Skywatch Friday: Jupiter Beach at Night

At this beach in July I saw my first Green Sea Turtle. She performed two false crawls before heading back into the water. