ... DENNY caught one legal size grouper, a Red on this day.

I lost exact count of the grouper that came aboard yesterday, but I would say it was somewhere between 12 and 15.

We only kept one grouper for the table.

Like us, the grouper is a predator. This huge maw is the last thing many a grunt or sand perch ever sees.

Officially ... (meaning, what Denny told his very patient wife Karen), this trip was school related. We were actually not fishing, but collecting black seabass for an aquaculture display tank in Denny's classroom.
The black seabass in the photo above is a big one by the way. It is also a male ... see the big hump?

We caught a blue million of them by the way ... often two at a time on tandem rigs.
In fact, in the course of the day, an assortment of at least a hundred fish came over the gunwales. Sand perch, grouper, seabass, puffers, jolt head porgies, and grunts.

Of these, only about ten fish were kept for the table ... mostly delicious black seabass like the fellow above.

(I ate my share of the catch as soon as I got home)

After a full and fantastic day fishing on the beautiful Gulf of Florida, we cruised back to Cedar Key, fishy and happy.

We had to be back at the dock by 4:00 pm.

Denny had gone fishing on his wedding anniversary and he and Karen had restaurant reservations at 6:00 pm.

I told you she was patient.

WARNING: Shameless advertisement below:

Captain Denny Voyles is a licensed charter captain.
He really is a fish whisperer.
Check out his website and book a trip if you want to catch fish ... lots of fish.

Your Robins Have Arrived ... and boy are they thirsty!

2012-01-03T05:45:00.000-05:00

If you live up north where winter really IS winter and you have been wondering what your vacationing robins are doing ... well, they are here.

They are here by the hundreds, filling my yard, my forest, and my goldfish pond.

Every day around sunset, it seems a new flock arrives and takes turns bathing in every spot of water around PFHQ ... more validation for my belief that even tiny bodies of water can make a difference to wildlife.

... Which is why I keep installing them around PFHQ.

Growing up, and living most of my life in Florida, I only know Robins as members of large noisy flocks.
In the summer, up north, are they more solitary/small groupish?

Happy New Year! A Fish Fry and Bear's Resolutions

2012-01-01T10:42:00.001-05:00

We stayed home and fried fish for a mixed pod of our girls, (Jr. had to work), boyfriends, and friends. Y'all should'a been here, 'cause I fried way too much fish, not to mention the abundant salads, southern caviar, shrimp, cheese grits, jalapeno hushpuppies, and other assorted tasties.

... and of course ...homemade Datil Pepper Sauce.

I was able to send guests home with boxes of fish, etc., so nothing went to waste.
The fish we were munching on was Sheepshead that my pal Denny and I caught off Cedar Key.
Unfileted, they look like the fish in the picture below.

By the way, the Texas parks department asked for permission to use the photo above in a museum display about Jetty Fishing (sheepies love jetties). I don't know if it made the final cut, since I am on this side of the Gulf of Florida, but I appreciate them asking.

This was my station.
The thing about fried fish is, you really need to eat it while it's hot, so I had to force my too polite guests to start eating while I was frying.
They gave in pretty easily now that I think about it.

After all, it's not like I couldn't nibble as I fried.

I like a light, crunchy cornmeal coating on my fried fish ... no fluffy beer batters or thick coatings.
Yesterday, I just mixed a commercial seafood breader with some straight cornmeal ... about half and half, and then tossed in a little salt and black pepper.

The fish went from a cold water bath to the breader mix to the hot oil.

The beautiful glass above is a home-brewed red ale made by my college roommate Dave. Dave and his wife Tami both retired last week and will now be living in their cozy cypress log home in the woods just a little north of here.

Dave is a brewmaster and a brewing judge, so he knows his stuff. This ale was exquisite.
He's got plans for his own microbrewery and this recipe is a winner. I would tell you what he calls it, but I would have to kill you.
(Just kidding about that kill part, but he has a very clever name for this red, which must remain top secret for now.)

So what about New Year's Resolutions?
I don't do them.

Bear does though.

Actually, he has 7 he would like to share with you.

1. More deep thinking about life, the universe, and everything.

2. More time spent with his grandmother.
3. More soulful looks upward at his grandmother when she is eating.

4. Continue trying to make contact with the subterrestrial beings that inhabit PFHQ.
5. Limit that subterrestrial contact to sniffing and licking, rather than attempts at consumption.

6. Abstain from drinking goldfish water.
7. Get neutered this summer and barcode chipped.

(Okay, the neuter thing was not his idea ... shhhhh)

Happy Newter Year!

Sore Shore Bird

2011-12-27T17:35:00.000-05:00

This little Dunlin was hanging out near the gravel boat launch at Shell Mound last week. Emma, Bear, and I had just beached the canoe after a good paddle, when the Dunlin caught my eye ... mainly due to his refusal to fly away after we slid in only a few feet away.

He was standing on one foot, which the shorebird clan seems to do alot, ... nothing weird there, but he had what could only be described as a "hangdog look" ... as if he just didn't feel very good.

Plus, as I mentioned, he didn't try to fly away when two humans and a giant labrador retriever pulled up next to him.

Something had to be amiss.

I oozed over a little closer.

He perked up when I approached him slowly, but did not fly or move away.

This Dunlin's symmetry was ... well, ... not.

A side view showed a left ankle that seemed swollen and red compared to the right.

Ouch!

That looks so painful, don't you just want to lance it, flush it with hydrogen peroxide, and pack it with Neosporin?

If it were my foot, that's what I would do.

After a few photos, I left the dunlin alone to deal with his sore foot. When the canoe was all strapped down tight, I turned to see if the tiny bird was still there. He was, but at that very moment he lifted off and flew out over the water towards a shell bar just barely exposed by a falling tide.

The bar was already crowded with other dunlins, terns, and willets as he swooped in for a landing.

At least he would have company,

... misery loves company.

A Christmas Card From PFHQ

2011-12-24T13:14:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas!

Thanks for dropping in, lurking, commenting, and hanging out with me here at Pure Florida.

You make it a joy to share the beauty and wildlife of my favorite part of my favorite planet.

I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

Bear Goes Crabbing

2011-12-23T09:29:00.000-05:00

Emma and I took Bear crabbing out at Shell Mound yesterday. The actual crabbing part was an afterthought.

In truth, my focus was simply getting some water time in with my baby girl and big dog. Crabbing is pretty simple though ... some string, some chicken scraps, ... it seemed an easy addition to our list of things to do, or not do, on this trip.

... and there were all those chicken backs in the freezer marked "crab bait", taking up space. I know they were taking up space, because periodically, I was reminded of this fact.

Bear pondered why anyone would toss a perfectly good piece of raw chicken into the Gulf of Florida, and then periodically pull it in, only to toss it out again.

It was a mystery to him.

A mystery to me also, since the crabs just weren't "feelin' it".
So after a while, Emma and I just released the chicken into the Gulf and enjoyed the day with Bear.

Bear was surprisingly good for only his second canoe ride ever. Only once, when we passed too close to a shell bar with shorebirds packed beak to butt, did he cause a few moments of Tippacanoe and Tyler too.

He stared down those birds and saved us from attack.
Or... at least that's what Emma and I told him.

He seemed to buy it.

On one of the tiny uninhabited islands around Shell Mound, we stopped to stretch our legs and give Bear some water time.

A piece of red cedar substituted for any of a dozen water toys we left at home.

He retrieved, explored the shore, and just swam off into the Gulf over and over again ... doing what Labs do, what they love, what they need.

He was having so much fun that when we told him it was time to go, he waded out into the water and struck a rebellious pose.

Eventually, he came to his senses and we loaded up for the paddle back to the excellent gravel launch at Shell Mound. Thank you USFWS, it is much improved and that composting restroom is spotless and odorless ... how the hell... anyway, ... good job.

Emma got this shot of two happy guys after a good day on the marsh.

He (Bear) looks perky, but he's really pooped out and ready to snooze.

At least, he seemed tired, but a couple with a little girl dog pulled up at the ramp while we were strapping the canoe on to the trailer ... suddenly he was Mr. Perky again.

Good boy, Bear, good boy.

BALD EAGLE PARTS

2011-12-21T11:12:00.000-05:00

If you were here yesterday, you know I had a pretty raptoriffic encounter with a very cooperative Bald Eagle along a country road.

So if yesterday's post could be classified as sort of a "GEE WHIZ, WOWSERS, YOWZA!" kind of eagle post, today's will be a calmer, (BUT DAMN! IT WAS SO COOL!), ... ahem, look at some eagle parts.

First, thank you birders for your input, and especially, Julie Zickefoose, thank you for the gender probability.

I'm referring to this eagle as a "She" from now on, because:

A) Zick seems to think she is a girly girl.

B) I have a policy here that anything beautiful is a "she" if I am not really sure about the gender.

Before we get started, let's pause and thank Rachel Carson.

I'm pretty sure, (having grown up in the scarce bird of prey- DDT era), that we owe our eagles and ospreys to her.

Now, let's poke and prod this ea-girl.

(I can't bring myself to call her a hen)

She's big! I left the fence and road in this shot so you had some size reference. This encounter made me curious about how much an eagle might weigh ... 8 to 16 pounds ... which is quite a range if you think of it.

A little cruising about the net showed that the weight of her feathers exceeds that of her skeleton.

Her feet are big, bone-crushingly powerful, and equipped with scimitar claws that would make Raptor Red proud.

It's pretty common here on the Gulf coast to see an eagle flying overhead with a large fish struggling in those claws.

I don't think they drop many. I count as one of my luckiest moments, a day on Moses Creek in St. Johns county, when I witnessed an eagle harrass an osprey in mid-air until the osprey dropped his mullet...

...which the eagle snatched out of the air as it fell.

She can do piratical stuff like that because her talons lock down tight and the bottom of those feet have little projections called spicules (also a Porifera term, marine nerds) that help grip prey.

It wasn't cold on the day of my eagle encounter, so I am guessing the fluffy aspect here is to show me how big and bad she is.

Duly noted oh "Taloned One".

Even though I kept a pretty respectful distance, there was a moment when she thought about taking her meal elsewhere.

She picked it up.

There were a few hoppy, flappy attempts to take it somewhere else, but in the end, she decided to keep dining right where she was.

It's good to have your nostrils high on your bill if you plan to spend lots of time plunging that thing into carrion.

Her bill ... what can you say about it?

An avian Ginsu.

We all know she's got super vision, but until yesterday, I didn't realize she has two fovea in each eye.

You have one.

Go look it up.

She also has a nictitating membrane for some extra eye protection.

Just like sharks.

I left her there, feeding on that hog's head, thankful for the encounter, still not believing it worked out the way it did.

Were it not for Christmas break ... I would have been at work.

I may have to rethink this whole working thing.

What else am I missing?

BALD EAGLE!! MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ME!

2011-12-20T10:13:00.000-05:00

I try not to leave the house without my camera and I can't tell you how many times that has made ALL the difference in my day and here at Pure Florida.

Yesterday, after doing almost all of my Christmas shopping online, I was missing some of the hustle and bustle that used to drive me crazy ... before online shopping.
Maybe I should actually "GO" shopping.

So, with the pressure off, I cleaned up and set out for Gainesville to join the herds.

I didn't think there would be time to do any critter photography, but I brought the camera anyway.
As it turns out, Miss Sara N. Dippity was riding along with me as I pulled out of our driveway.

Not more than a half-mile from drive, three bald eagles were working on a dead hog.
It's common this time of year for hog and deer hunters to leave a stripped carcass along the wooded roadsides out here on the frontier.

As I approached, all but one of the eagles flew off.

I slowed, reminded myself that this one would fly too, ... probably as soon as I turned on my camera.

I turned it on anyway.
In the seat next to me, Sara smiled sweetly.
Was it pity?

I pulled over across and down from the eagle. Better a cropped, zoomed, through the windshield shot than nothing at all.

The eagle seemed much more concerned about his dead hog meal than me, so I unzipped the JEEP window and poked the lens out.

Still there.

I shot a bunch, then decided to move closer.
When the JEEP rumbled to life again, I just KNEW that eagle would take flight.

Nope.
Still there.

Three times I moved the JEEP, ... each time, getting a little bit closer with a little bit better light angle.

The eagle kept an eye on me, but continued his pulled pork dinner.

I shot 124 photos, and a handful of video clips, including the one below.

Now, I'm not going to throw a hundred shots up here and run y'all off, so I think we'll save some of the close-up feeding action shots for another post.

I was pretty stoked after the encounter.

Beach First, Work Second.

2011-12-18T21:42:00.000-05:00

We took time to hit the beach before going to work at Mom's house yesterday. On every previous trip, I had promised myself that I would hit the beach after the work was done.

I never got there as we always worked until dark.

So, yesterday, with Junior and Bear along for the ride, I turned the JEEP onto SR 206, slipped across the long bridge over the intracoastal, and cruised down onto Crescent Beach ... before checking in at Mom's

The beach access sign said, "4 Wheel Drive Only".
The JEEP smiled knowingly.

As soon as the doors opened, Bear took Junior for a run.

A boy and his dog.

Junior helped Mom put up her Christmas yard decorations out front while I got things ready for rail installation on the wheelchair ramp.
A little history ...

My Dad, a polio survivor, fell and broke his knee a while back. He's mending, but going down the porch steps with a brace, a crutch, and a weak leg has proven to be not only more difficult, but more dangerous.

A ramp would make life easier for both he and my Mom, and so the ramp project was born.

The bulk of the ramp was built over the last few weekends by my brother and I. So far, it has consumed about 3-4 Saturdays ... which is not that bad I suppose for a couple of guys who have never built a wheelchair ramp before.
I researched ramp slopes and features, scratched out a plan, and the rest morphed out as my brother and I worked on those previous Saturdays.
My brother picks up a lot of the parental chores since I am far away, so Junior and I slipped over unannounced to give him a break.

All we had to do on this trip was trim the 4x4's down and install some sturdy railing.

And, any other errand that Mom came up with during the day.

We worked steady, only stopping to eat and dash to Home Depot for wood and carriage bolts.
Junior turned out to be an excellent sidekick and we soon fell into a good work rhythm.
The sun set before we finished (surprise!) and the last two rails went on in semi-darkness. Every so often, one of us had to jump around in the target zone of the security light so we could see what we were doing.

This added a bit of comedy just when we needed it.

Eventually, that last rail went up and we could could call this project complete.

Yes, still tweakable, but complete and ready for use.

After dark again.

Always go to the beach first.

THE LAST DATIL PEPPER

2011-12-17T06:55:00.000-05:00

This spindly datil pepper never was properly transplanted last spring, never got moved out of the shady light near the house, and often wasn't watered.

All summer long it grew between the house and the surrounding oaks, receiving just a few hours of direct light and longing for the sunny garden spot where a dozen datils basked in the best light at PFHQ.

A few weeks ago, we had our first freeze, just barely freezing mind you, but enough to cause the garden datils to give it up.

Not this little guy.

Apparently the warmth of the west facing house wall and the warmer air beneath the live oaks kept it ... not only alive, but fairly frisky.

Micro-climates, folks.
... or maybe in this case ... Nano-climates.

Speaking of "Nano-" ... I am reading "Micro" on my Kindle Fire.
Created by the late Mr. Crichton and finished by one of my favorite writers, Richard Preston.
Lots of fun, and you can tell as you read it that it should be a "Jurassic Park" style blockbuster movie in the near future.

Bear has no time for novel reading at bedtime or any other time.
He knows I'm off for Christmas break and that means we are going on adventures.
He is impatient to begin.

Lastly in this potpourri, I found a new ~~money pit~~ project for my pal, Kevin.
Is she a beauty or what?

Now, I must go.
Bear, Junior, and I have a mission to accomplish.

I will, of course, blog about it.

Mystery Snake: I Should Know This.

2011-12-13T20:16:00.000-05:00

This spectacularly beautiful little snake turned up under one of those black goldfish pond shells that sits, upside down in my garden area.

A few weeks ago, I flipped it over as I looked for a small skink to feed Zack the injured kingsnake. I never did find a skink, (and to be honest, I wasn't excited about feeding a a cute little skink to Zack).

I actually had Zack in my left hand when I flipped over the pond shell and spotted the mystery snake.
Zack was pretty calm, so I made a grab with my right hand while holding Zack and the pond shell in my left.

The mystery snake was a beauty and a ... well, a mystery. He was obviously a juvenile mystery snake, which complicated things since baby snakes often have much more dramatic markings and colors than the adult forms.

He had a long slender tail like a coachwhip, but was younger (smaller) than any coachwhip I had ever caught.
Young coachwhips that have graced my hands were less brown and more greyish.

He did hold his head up once like racers do, but again, he was patterned differently and was much younger than any racer I had encountered.

My online searches were not "smoking gun" successes, so I am tossing him out into the serpentine connections of the internet for you to ponder.

As docile and pretty as he was, I had enough snakes to care for at the time, so I let him go in the cozy darkness beneath the boat stuff shed.

Like any good mystery, he stayed on my mind for some time afterwards ... and now ... he's on yours.

Progressive Dinners: What In The World?

2011-12-10T09:40:00.001-05:00

When you are the new guy on a school staff, the first year is a learning experience as you go through the seasons of the school, experiencing the traditional events particular to that site.

At my school, a Christmas "Progressive Dinner" is tradition.

The concept was a new one for me.

4 courses, 4 staff homes.

In this sparsely populated, geographically large county (bigger than Rhode Island), the distance between homes can be extreme.

I live less than 5 miles from my principal, which made me, the new clueless guy, an obvious choice for one of the stops.

So at the faculty meeting a month or so ago, when the progressive dinner was first announced, I was volunteered.

I accepted of course, heck, the wife is a professional caterer when she is not being a professional nurse.

This would be a breeze.

When I got home and announced that we were a stop in the progressive dinner, I got the news that the dinner date was also the date of the biggest party of the year for the Southern Sisters Caterers.

Translation: You will be hosting solo, Mr.

Yikes!

So today I will be tackling the list below instead of tromping around in the grey, damp, wintery wilds of Pure Florida.

There is a giant Key Lime Cake in the fridge though and my desert stop team of 4 other faculty members will be bringing their contributions later.

So, I feel good about this.

Even though the list awaits.

Guess which item on the list is the most fun.

So, now it's time for me to start tackling the list.

But, before I go, here's a little progressive dinner for you starring Zick, the official snake of Pure Florida.

She's growing nicely, so yesterday she progressed from frozen pinky mice to frozen fuzzies.

If you are not a frozen mouse in your freezer person, you may not know that fuzzies are the next size up in mousey snake food.
They are about twice the size of pinkies, but I felt it was time.

I was a little worried at first ... had I miscalculated Zick's readiness?

Nope.

It took her longer than usual to get it down, but she did just fine.

Afterwards, she was a complete log potato.

Is she smiling?

Okay, I'm off to be a white tornado.

(Google it, you babies, the grownups remember...)

All I've Seen Lately

2011-12-08T20:21:00.001-05:00

The only outdoors I've seen lately has been the Gulf sunrise as I get to work on the island and the Gulf sunset as I leave the island.

This mornings sunrise, combined with fantastic expanses of low tide mudflats, ... well, it was just too much to ignore.

So, I pulled over on the skinny causeway that snakes across the marsh and ties the island to the mainland.
Camera in hand, I crossed the road to a break in the mangroves where I could photograph the sun's entrance.
It was not the kind of sunrise scene you ignore or take for granted.
Sparkling, crisp air, tinted mud, glowing puddles of Gulf water, ... was there really anything at work so vital that three or 4 minutes spent here would be seen as 'wasted time"?

Don't think so.
Heck, I was early anyway and this seemed to be my reward for getting to work long before I really have to be there.

There are rewards for working late too.
It turns out, not only does the Sun rise , but it also sets.

It's a WIN-WIN situation.

Yo! Check Out My Student's Water Cycle Project! Yo!

2011-12-03T15:16:00.000-05:00

After a unit on water, Florida's underground water supply, and the water cycle, my biology kids were told to come up with a water resource protection project.
They could use any format to deliver their message, so there was alot of choice involved.
In fact, I gave them a sheet of possible project media that listed over a hundred possible venues, from epitaphs and resumes, to skits, and songs.

A few of my kids chose music as their medium.
I believe we had 4 rap songs, but this one really rocked the house.

It's by a neat kid who works hard for his grades and who loves to rap.

It's not so much a video, but more of an audio file.

Crank up your volume and enjoy!

Give them choices and they will find a way.
This kid did.

I love the way he starts of all dweeby voiced, and then kicks it up.

The Schoolyard Osprey

2011-12-02T15:41:00.001-05:00

This morning, I took my chemistry class out on a scavenger hunt for pure substances, heterogeneous mixtures, homogeneous mixtures, and solutions.

It seemed like a good way to have them process some of the week's key ideas and take advantage of a beautiful wintery day in Florida.

When we popped out the stairwell door and into the elementary school playground, one of the resident ospreys was waiting for us.

Well, hello Ms. Sara N. Dippity!

You know me, I usually have my camera with me, wherever I am.

So, as the students scattered out in teams seeking mixtures of all kinds, I walked over to the osprey's perch and grabbed a few portraits.

He was pretty magnificent against the bluemonguous sky.

He may need to work on his posture though. It was cold and breezy, so he was probably just conserving some of that bodacious bird body heat.

I wonder how many mullet have been field-stripped by that curved black blade?

More Mud ... Been There Dunlin That

2011-12-01T00:24:00.002-05:00

Yes, mud can be beautiful.

I am not alone in this opinion.

The dunlins agree with me.

ZACK THE KINGSNAKE GOES FREE

2011-11-30T00:51:00.007-05:00

Remember Zack, the injured kingsnake? I posted about him shortly after Zick, the captive bred Florida kingsnake arrived in my classroom. Zack, named after the lad who brought him to me, had a substantial wound about a quarter of the way back from his head. The boy knew it was a harmless kingsnake thanks to a few weeks exposure to Zick in the classroom.

Thus, the presence of Zick saved Zack.

I put antibiotic ointment on the wound and kept Zack in a hospital cage at home. The wound healed and his mobility improved a lot.

There must have been some nerve damage past the break, because even with the wound healed, he has some reduced movement at the back end.

I had a routine of taking him out on sunny weekend days and letting him crawl around. His mobility seemed to be better each time. If I didn't keep an eye on him, he would disappear beneath the leaves and grass in the yard.

Last weekend, even though I had grown attached to him, I knew it was time for Zack to go be a snake. He had not eaten during his time in hospital, but he had recently molted and seemed frisky enough.

So, I took him to a cozy gopher tortoise burrow here at PFHQ and wished him well.

There's a little video below that documents the release.

In Honor of Cyber Monday: FC's Review of The Kindle Fire

2011-11-28T15:35:00.002-05:00

In a rare case of self- indulgence, I pre-ordered the Kindle Fire back in October, almost as soon as I heard about it.
I did go to the Amazon site and read about it of course. I'm not completely impulsive.

What allowed me to click the "submit purchase" button so quickly was the fact that I had already talked myself into buying the "new" Kindle Touch and was close to ordering when the press release about the Fire came out.

Let's see, I was already to buy a $139 Kindle Touch and suddenly, Amazon says, "Hey, if you can wait until November 15th, we are going to release the Kindle Fire with all of these whiz bang features ... blah, blah, blah, etc."

So, for $60 bucks more, I can get this sports car E-reader?
I was there.

Now, of course, the regular Kindles have dropped in price and they are a great reader at a great price, but it was too late for me, I was hooked on Fire.

I've had it for about 2 weeks now and let me tell you, I love it.

For those of you who may be trying to decide whether to buy one on this ubercyber shopping day, here are my thoughts:

The Kindle Fire is super easy to use, I never looked at the digital manual until last night, and that was just a case of browsing ... "Oh, hey, look, there are instructions!"
For the record, the digital manual that is preloaded on your Fire is clear and easy to use.

The button on the right is the On/Off button.
The center slot is for charging it. The fire comes with an A/C charger of course.
The far left hole is for plugging in your ear buds or little speaker.
There are no other physical buttons, switches, or toggley thingies.
All other controls are on the touch screen.

The reading pages are bright, clear, and easy to read.
You could really see the difference when I held it up to my sister-n-law's Kindle Touch.
This one is definitely brighter.

Web browsing is very smooth and fast, even at my remote location with quick, but not super fast Hughesnet satellite broadband.
Somehow, the Fire mysteriously knows when I have tilted it from the vertical to the horizontal ... AND IT ADJUSTS FOR ME!
How do it know?

I swear, it's like living on board the Enterprise.

The view above is a full web page viewed on the vertical. A little spreading of the fingers against the screen enlarges things for easier reading.

I didn't take a shot of the digital keyboard that pops up at the bottom of the screen when you need to type something, but it is big, clear, and my big fingers don't hit the Q when I am aiming for the W.

I find it super easy to use.

Above: Sound Check.
Buying music or apps is easy peasy seamless with Amazon, especially if you are Prime member. Prime membership gives you free 2 day shipping, cloud storage, and tons of digital content, much of it "free".

I watched "24" for the first time last week by streaming it for free on the Fire, while simultaneously texting my kids ... and composing a PF post on the laptop.

It was a connected moment.

I don't usually reread fiction books, so I like the green aspect of digital content, plus, I like the price of digital texts.
With my simple, "nonsmart" phone, I haven't done much in the way of Apps in the past, but now I see my Kindle Fire as a repository for all kinds of useful Apps and nonfiction "DIY" style books that I do return to over and over again for advice.

Maybe some Angry Birds will find their way in there too.

So, in summary:

Yes, I think the Kindle Fire is great.
No, I do not miss the "feel of a paper book". I can just imagine people thousands of years ago, in Egypt when papyrus first replaced clay tablets. " Well, I don't know, Imhotep, I just like the feel of damp clay and a reed stylus in my hand."
No, it's not a little squished computer like an Ipad. It's a color E-reader with WIFI connectivity and some neat bells and whistles. It's also not $600, and with WIFI, not 3G, I don't have yet another data plan to fund.
Yes, the screen is bigger and brighter than the Kindle Touch,. It's big enough for reading, email, and web browsing. I do not plan to write my novel on it. That's what laptops/desktops are for.

So there ya' go. Make up your own mind if you were thinking about which E-reader to buy today. I have no doubt that the Nook is a good reader too, but I'm a Fireman.

*Disclaimer: This is all just my personal opinion and experience with 2 whole weeks under Fire. I have no relationship with Amazon, except that I am a customer and a fan.

Now, quit cybershopping on the job and get back to work!

Turkey Guy

2011-11-24T08:21:00.000-05:00

I am the "Turkey Guy" at this year's Thanksgiving feast. The shot above was taken during a basting break for the ~~dinosaur~~ bird.
Our traditional turkey method involves lots of basil and wine.
The gravy that is produced from the pan drippings is dark, rich, and DELICIOUS.
This is a short post since I have been up since 4:00 am cooking 2 turkeys. While they roasted, I also gave the BEAR dog a bath so he can be shiny and fresh for his grandma who loves him like another grandchild.

Right now, the turkey's are done and it's time for me to make the gravy.
I bid you a Happy Thanksgiving and hope the day, the gatherings, and the food go just as you had hoped.

Do Avocets Dream of Perfect Mud?

2011-11-23T09:43:00.000-05:00

For three after work afternoons in a row, I had missed these avocets.

The first afternoon, I just could not stop, an appointment demanded my presence elsewhere.

The second day, I stopped, and they immediately flew off.

The third day, they were a little too far from the roadway.

On the fourth day, as I got into the JEEP to leave work, I prepared for OPERATION AVOCET.

Step one: Unzip the passenger side window and fold it down.
Open camera bag, check all camera settings.
Pray,hope, wish that the birds will be there.

And they were.

Individually and in small troops, they slogged across the tidal mudflat, sweeping their upturned bills sideways through each and every ebb tide puddle.

Tiny mud snails, grass shrimps, and fish fry left behind by the retreating Gulf of Florida were efficiently and ruthlessly removed from their protective puddles by the left - right sweeping of the avocet's bill.

Our winter tides are tres, tres LOW and the migrating shorebirds, like these avocets, are reaping the mud's rich bounty.

I wonder if the avocets love the marshy mud for all it provides.
I know I do.
I love the smell of the estuary mud.
I love the texture ... like silt pudding.
I love sinking in it, sometimes up to my chest ... and feeling things, living things creeping through it, brushing my skin, reminding me that this mud is ALIVE.

The avocets know that last fact, that the mud is alive.
It's what draws them to slog across it, sweeping, ever sweeping.

I don't know if the bird brain allows an appreciation of the big picture though.
Does the avocet ever pause in awe at the wonder, the sheer magic, that transforms sunlight into diatoms in the mud, and then to snails, shrimps, and other mudflat plankton eaters, before finally, changing one more time into feathers, muscle, and long sweeping, upturned Avocet bills?

I don't speak Avocet, so I don't have an answer.

They were chattering about something while they worked though ...

Whole Lotta Moltin' Goin' On

2011-11-21T15:26:00.000-05:00

The giant Malaysian prawn did it first.
Last week the kids walked in to an "empty" shrimp directly beside the "full' shrimp you see above.

"Wow! He shed!"
" He molted." (not me, another kid)
"Same thing."

"EEuuuuuu! He's eating it!"

Next, the mangrove seeds started. This is the seed of the black mangrove. They sprout on the tree, the better to get growing as soon as they drop to the mud, before an ebbing tide carries them beyond land.

And then, today, Zick (who was being very secretive) began showing signs that she too is in a moltin' mood.

Her eyes have clouded over with the thin film of condensation that occurs when her skin begins to loosen.
Essentially, her windows have fogged up.
That means it won't be long before she molts into her new duds.

I predict tonight is the night.

She was peeking out of her cave and taking a long drink a few minutes ago.
I believe she was contemplating a little swim after I turn the lights out and go home.

A girl needs moisture to soften her skin.

It comes off so much easier that way.

The Week Past

2011-11-19T06:13:00.000-05:00

The final game of the regular Academic Team season pitted my Cedar Key Sharks against daughter Emma's Bronson Eagles.
We played on her turf and split the day with a JV win for her and a Varsity win for me.
I almost had to forfeit when the scheduled bus driver for the 30 mile trip dropped the ball and forgot she had a trip that day.
Lucky for me, another bus driver finished her regular route and zipped back to pick us up for the trip to Bronson.

It was a fun match playing against kids I had coached for years and against my baby girl.
Fun.
Maybe a bit surreal too!

One corner of my messy "teacher table" in my classroom.
That's Zick in the aquarium. She is growing beautifully and loves to bask under a herp light that sits atop her cage.
I am predicting a shed very soon as it has been awhile and she is obviously getting bigger.

The Macro-Herp I hinted at yesterday was supposed to be a 5 foot corn snake, which would have been blogworthy, but instead it turned out to be a nice 5 foot grey rat snake. Now there must be about a million grey rat snake posts here on PF, so I didn't rush to get a photo of this snake.
It's just visiting the class and belongs to one of the 5th graders who Zick entertained in a classroom visit back about a month ago.

Yesterday, I intercepted my first "passed note" since coming to Cedar Key.
Now, I see and hear EVERYTHING in my classroom ... but I don't SEE and HEAR everything in my classroom.
Okay, class, who knows what that means?

ANSWER: You pick your battles.
A traveling note between kids who are on task and getting the job done is generally not SEEN by me.

A traveling note that has taken priority over the work to be done is definitely SEEN ... and removed from the system.

I have a file going back decades with great notes, some sad, some hilarious, some shocking.

This one was "noteworthy" only due to the Mayberryesque topic that was being discussed.

"Hey, I don't know if I can go with you to the cane grinding this weekend..."

A 21st century school note between two sweethearts about a date at the cane grinding.
I love this place.

I'll end with this note, stuck to a locker just outside my classroom.

Who said letter writing is a lost art?

Nano-Herps

2011-11-18T01:04:00.003-05:00

This is one of our crown snakes, of that, I am pretty sure. However, there are about 3 crown snake species in Florida, and I haven't had a chance to check it out.
This little guy was under a chunk of concrete. He wasn't visible when I turned it over, but a quick rake of the newly exposed dirt with my fingers brought him up wiggling and squirming.

This little frog was under the same piece of concrete.
What a cutie, right Dani?

I think it might be one of the cricket frogs, but am open to ID advice on that.
Again, my schedule is keeping me from a good look-up session, and it's not a frog I encounter that often.

He was squeaky, unlike a lot of frogs that don't say a word when you catch 'em.

I let him go in the leafy, mulchy, goodness of the flower bed next to the house, during a predawn rain yesterday.

Apparently, I will be getting a MACRO-HERP today, courtesy of an elementary student at my school.

If she and her Dad follow through, I will share it here this weekend.

1998 JEEP For Sale on Yahoo: Buyer Beware

2011-11-16T08:58:00.000-05:00

JUST FOR THE RECORD ... AHEM ... When my son sent me an email with the subject line: "HOLY CRAP DAD! THIS JEEP IS ONLY $3500 AND HAS ONLY 60,000 MILES !!!" ...

The first thing out of my mouth was, "Son, if it sounds too good to be true, it usually is.

Then, we talked and I too drank the kool-aid.
It was grape as I recall.

The boy ( he's really a young man now) has been suffering from a severe case of JEEP Fever for a long time and none of my half-hearted lessons on the impractical nature of the JEEP Wrangler have reduced his temperature. That kind of advice from me ... a registered JEEP Wrangler fanatic ... doesn't carry much weight.

He found the JEEP ad on Yahoo.
Some things just stunk about this deal:

The mileage was waaaay low for a 13 year old JEEP ... but, down here we see snowbirds all the time with RV's towing a little JEEP Wrangler on their way to Sarasota or some other "waiting to die" retirement location. Those JEEPs barely get used.
It was too cherry for 13 years. I baby my Wrangler, but dang ... no way the paint job is as good as this blue one.
It was an out of state deal.
It didn't sell in the week or so that Junior went back and forth investigating it. A JEEP like that, with a price like that would have sold the very first hour of the first day down here.
The seller would use Google Checkout and that sounded good, but he would also ship it at his cost for a 7 day check it out period. That sure is generous. Ridiculously generous.

To make a long story short, we couldn't quite talk ourselves out of pursuing this further. Lucky for us Western Union actually saved the day.
This deal set off all kinds of Internet fraud warnings at their office.

Result.
No deal.

So, if you are shopping for a used JEEP Wrangler, and you see this advertisement ... just keep cruising.
It stinks to high heaven.

Don't you love it when you get an expensive life lesson for FREE!

Repeat after me: If it sounds too good to be true, it ~~probably~~ is.

Water + Trees = Birds

2011-11-15T04:06:00.002-05:00

Saturday morning in St. Augustine, I woke up early (as usual) and zipped out to get breakfast from Theo's for Mom and Dad.

Since I was early, I had time to stop at this retention pond that my brother had mentioned as we visited Dad in the hospital the day before.

Terry said the Spoonbills were roosting in the band of trees planted on one side of the pond.

... and they were.

It was cold ... a good day for snuggling your huge featherless bill under a warm wing.

The sun was barely peeking over the edge, so these photos may be a little soft.

A water turkey debates whether to exert the energy needed to fly away, or should it rest and just keep an eye on this intruder.

Flying is such hard work.

Especially if you are an anhinga.

Much easier to swim for this bird.

Cold morning though ...

...decisions.

Lots of other birds were cruising, flying, flitting about in the skinny band of trees, in the retention pond, in the middle of a business district of shops, hospitals, warehouses, and small factories.

Water + trees = birds.

Even here.

Well, ... not there ... not on the moon.

Here.

Ramping Up For A Landing

2011-11-12T12:59:00.000-05:00

That's my Dad on his birthday back in September. The brace is a legacy of his battle with Polio when he was about 12.

Dad won.

Polio got in some good licks though, and for the last 25 years or so, he has needed a leg brace to strengthen "the polio leg".

He fell and cracked his knee cap a few weeks ago, so we have all been helping out, taking care giver shifts, and generally trying to take some of the load off my Mom.

There was a scary incident this week that required a trip to the hospital for an overnight stay while he was checked out by the doctor. Luckily, Mrs. FC was there when that happened, so the incident was handled quickly and professionally.
(She is an RN)
He's home now, with a home health care nurse scheduled to come in and help with physical therapy, etc.

For a while at least, a wheelchair will be a big part of his life, so I am working on a ramp for the back porch this weekend. I have one landing about done and am dashing into Home Depot after this post.
(Thank you Barnes and Noble WiFi)

Just wanted to pop in and explain the lack of critter posts this week.

Gotta go.

Cedar Key Traffic Jam

2011-11-09T05:00:00.004-05:00

Oh my gosh! The traffic!
If it gets any worse, we'll need a traffic light here on the island.

The clam farm boat in the picture was creeping along ahead of me yesterday morning.
They had just pulled into the road and the guy in the boat was stowing a few things away. A moment later, the truck stopped, he hopped down from the boat, and jumped into the truck.

That's a pretty typical clamming boat. The motor is up front ... "bird dog" style. The cut-a-way stern allows the clammers easier access when they are lifting clam bags from the muddy bottom and up onto the boat.

Zack Update

2011-11-06T07:14:00.000-05:00

You may recall the injured wild Florida Kingsnake that one of my students brought to me about a month ago. This was only about two weeks after Zick, the captive bred Florida Kingsnake arrived in the classroom via UPS. I credit Zick with saving this snake's life because thanks to her presence in the classroom, the student who found this injured snake recognized it and saved it.

There's a post about Zack the injured snake, but the short story is he had an open wound about one third of the way back from his head that was more than skin deep. It looked pretty bad at the time, but I took him home to see if he could be fixed.

I doctored him with Neosporin and he did the rest.

Currently, the wound has healed over. There is a noticeable bump in his otherwise sleek appearance which is probably some scar tissue buildup.

Apparently, there is some nerve damage at that point, because he is perfectly snakey wiggly from the scar forward, but not so much from the scar to the tail.

It's not a case of paralysis. He can move his back end, but in a more clumsy, less responsive manner. Nerve tissue being what it is, ... I'm not sure that will improve.

He doesn't seem interested in pinky mice or earthworms, or anything else I have offered yet. I know he's a snake and can go a long time without eating, but I would love to see him chomp down on some vittles.

He is maintaining his body mass, so I'm not worried about him. It just would be really reassuring to see him eat.

I've included a short, nasally narrated (stuffy nose that day) video of him basking in the sun last weekend.

He's a cutie.

Keep your scales crossed that he fully recovers.

The Last Macrobrachium

2011-11-04T05:17:00.000-05:00

Regular Pure Floridians may remember my Macrobrachium rosenbergii aquaculture project with my kids at my old school.
The students and I built a simple small scale recirculating aquaculture system and grew giant prawns from tiny post-larvae tots to hulking examples of prawnliness.

The system worked great, the shrimp grew well, and losses were minimal.
The only heavy losses were totally due to misjudgement on my part ... underestimating raccoon cleverness and procrastination.
Both of those errors in judgement (again, mine, not the kids) happened in the "in between" time known as summer.
The prawns all came home to spend the summer with me when school shut down. They moved in to my old tilapia tank to spend the summer and await the next school year.

While raccoon predation was not an issue in the classroom, it was a challenge in an outdoor setting.
I covered the tank with old fencing and stopped that issue, but not before losing some prawns to the bandits.

The worst loss of prawns was simply due to waiting one week too long to move them back to class a year ago. A cold snap SNAPPED the last weekend before I planned to transport them back to school.
It was a sad, massive kill.

A few weeks ago, I went out to check on the final survivor (after a cold snap... arrrrgh) and he was on his side, at the bottom, immobile.

Dang!
I did it again.

I dipped him up and ... he twitched!

A quick plunge into an aquarium with fresh 72 degree well water and he revived just fine, thank you maam.

Call me "Lucky".

So Lucky is now living in my new classroom, amazing everyone who sees him and triggering interest in doing the whole thing over again here at Cedar Key School.

What?

Oh ... Lucky says to tell you he's molted since these photos were taken and has a new unbroken rostrum and bright blue claws.

Pride in appearance.

It's a shrimp thang.

Resurrection Test

2011-11-03T05:18:00.002-05:00

Bear puts Resurrection Fern (Polypodium polypodioides) to the ultimate resurrectionalistical test.

Dewsday Morning

2011-11-01T05:06:00.002-05:00

Saturday was cool and rainy, so I took a photo walk without the Bear dog.

He doesn't have the patience for nature photography.

The rain had walked this path before me.

Miss Guara wearing her diamond necklace.

The palmetto that I burned in last winter's micro-controlled burn is thriving and making more frondifinous fuel for this winter's burn.

I have a lot of old laurel oaks that apparently are near the end of their short (in tree terms) life span. Every once in awhile, one just ups and quits, like this one did about a year ago.

It's mostly a main trunk now. The branches have succumbed to gravity and lie around the base.

There is a mad scramble for light going on as holly, bay, and oak saplings race for the sun.

The wild persimmon tree was all "Fally this, and fally that."

I tried to ignore her, but she kept showing off.

Spider Structural Support, Inc was busy down by the pond.

The rugged little kumquat tree surprised me with some dangling, ripening fruit.

This poor neglected tree gets frozen back to a stump about every third year or so, but it always picks itself up and starts back up again.

The yellow leaves are the kumquat's way of saying, "Hey! I'm anemic here! Helloooooooo! How about some fertilizer?"

It's not easy being a fruit tree at PFHQ.

True Grits :30,375 Comments

2011-10-29T10:09:00.001-05:00

In my world, grits are never wet enough that a spoon is required and I never clutter them with shrimp, cheese, or any other Food Networkian hoopla.
Give me real butter, salt, black pepper, a crumbled strip of center cut bacon , a fork and a place to stand, and I can move the world.

So, I took a walk this morning in the drippy, dim light of an overcast sky. A cold front is moving through and it is delivering light rains and grey skies. The cool dim morning just called out for a walk, a photo walk sans le chien "Bear".

I took way too many photos of wild flowers and fall leaves, but they will have to wait for another post.

Out in the ~~weed choked hell~~ garden, the rootbound, two foot tall Meyer lemon in the tiny pot has produced quite a pair. The poor thing deserves a better container and some actual soil. I don't know how the little impulse buy has survived the hot summer, let alone produce children.

The potted datils are still going strong even as November peers coldly over the calendar wall. Look at that plant! These datils are not only holding fruit, but they are still blooming!
I have a huge batch still to pick plus a good store of 2011 datil seeds for the 2012 season, so check out the datil page above this post or the datil ad off to the right if you want some seeds.

The pepper in the picture is demonstrating one of the traits of datils ... a purple blush. Generally, the peppers go from green to green with purple blush to orange, but they don't always get the blush.

Again, I have the wilder morning dew walk photos in reserve for a post this week.

Now about those comments ...

First, imagine how dull blogging would be without the comment feature.
Ack!
Would we still do it?
To me, the back and forth aspect is about 60% of the blogging fun.
That's why I always feel guilty when life keeps me from commenting back on the two current posts that show each day on Pure Florida.

One thing I almost never do, however, is go back to previous posts to read comments. I just don't have time.
I long ago dropped the email comment notification feature since it was clogging my email and most were current comments I would see anyway.

Recently I was deep in Blogger and hit the comment tab. This of course shows all 30,375 comments here at Pure Florida.

While 99.9% of those comments are wise, funny, critical in an adult manner, narrative, encouraging, or empathetic, ... some just cry out for the be-yatch slap or at least a satisfying DELETE.

For instance ... way back in the archives there is a video of me moving a fat girly moccasin out of the road. Some of you expressed concern about my proximity. Fine. No problem with that.
One person shrilly called me names and said they would never want me teaching their children ... as if the post was a how to do moccasin removal for kiddies.

Another commenter freaked out when I pointed my finger at Bear and yelled, "BAD DOG!", as Bear made a lunge for an endangered gopher tortoise. I had some fun with that as Bear is no where near the wuss that commenter appears to be.

Finally, a commenter just lost it over a post in which I surgically (with a razor cutter) removed just the stinging tip segment of one of our native brown scorpions so I could hold it and show it to my students. The commenter called me a JERK and lamented how I had taken the scorpions ONLY way of getting food. Why I should have just squished it if I was going to do such a thing.
Now, once you get mean and call me a JERK on MY blog, you get deleted.
Had it been a civil comment that disagreed with what I did, I would have explained that scorpions and all their arthropod cousins regenerate lost body parts after a few molts. And with two chelipeds still intact, that scorpion could get by just fine until the new stinger came in.
At least bother to google your subject if you plan to chew me out about it.

I hope the scorpion commenter doesn't eat stone crabs ... only the claw is removed and the crab goes free to grow new ones.
The horror!

I am sure, that in those 30,375 comments there are some other "PLEASE DELETE ME" whiners, but I am not going hunting for them.

Are these people irritating?
Yes.
Am I irritating sometimes.
Yes.
Do I mind debate or being corrected here at PF?
Not a bit.
Do I demand civility?
You're damn right I do.

A Happier Snake Tail

2011-10-24T15:34:00.001-05:00

Emma has not only taken my place at my old school, she has also taken on the mantle of "Snake Go To Person" ... a title formerly owned by me.

The chief of maintenance just switched from calling me to calling Em whenever there is a snake to deal with on campus.

That actually happens quite often on the forest surrounded campus.

This time it was a tiny kindergarter.

Pretty dang cute.
What a squirmer!
I could hardly hang on to him for a few photos before releasing him in the snake-heaven known as PFHQ.

I get all nostalgic when it comes to garter snakes. They were the first snakes I captured and kept as a boy.

They don't make the greatest snake pet and never seem to totally tame down like a ratsnake or kingsnake. I never kept them long for that reason.

Even so, seeing one always take me back to a big pickle jar containing some leaves and dirt, with a fresh caught garter snake peering out, and a little boy peering in.

Roadkill Rattler Rare Opportunity

2011-10-22T07:07:00.000-05:00

The juvenile diamondback rattlesnake in this post was run over directly in front of my driveway entrance last week.

(Not by me.)

It must have happened only a few minutes before I slowed to make my turn, because the tail was still quivering when I knelt to look at it.

That movement faded in the time it took me to grab my Sony out of the JEEP.

While I was sorry to see the rattler had not made it, the situation did allow for a close examination of a snake that would normally be off limits.

Here is the business end.
Diamondbacks are pit vipers, and you can see the heat sensitive pit below, and in front of the eye in the photo above. At night or in a burrow's darkness, these pits allow the hungry Diamondback to find the mouse, rat, gopher, mole, or rabbit as it hunts.

I'm always fascinated by the layout of scales on reptiles and fish. There are so many shapes, so many patterns to allow for a coat of armor that protects while not restricting movement.

On the dorsal side, the layout is one called disruptive coloration. The Diamondback is not attempting to match the background perfectly. There's too much variety in the landscape for that.

Instead, a pattern of spots, stripes, and geometric shapes "disrupts" the sinuous snaky outline, so that even a large Diamondback can be hard to spot against the background soil and vegetation.

This youngster was just getting started on it's rattler.

The scene above is the entrance to my drive. Behind the JEEP is the paved road where the snake was lying. The snake lover in me was sad to find a rattler killed while crossing the road. This is a species that is becoming increasingly rare in the Southeast.

The dog lover and personal pain avoider in me had to consider that every single morning before dawn and every night before bed, Bear and I walk this long sandy driveway so he can do his "bidness".

On these walks, he is always barefoot and I usually am.

Things to ponder.

After the pictures, I placed the snake deep in the palmettos.

F.A.S.T.ing

2011-10-21T20:51:00.000-05:00

My absence here at PF has been due to my presence here in Orlando. I am attending the Florida Association of Science Teachers convention. The first day was full of field trip offerings, I chose a behind the scenes tour of SeaWorld.

We got up close and personal with a polar bear who ignored us as she dug for a treat buried in the snow.

After the polar bears, belugas, and walruses, we toured the wildlife rescue/rehab area. The picture above shows a sea turtle rehab center at Sea World.

The manatee rehab pools held three manatees. This one had apparently swam through some industrial banding at some point and it became embedded in his skin. The SeaWorld vets removed it and the wound, even though it still looks terrible, is actually healing.

Emma and the dolphins.

We both went to the FAST convention, she from her school, and me from mine. Her mentor teacher, Stacy, went too and we had a great time seeing the science behind Sea World.

After all, any day that starts with a chance to pet a baby shark pup has got to be a good day.

STRANGER IN A STRANGE orLANDo

2011-10-21T15:17:00.000-05:00

I'm at the F.A.S.T., (Florida Association of Science Teachers) convention.

Bit of a whirlwind, but details to come this evening.
Gotta dash to another event ....

Bear Gives Us The Run Around

2011-10-17T00:03:00.013-05:00

On Dad's birthday, a garage sale was happening next door at the neighbor's house. The ladies went over the fence to go shopping and came back with a stuffed animal for Bear.

The video is a snippet of what happened next. I am in catch-up mode after a busy weekend at the seafood festival, so Bear is doing the heavy lifting here today.

The "Atta boy, Tiger" and "Show him how to run" commentary from off camera is my Dad enjoying the show.

CEDAR KEY SEAFOOD FESTIVAL PREPARAPALOOZA

2011-10-14T05:18:00.000-05:00

GOOD GRIEF!
WE HAVE BEEN COOKING ALMOST EVERY EVENING SINCE LAST SATURDAY!

The picture above is a collage of scenes from the mega-chowder production day Saturday. The location is the professional certified kitchen of the Southern Sisters Hospitality company.
We made 30 quarts of Minorcan clam chowder on that one day. Since then the total volume has risen to about 50 quarts. It's all frozen now, but I will be up EARLY in the morning to bring it back to life.

I've lost count of the jars of Minorcan datil pepper relish that we prepared there, but I think it is over or around 50.
We are calling it Cedar Key Shark Sauce, since our Cedar Key School mascot is the shark, and the profits are going to the school.
Specifically, the money will help fund our Marine Science Program and our High-Q Academic team.

From now until sometime Sunday evening, all will be festival madness, so I have no idea what sort of posts will or will not make it to PF for the next couple of days!

COME TO THE FESTIVAL THIS WEEKEND, EAT SEAFOOD, BUY ART, SOAK UP SOME REAL FLORIDA!

Plant A SSSSSSSeed

2011-10-12T01:10:00.003-05:00

Not Zick, this is SSSSZack.

SSSSZack is a young Florida Kingsnake also, just like Zick, but he is a wildling, not captive bred.

He is also injured. Last Friday, (the same day the gecko and the orphaned flying squirrels dropped in), one of my students showed up with SSSSZack.
"He's hurt, I found him by the sidewalk."
While I was happy that one of my kids was kind enough to rescue an injured snake, I had to temper that with a safety message to the whole class.
Being as diplomatic as I could, I tried to be grateful to my snake rescuer for his kindness while reinforcing the fact that as kids, they should not be out there grabbing snakes, since the penalty for mistaken identity can be severe.
We had the usual talk about leaving wildlife alone, which I present very convincingly, even if hypocritically, since I am a snake grabber since about the age of 9.

SSSSZack's injury is located about one quarter of his length back from his cute little head. There is a puncture and some swelling. Last Friday, I daubed on some Neosporin to try and prevent infection.

Since that time SSSSZack has been in a Rubbermaid hospital snake box here in the dining room. He is active and behaving normally except for reduced movement behind the injury.

It's not a total lack of snakey sinuosity, just reduced movement. The tip of his tail has movement, so it's not a case of paralysis.

Maybe it just hurts.

He seems to be showing some improvement back there, so we will see.

I didn't attempt to feed him, since I was afraid the meal might not get through the injured point or move correctly if his back end wasn't responding well.

I think I will attempt to feed him tonight since things are looking a little better.

Don't get too attached though ... I'm not sure SSSSZack will make it.

I will keep you posted.

Zick, on the other hand, is doing great.

I introduced "Zick" the baby Florida Kingsnake a few weeks ago here at PF. At the time I believe I mentioned that one of my reasons for bringing her into my classroom was to have her serve as a serpentine ambassador.

Because, y'all know that ...
t's easy to fear snakes if you never are around them.
It's easy to hate something you fear.
It's easy to kill something you hate.

It was my belief that having Zick in our class, watching her eat, bask, shed, and grow would win over the hearts and minds of my students.

I'm not always right, but there is solid evidence showing that I was correctamundo this time.

A few days ago, a cute little 5th grader came in asking about Kingsnakes.. It seems her classmates had all picked different snakes as research projects.
We talked about Zick and I offered to bring Zick down to the 5th grade for a visit if it was okay with her teacher.
It was.
The next morning, the same girl showed up with a tiny, 4 inch long ringneck snake.
"What does it eat? , she asked.
We talked about ringnecks, and I encouraged her to let it go since it's hard to find food for such a tiny beast.
One day later, she walked in to my classroom with a young grey rat snake, all 9 inches of him. He was actually the perfect size to keep as a pet, so we talked about simple Rubbermaid box snake habitats and general rat snake care.

That afternoon, I walked down to the elementary wing of our tiny PreK-12 school. It's an older redbrick building with all the musty, booky, chalky school smells I remember from my own elementary experience.
I mean this building looks and smells like a REAL school.

After a few deep breaths of schoolhouse essence, I knocked on the 5th grade door and was greeted like a celebrity. The kids were pumped about their snake research and each one was an expert on their chosen species.(GOOD JOB 5TH GRADE TEACHER!)
I had Zick the Kingsnake in her Rubbermaid travel cage. We talked about kingsnakes, safety, and the good things snakes do. While we talked, I held Zick up so they could get a good look.
I wish I could remember all their enthusiastic comments, "Fabulously awesome" is one that stuck in my head.
After a while, I pulled a thawed pinky mouse from my pocket and they crowded around to watch Zick eat.
"Will she bite you?" they asked.

I assured them that even though any snake, even a pet one, could bite you, Zick was very tame and had never struck at me.

At that point, I dangled the poor, dead mousling by the tail to get Zick's attention. She was instantly interested and struck almost immediately.

For the first time ever, she missed the mouse and got my finger.

The entire 5th grade gasped in unison.
"SHE BIT YOU!"
I could feel her hanging from my finger, but it didn't hurt,... she's too small to even break the skin, so I just carried on.

In a moment, she let go, retargeted, and nailed the mouse.

Once Zick was committed to eating the pinky mouse, I backed off and let the children crowd in around the plastic box. They were completely awestruck as she worked the seemingly too large meal into her mouth and down the hatch.
While a few may have still had snake jitters when I left, I could tell that the majority of these kids thought snakes were pretty cool animals.

... and you gotta love that.

A Weekend of Waifs

2011-10-09T10:00:00.002-05:00

It has been a weekend of pre-Seafood Festival cooking and waifs here at PFHQ. We spent all day yesterday cooking 30 quarts of Minorcan style clam chowder in the Southern Sisters professional kitchen.

We are not done.

By next weekend, we need to make that amount two more times.
Y'all gotta come buy some and support the Cedar Key School kids.
... otherwise, I will be eating clam chowder into 2012.

Gotta make a couple gallons of Datil Pepper relish too ... sigh.

It's for the kids, it's for the kids, it's for the kids ... (my mantra)

In between all the cooking, a few forlorn waifs turned up, like this tiny Mediterranean gecko.

A student of Emma's brought it to her, and since I have a tiny colony of porch geckos living here at PFHQ, ... she brought it home to me.

Is he cute or what?

Emma also brought me not 1, not 2, but 3 baby flying squirrels. I don't know the story on these, except that another teacher passed them to Emma to pass to me to pass to the "Squirrel Lady" that I work with. We bought some pedialyte and milk replacer to get them through Friday night/Saturday morning, until we could pass them off to Squirrel Lady.

These 3 are older than little "Sharky" from a few weeks ago, so I don't know if "Squirrel Lady", will rehab them or if she will pass them on to "Flying Squirrel Lady" to rehab.

These 2 dedicated squirrel rehabbers have real names of course, I mean, I think they do.
They must.

Bear was not thrilled about being banished from the bedroom while the 3 flying squirrels were fed Friday night, but he tolerated his exile very well.

This is a recent photo of little "Sharky", the flying squirrel waif from a few weeks ago. Squirrel Lady forwarded an email to me that included this picture and the news that Sharky is doing great and is now 14 grams. He did have a turn for the worst at one point, but Flying Squirrel Lady pulled him through it.

Ya gotta love squirrel ladies ... and wildlife rehabbers in general.

It truly is a labor of love that requires lost personal time, spending personal funds, occasional heartbreak ...

... and success means saying goodbye to something you cherish.

MYSTREE

2011-10-06T07:00:00.002-05:00

Hmmmm ... now who could this be?

Odd ... this picture reminds me I still need to get Bear fixed.

This MysTree was growing right at the water's edge as I kayaked the Waccasassa and Wekiva last weekend.

When I sliced one open, it looked like this.

One of the shrubby trees still had it's leaves about it. They are pictured above.

Who is it?

Kayaking The OTHER Wekiva River

2011-10-04T04:07:00.002-05:00

Come on.
Grab your paddle and I'll show you some of the "other" Wekiva River.
Around here, we pronounce it "WE-KIVA" (LONG I, ACCENT THE WE)

The other Wekiva is down around that little town that the mouse ruined ... starts with an O, but it escapes me now.
THAT Wekiva is actually a state park.

This one is not, but it should be.

Push off from that bank and I'll show you what I mean.

Since we are going upstream from the mouth, we'll need to launch on the Waccasassa River first, then paddle up to the confluence.
When the Waccasassa curves to our left, we will go straight into the mouth of the Wekiva.
Here we go ...

The Waccasassa is a beauty in her own right, but like the Wekiva, she has some blemishes.
Curiously, each and every blemish is courtesy of us.
Imagine that.

Take this old shrimp boat for example ...

(PLEASE TAKE THIS OLD SHRIMP BOAT ... AWAY!)

This vessel is pictured in the second post here on Pure Florida, April 11, 2005. She was floating back then. Today she has floundered and is a derelict vessel crumbling and rusting away ... adding who knows what pollutants to the beautiful Waccasassa River system.

I could so RANT right now, but it is such a beautiful October day.

Paddle.

We are still on the Waccasassa and you can see how tidal she is, even here, miles from the Gulf of Florida.

This is a place where fiddler crabs scuttle over cypress knees as salty ocean slowly yields to spring fed freshness.

A juvenile Yellow-Crowned Night Heron totes a crab, that even de-legged, seems too big to swallow.

Could you look just a little more dino?
Sheesh.
That eye ... I think I saw it in the kitchen in Jurassic Park.
Clever girl.

We left the Waccasassa behind after that Night Heron.
Now, we are on the Wekiva. She's fed by Wekiva Springs, miles upstream from where you and I are paddling. The water is now clearer, the bottom cleaner due to a brisk current that issues from the spring.

It's still influenced by the tides ebb and flow, but right now, with the tide out, freshwater rules.
Let's push on upstream, when we poop out we can always turn around and cruise back with the current.

No telling what is up around the next bend ... and there are lots of bends.

Somebody ought to paint that scene.
It's classic Florida Cracker Cattlesqueish.

This Cracker bull was guarding his herd as they fed in the river swamp.
I was so focused on the cows up ahead wading into the river for a drink, that I didn't notice this guy ... just a few feet to my right ...until he made that low rumbling growl ... do cattle growl?
It sure sounded like a growl to me.

I was too busy gauging the depth of the river between my kayak and his horns to focus on his voice, but I think I know menace when I hear it.

How do you explain getting gored by a bull while kayaking?

2011?
1911?
1811?
1711?
1611?

It was a scene, so timeless and Pure Floridian that I just stared at the young bull as he glared at me, framed by cypress, palmetto, and palm.

Sometimes you just have to pause and drink it in.

There were more bends of course.
I'll tell you about them in another post.

Amazon Kindle Fire: I Just Drank The Kool Aid

2011-10-02T08:41:00.000-05:00

It's an amazingly crisp, cool, fallicious day here at PFHQ today, so this will be a short post.
Right after I click "publish" I'm going out in search of photos and "tales" to share with you.

I have a Bear video post coming up, so at some point this week, we can all get our Bear fix.
A few minutes ago, I ordered (pre-ordered actually) an Amazon Kindle Fire. I was on the cusp of ordering the Kindle Touch two weeks ago, when I heard the news about an upcoming Kindle announcement, so I waited. I'm glad I did! I won't get it until mid-November, but when I do, you will get a review here on PF.
We were in St. Augustine yesterday for Dad's birthday celebration. He's 83, a polio survivor, and one amazing person, even with the challenges of age and the aftereffects of a vicious virus.
The Gators lost to Alabama last night. The house is in mourning ... I tread lightly, not understanding what the big deal is, but knowing better than to say things like, "It's only a game". Once bitten, twice shy.
Yesterday, standing in one spot at my parent's suburban house, next to the road, I watched two red shouldered hawks do aerial harassment of a larger red tailed hawk, saw a pileated land on a tree a few feet a way and do it's jungle bird call, AND gasped as a bald eagle soared overhead. ALL during a 15 minute driveway conversation with my brother. What the hell? It was like wild kingdom.
The Datil Pepper festival was this weekend in St. Augustine. I didn't make it due to Dad's birthday, but I hear it was fun. Check your calendar this time next year, Pepperheads.
Zick, the Pure Florida Kingsnake, shed this week for the first time. Her cast off skin was 52cm long. She is radiant in her rich new skin.

Now, I've rattled on long enough for such a beautiful day.
Time to get out there and find us something.

The Lost Week Ends

2011-09-30T05:37:00.000-05:00

A lack of internet service at PFHQ (at least service at any useable speed) for the past week or so has really cut into my posting.

You may have noticed this, and I apologize.

As is my way, I tried to resolve it myself for a few days before I decided it must be the Hughesnet modem.

A phone call to "Brian" in India, confirmed this and after a 20 minute polite chat, I had a new modem on the way.

I hooked it up last night and I'm once again to slip around the ether at a speed I can live with.

It was actually very good customer service ... you would have heard about it if that had not been the case.

Enjoy this peaceful interlude ... courtesy of the Sun, Sony, and a new modem.

PiRknotSquare and ShrimpRknot Either

2011-09-26T15:20:00.000-05:00

Last week, I had to be away for two days of training and some of my fellow teachers covered all my classes. They did this because the school budgets are so slim, it's hard to afford a substitute teacher these days.
And ... they don't make much, these brave substitute teachers, so that tells you something about the budget.

I wanted to thank the regular teachers who lost a planning period or doubled up, so I made a blueberry pie.

Not an extraordinary thing, but it was my first real, gotta crust, not a key lime ... PIE.

I found a recipe online, pulled a bag of my own home grown blueberries out of the freezer, and got started.

My version of "dot with butter".

My version of a shark, made from the trimmings and leftover bits of crust.
The shark is our school mascot.

The thing about giving a pie to someone as a gift is ... you can't really taste it to see if it came out alright.
Nobody gives a pie missing a test slice, as a gift.
It just isn't done.

I left it in the conference room with a note thanking the teachers who covered for me.
In the afternoon, I had a washed and empty pie plate, so I guess it was okay.

In the foreground, a plate of salad and some of the shrimp that I caught back in August.

That was supper Saturday night. You can mess shrimp up in a million spiced, breaded, bacon-wrapped ways, but there is something to be said for minimalism with such a delicately flavored beast.

These were cooked by dropping them into hot water and almost immediately removing them.

Well, yes, I confess to dipping them in our homemade datil pepper relish. We made a big batch Saturday (background) and the whole house smelled AWESOME all day.

No way I was passing that up with a plate full of shrimp at the ready.

I may be a shrimp minimalist, but I'm not crazy.

15 Nanoseconds Of Fame

2011-09-25T10:40:00.000-05:00

Okay, this is a test.
Which person in the Cedar Key Beacon photograph is FC?

You may remember that last weekend, I devoted my morning to slogging about in the marsh while participating in the Coastal Cleanup.
Astute readers may recall that I mentioned that I think I placed somewhere in the top trash picker category, since the sponsors gave me a bag of candy and had me pose for a picture.

A week later, I have confirmation.
Why a week?

The small towns in our Rhode Island sized county all publish weekly papers ... if you want a daily, you have to subscribe to a "foreign" newspaper from some other county.

I know, I know, who reads paper newspapers anymore ... everything in the paper version is a day old and you read it yesterday in the online version.

So maybe weekly papers make more sense ... less trees cut down, less paper waste, less gas used to deliver it ... and really, if it's not still interesting a week later, it was probably trivial to begin with.

Thursday, the Beacon came out, so I popped into the convenience store by the bait shop and bought a diet Coke and a paper. My Coastal Cleanup participation had 3 goals and getting into the paper was important to one of them.
My goals:

Lead by example for my students. I had promoted the clean up all week in class. If you talk the talk with teenagers, you need to walk the walk.
Clean up the local marshes that I love so much.
Let the community of Cedar Key see that their new science teacher is investing time in their community outside of the classroom. Sort of a "get to know me" moment.

So for all the reasons above, I hustled hard that morning. Those folks I didn't meet in person during the Coastal Cleanup, well they could see how hard I worked in the paper, ... even if a week later.
What a plan.
What could go wrong?

This: The Beacon reporter got my name wrong in the caption.

Too funny!

I could correct them, but I'm not sure it's worth waiting for a week.

At least the "mud otter" creepy thing I found got named correctly in the paper.

Zick Eats

2011-09-23T11:14:00.001-05:00

Zick really enjoys a good frozen pinky mouse ... thawed of course. She goes at with great gusto, usually with a few missed strikes as I dangle the mouselingmorsel by it's tail.

Zick is, after all, new to this planet and still honing her accuracy.
Her instincts to make the strike and to instantly wrap up the prey animal in tight bands of squeezey snake muscle have been honed over millions of years and they work beautifully.
That is the wonder of the bio-programming known as instinct.
It's just there.

Zick is instinctively wonderful ... she just needs a little more practice judging distance.

Here, she makes a little love knot to show me how fond she is of me ... or is she just chilly and enjoying the warmth of an endothermic hand?

The video below shows her already "in the grip" with a thawed pinky mouse.

Zick eats about once a week and I bet it wont be too long before I walk in and find a shed skin.

I suppose I should really try to get her to stretch out on a meter stick so I can get a baseline starting length.

There is something in a snake that abhors straightness though, so my measurement may not be accurate.

At least snake eating habits aren't gory with rending and tearing ... just smoothly, sinuously, squishy.

Baby Flying Squirrel Update

2011-09-21T01:14:00.000-05:00

If you remember, just a few posts back, we had a little baby flying squirrel that needed some TLC rehabilitation after it became an orphan.
You may also remember that the "Squirrel Lady" out here at Cedar Key took it upon herself to get this baby to the "Flying Squirrel Lady" who had more experience with the tiny flying clan.

A recent email from the "Flying Squirrel Lady" included these photos and the news that little "Sharky" was doing very well.

... Just a little good news on your Wednesday.

(Oh, and ladies ... especially lady Gator fans ... there's a baby squirrel in the photos.)

Cedar Key Coastal Clean Up 2011

2011-09-19T15:30:00.003-05:00

Meanwhile ... deep in the mangroves ...

When I showed up at the Coastal Clean Up staging area, early Saturday morning, I was given the "Back Bayou" as my target zone. This is a quiet marshy lagoon behind the school where I work.

Armed with a few extra tough garbage bags an enthusiasm for anything marshy and eco-friendly, I headed into the mangroves.

There were all kinds of trashy things under the mangrove canopy ... from left to right:
cans, old bottles, old shoe liner, old basura blanco.

There were weird things too ... things that gave me the willies ... like this big-eyed mudstronsity.

I grabbed ALOT of trash for a solo picker. There were way more glass bottles and shards than I expected. Some of the soft drink glass bottles were dated by designs I had not seen in a while. That told me that this area of black mangroves and gooey knee sucking marsh mud had not been cleaned in a long time ... if ever.

It was hard going with soft mud and long slogs out and back again with black bags of glass and cans, pressure treated boards full of 16 penny nails, and metal pipes.

This is my "haul".

Three garbage bags with mostly glass and metal containers
One chair and one boat seat.
A 10 foot steel pipe full of mud ... ugh, heavy.
Rubber hose
Two 5 gallon buckets which I used to carry more bottles and cans.
3 big pieces of pressure treated lumber and some tarp ... probably some kid's hut years ago. It was semi-attached to an oak that leaned out over the marsh.
A rusty step ladder

I guess that's it ... There was more, but time was up at 12 noon and to be honest, I was needing a water break after hours of mud slogging and bush whacking.

Back at Clean Up HQ, dedicated volunteers sorted, counted, and classified all the trash. This is an international effort and the recording volunteer is using a standard data collection form to record trash data.

This dumpster was full of all kinds of garbage, from old clam farm bags to lumber. Recyclables went off to be "renewed" of course.

Let's hope they bury this scary thing deep in the landfill.

All in all it was a great morning. We've had a little bit of fallish (by FL standards) weather and what could have been a hot, gnat infested, torture session was just a lot of hard, dirty work under low humidity conditions ... (by FL standards).

I can't wait to read the trashy totals for the whole day. I did hear that the SWAT kids (Students Working Against Tobacco) picked up over 4000 cigarette butts.
I seem to have picked up enough trash to qualify for a prize, although I never heard if it was categorized by first, second, or third place.

I just know at one point, the organizers said,"Congratulations!", gave me a big bag of Hershey's candy, and had me stand with two other Coastal Cleaners for a picture.

I haven't seen the picture yet, but I know I was covered in dried marsh mud from head to toe, so I may be incognito anyway.

It was great fun and super exercise, plus, the beautiful marshes of Cedar Key are a little cleaner than they were before the Coastal Clean Up.

I'm definitely coming back next year.

We didn't get it all.

Meet Zick, The Baby FLORIDA Kingsnake

2011-09-16T01:21:00.003-05:00

Meet Zick, my new baby FLORIDA Kingsnake. She arrived yesterday via UPS and is the first snake I have ever paid money for, even though I have had a dozen or more pet snakes since I was a boy.

Every other snake was a yard capture or hand me down, all wild, all ratsnakes except for a few garter snakes when I was about 10 years old.

They were all temporary visitors in the FC household, but Zick is different.
She's captive bred and a long term commitment, just like any long-lived pet. Even though she's a native Floridian (duh, what else would you expect here at Pure Florida?), she won't be released at any time.

She's here to stay.

I named her after Julie Zickefoose, poet,musician, writer, and artist extraordinaire. The real Zick is just one of many amazing people I have met through the blogosphere, and she just charmed the scales off me when I met her and her two great kids at the Space Coast Bird thingie last January.

Zick the kingsnake is about 3 weeks old and about 12 inches long. She came from Reptmart, a supplier that I found online by a random search in Google. I found other suppliers also, but I was impressed by Reptmart's facility as shown on their website and their concern for the safety and health of their animals.

Zick will be my classroom snake so, I cleared the idea of a snake arriving at the front desk with our receptionists and made the order.

An hour after I clicked to complete the purchase, I received a call from a Reptmart employee.
She had looked on the map and noted Cedar Key's end of the road, middle of nowhere position on the shipping maps. The distance from any UPS air hub had her worried about the snake spending too much time on a hot UPS truck. Her research showed that deliveries to Cedar Key School were often late afternoon deliveries and she asked for a location closer to Gainesville.

Immediately I thought of my daughter Emma who now teaches at my old school, just 20 minutes from Gainesville. The Reptmart lady researched time of delivery for that school and found that most deliveries there were by noon.
Perfect!

So we had the snake delivered to my daughter, much to the chagrin of the snakeyphobic office ladies there ...(who are great sports by the way!)

I tell you all these shipping details as evidence for the concern Reptmart has for the welfare of the animals they sell.

Zick arrived bright-eyed, active, and perky yesterday.
I could not wait to get home and meet her, so I zipped home as soon as I could.

She's beautifully marked, sweetly slithery, and very docile. Zick will spend this weekend at PFHQ getting acclimated to us, and then next week she will move into her new digs in my classroom.

You can expect frequent Zick updates as she gets busy growing and showing my students that snakes are not something to fear or loathe.

It's a big job, but I think she's up to it.

FRIENDLY REMINDER:
TOMORROW IS COASTAL CLEANUP DAY ACROSS FLORIDA!
CHIP IN IF YOU CAN!

THE COASTAL CLEANUP AT CEDAR KEY IS 8 AM TO 12:00 NOON. MEET AT THE BOAT BASIN DOWNTOWN.

JUST GOOGLE COASTAL CLEANUP AND YOUR COMMUNITY TO FIND OUT WHAT S GOING ON LOCALLY.

Goodbye Gopher

2011-09-15T07:00:00.004-05:00

Happier days.

For years, the gopher above was a regular, but not everyday sight as I left for work or returned home.
It lived about a half mile down from my mailbox, along my quiet country road.

I have stopped to shoo it off the road and back into the grassy shoulder about a dozen times, almost always in the late afternoon as I headed home from work.

My usual shooing plan involved pulling over into the tortoise's lane, stopping close to the gopher, and chastising it for being on the road ... complete with wagging, nagging finger.

For this, I would get a hiss and a gradual turn back to the shoulder.

Then, I'd head on to my driveway.

Here are the trails made by the daily foraging of this gopher. It's all right next to the road. I'm actually standing on the road to take this picture.

This is very close to the giant diamondback rattlesnake location which I posted about a few weeks ago.

No mystery there ... diamondbacks are just one of over a hundred species that use gopher burrows as a refuge.

If you follow the main trail up to the fence line, at the edge of a cutover piney wood, you can see the burrow entrance.

The white sand around the front is from tunnel excavating and is called an "apron".
Often this where a gopher will lay her eggs.
For reasons that will become clear soon enough, I'd like to think there are some small round eggs incubating there right now.

A few days ago, a flock of vultures flew up as I approached the gopher's territory.
"Let it be an armadillo", I thought as I slowed for a look.

It wasn't.
It was my gopher, crushed by a tire and dead.

This is an extremely quiet,isolated area with almost no traffic ... I think this was most likely an unintended death.

I know plenty of good people who still run over snakes (I said "good", not "perfect"), but for the life of me, I've never heard anyone say they purposefully run over turtles.

It could have been a case of distracted driving, texting, makeup adjustments, or a big log truck unable to safely swerve ... whatever the reason, I bet it was unintentional.

Goodbye, Gopher.

Whatever the reason, I'll miss the wonderful old lump of a reptile who made me stop and "shoo" on so many rides home after a long day in the classroom.

I wish I could have been a little bit earlier on this particular day.

If I squint real hard and try to see the bright side in this, there is a pretty sweet burrow left gopherless now, and just waiting to be claimed by a new tenant.

Perhaps one day soon, I'll turn the corner on to my road and find another stubborn gopher in need of a good chewing out.

I'd like that.

Shameless Teaser for tomorrow's post:

PHOTOS OF ZICK!

Baby Flying Squirrel

2011-09-14T02:43:00.003-05:00

A friend's pet cat decimated this baby flying squirrel's family and then brought this tiny baby into the house. Luckily, the friend intervened and rescued the tiny squirreling before any obvious damage was done.
Sigh ... as if I needed one more reason to dislike the domestic cat.

Anyway, Ms.Sara N. Dippity was looking out for this squirrel, because another friend of mine just happens to be a certified squirrel rehabilitation specialist with a passion for all things squirrelly.

And, I happen to work with the "Squirrel Woman", so the little flyer was transferred into the best hands possible today at school.

She said he's dehydrated and the youngest she has ever dealt with, but she will do her best.

I know she will, and that's good enough for me, whatever the final outcome.

The Ride Into Work

2011-09-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

Ho hum ... just another gorgeous sunrise at the Number 4 bridge in Cedar Key.
It's different everyday, but is consistent in it's gorgeousityness.

I rode Raptor Red in today and it was chilly as I zipped through miles of piney woods and cypress swamps, but within a mile of this bridge things warmed up considerably. By the time I slowed for the bridge, the light windbreaker I wore was feeling a little stuffy.

That's heat capacity for ya ... or more specifically, that's the power of water's HIGH heat capacity.

Speaking of water ... Florida's Coastal Cleanup day is this Saturday, the 17th of September.
I'm going to be out here helping clean up at Cedar Key. (8-12, meet at the boat launch downtown)

If you get a chance, join your local community in their own Coastal Cleanup Day.
Get wet, get dirty, get clean.

Hum V Butt

2011-09-10T09:08:00.000-05:00

Meanwhile ... at the feeder, conflict arose.

Lake Woodruff NWR, A Quiet Gem

2011-09-09T02:54:00.002-05:00

This is the way into Lake Woodruff National Wildlife Refuge.
The last time I was here was a winter visit over ten years ago. Now, the road in is paved and a security camera or two look down on the isolated parking area, but otherwise it feels just as it did on thse earlier visits.

The entry road passes through a lush cypress swamp. There's a wood duck nest box out there in all that green lifeyness.

After you park in the wooded parking lot, a series of dike trails are open for exploring. Like many NWR's that were designated to improve waterfowl populations, Woodruff uses a system of impoundments.
Each impoundment is surrounded by an elevated dike with flood gates and culverts so that water levels can be adjusted to best benefit migratory waterfowl.

Of course, you don't have to be a snowbird to reap the benefits of managed wetlands like these.

Because of my back road travel schedule, I landed at Lake Woodruff at the worst possible time to see critters.
Smack dab in the middle of a hot late August day.
I still walked the dikes, but not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.

Ok, maybe a bird or two, but not much else.
I didn't even see a gator.

This Tricolored Heron was busy chasing minnows near a culvert outflow.

The USFWS is busy improving the impoundments and beyond this point was "outta bounds" for visitors, so my walk was cut short.

This I was thankful for. I'll be back in the winter when the air is crisp and the impoundments are heavy with birds from distant regions of the country.

It's been a long time since I was here, but I remember clouds of snow geese ...

Triple D: Dad's Datil Doom

2011-09-07T00:55:00.003-05:00

Last November, I wrote this ...

"In my refrigerator is a datil experiment that is meant to mimic a Tabasco type sauce using datils.

I took bright orange, ripe datils and chopped them in a food processor.

Then, I combined the caustic orange goo with a little vinegar and salt.

I don't have oak barrels, so it's aging in a glass jar, but it smells wonderful when I pop the top to check it.
Months from now, I will process it again and then strain it for an orange liquid that I hope will be amazing.
I will let you know."

Well, it's time to let you know.

The fresh peppers on the right were just picked. THEY were off my best, most vigorous datil plants and they are the source of the seeds for the upcoming 2012 gardening season.

I didn't waste the fruits of course, they will be used to make some of our traditional tomato based datil pepper relish.

This post is really about the jar to the left.

It contains ripe datils from last year that were chopped in a food processor before being placed in that crock with vinegar and salt.

It's been curing in the fridge since November, and with a new crop of peppers pouring in, I chose yesterday to finish it off.

The photo above shows half of the aged pepper mix already reprocessed into a smooth sauce. On the right you can see the remaining half awaiting a turn in the food whacker.

I had thought I would strain it through cheese cloth, but cancelled that idea in favor of just giving it a heck of a puree ride in the processor.

I'm not afraid of the extra heat those seed will provide.

This sauce is going to stay in the fridge, hence the lack of canning equipment and boiling water.

I have a long list of things to add it to ... seriously considering wings as my first experiment.

Don't let the "DOOM" part scare ya'.

I dipped out a spoonful to taste test it and it was pretty damn wonderful.

Certainly good enough that the Pure Florida Crock Of Datil Fermentation will soon be curing a new batch in the fridge.

I have peppers coming out of my ears.

Not really.

That would be weird.

Blue Springs

2011-09-06T05:18:00.003-05:00

I used the Sunday after my reunion to do some exploring. If I left early, I could loop south on the way home and hit a handfull of parks that I had not seen in a long time.
One of these was Blue Springs State Park, near Deland.

It was a weekend day in the summer so the place was jam-packed and crazy ... well, crazy with people having a good time enjoying the spring and playing in the water.

I had to hang around for a gap in the foot traffic to catch the shot above with an empty trail.

I wasn't prepared to get in the water on this day, so I did my shooting from above the surface.

Florida has at least 4 "Blue Springs" that I can think of. It's a logical name for these beautiful aquifer access points.

At Blue Springs State Park, the park service seems to be doing a good job of managing large crowds while protecting the banks and vegetation.

It's harder to protect water quality in a spring as it can be affected by land use miles away from the actual spring site.

I have only been to this spring once or twice in my life, so I don't have the, "You should have seen that water 20 years ago" blues like I get when I go to Crystal River or Manatee Springs.

Ignorance is bliss in this case.

The spring had an impressive gar population.

Most passerby announced that these were "Alligator Gar", but they are a panhandle species mainly and not common on the peninsula.

It's kind of a rippley picture, but it looks like a "Longnose" to me.

This guy looks like an exotic PACU to me ... perhaps a red pacu.

Pacu are vegetarian pirannah shaped fish that are usually seen as tropical aquarium fish. They are a high value food fish in the Amazon basin and are being aquacultured in some areas.

I only saw this one.

Contrast that fact with the dozens of exotic blue tilapia using the spring and it makes me think that perhaps it is a single aquarium escapee.

Still, I only fish watched for a half hour, so my perception may not be reality.

That is often the case.

Trying To Reason With The Peak Of Hurricane Season

2011-09-04T10:34:00.001-05:00

Okay, hurricane season is getting serious, as it does every year around my Mom's birthday, so be sure you are ready.

Your hurricane shutters won't do you any good if they are rusted shut, or gunked up with mud dauber nests, wren nests, and a year's worth of windblown leaves and debris.

These shutters are on the house where I grew up in St. Augustine. Each year, either my brother or I do a clean and lube job on them so they can be shut securely with no last minute surprises.

This job consists of :

Walking around the house and zapping each wasp nest with wasp spray in a preemptive strike.
Next, old wren nests are cleaned out of the corners (this year there were 3).
Then the shutters, which fold accordian style, are opened and thoroughly lubed with WD-40 or something similar.
Latches are activated to make sure everything works and then they are secured in the open position until needed.

Don't let Katia (or her minions) be a Caught Ya ...

... unprepared that is.

Things Are Different Here In Cedar Key

2011-09-01T16:30:00.000-05:00

Like Mayberry with a dash of salt.

Does that photo capture the essence of a small island school or what?

It's an actual scene too, ... not staged.

That fishing pole sat there all day.

Oh yes, I'm loving it.

I'm working hard though ... hence the posting gaps this week.

I hope to catch up this weekend!

It's open house at school tonight and in about 30 minutes I should be meeting the parents who have been wondering, who is this new guy?

I think I'm ready.

Wish me "luck", or "break a leg", or whatever you deem useful!

What To Do If You Hook A Seaturtle

2011-08-29T13:49:00.000-05:00

What do you do if you accidently hook or snag a seaturtle while fishing in Florida?

The good news for both you and the seaturtles is ... it probably won't happen.

But, it might.

This young sea turtle swam too close to one of our lures and snagged a flipper. We were not able to remove the hook from his tough scaley, skin while he was in the water due to his efforts to swim away, so I used the dip net to lift him in to the boat for the 10 seconds Denny needed to pop the hook loose.

In no time this little guy was back in the water hunting the grassflats and avoiding the tiger sharks who hunt him.

The FWC (Florida Wildlife Commission) has specific guidelines for dealing with a hooked seaturtle. It turns out that we unknowingly followed them by applying common sense along with a sense of urgency in getting the turtle back into the ocean quickly and with minimal stress.

The actual guidelines can be found here.

Snagging a turtle is a pretty rare event, but if you are out there often enough, it could happen.

Check out the link above for more information.

Anyone who thinks turtles are slow has never seen a sea turtle kick it into high gear.

Watch the short video below to see what I mean.

Post Reunion ... The Slow Way Home

2011-08-28T11:01:00.000-05:00

Well, ... no, not that slow.

I wish.

If you dropped in for my last post, you know I've been at my high school reunion this weekend.

It was a blast and miraculously ... no one had changed a bit.
Everyone looked exactly like their yearbook pictures ... it was pretty amazing.

Of course, we all grew up in a town with the REAL Fountain of Youth, so it's really NOT that surprising.

Sorry, no pictures today to prove that claim ... I took a blue million pics last night, but almost all of them were on other people's cameras.

"Here, take one with mine."

"Mine too."

"Mine is the big one by my purse."

And ... there is the issue of courtesy. I think my friends deserve the chance to OK any photo I would post here, so perhaps in a future post ...

It was a heck of a lot of fun though and I look forward to the next one in about 5 years.

The class of '76 has too much fun together to wait ten years between reunions.

We are on the 5 year plan.

Right now, I'm somewhere on SR 40 west of Ormond Beach using McDonalds' wifi and sipping their excellent ice tea (unsweetened of course).

I've got my Florida State Park Pass in my pocket and plan to hit a string of parks in the DeLand area ... Blue Springs, DeLeon Springs, maybe Lake Woodruff NWR, and who knows after that.

Whatever happens on the slow ride home, you know I'll share it with you.

Now, the JEEP is calling.

Gotta go.

Pinkularity

2011-08-26T15:35:00.003-05:00

Roadside scenery on the way home from work.

How could one not stop for spoonbills?
I could not resist.
The Jeep rolled to a stop on the skinny road shoulder and I stepped out expecting them to fly away, but the just kept preening, yawning, and quietly honking in a nasally, ibissy way.

Oh, and there was stretching too.

Today, if they are there, I will have to resist the call of the pink.

It's that time again ...

I'm off to my high school class reunion.

SAHS Class of 1976, I'll see you at the White Lion for happy hour.

Shade Hawk

2011-08-24T06:28:00.002-05:00

This young red-shouldered hawk may have been born this year, but he wasn't born yesterday ... notice he's smart enough to get out of the heat and into some shade.

I took these photos a few weeks ago when the pond was almost dry (again). The hawk was perched in a willow that overlooked the two tiny puddles. It was a pretty good ambush spot for thirsty birds and randy frogs that were attracted by the promise of water.

I think things are quite different down at the pond right now, because we had a whopper of a thunderstorm last night with wall rattling thunder and torrential rains.

I was not allowed to go out during the storm and check out the pond water levels, but I will today after work.

I know the frogs were really singing as the rain fell in torrents, so I am expecting to find actual water in my pond.

On The Road Again

2011-08-22T06:10:00.002-05:00

Well, it's that time again.

Time to head back to school for another year of teaching and learning.

I learn so much on this job.

And ... while I will be the new guy at Cedar Key, daughter Emma will be the VERY new teacher at my old school.

Hard to say who will have the biggest butterflies in their stomachs, but I'm thinking mine are a wee bit smaller than hers.

However the first day may go for this father and daughter teaching team, we both know relief is waiting at the end of the day ... waiting patiently for us to return.

Nothing like a Bear snuffle to make you feel rejuvenated and ready to do it again.

Frog Egg Soup

2011-08-19T06:19:00.000-05:00

Well, it's that time of year again when I like to make Frog Egg Soup.

Here's how I do it.

First, find yourself a pond with frog eggs in it.

(Note: You can substitute salamander eggs, but you need to change the name of your soup.)

Gather up a bowlful of those delicous black eggs and head back to the kitchen.

Set the frog eggs aside and make a good soup base. I like to use onion, bell pepper, datil peppers, garlic, and bay. Toss in some salt, black pepper, cumin, and a dash of oregano.

Cook this down until the veggies are soft and the flavors are blended.

Add the liquid of your choice to finalize the blending and bring the deliciousness up off the pot bottom.

You can use broth, water, a little wine ... I like to use this golden fizzy water that comes in bottles.

After that, all you have to do is pour in the frog egg centers, add a little more water to soupify it, and stir it occasionally.

Did I mention you need to shell the eggs while the veggies were cooking? ... No?

Well, you do.

Just take each egg individually and squeeze gently until the clear gel "shell" pops off.

That's all there is to Frog Egg Soup.

If you think this sounds good, you should hear my recipe for Hoppin' John.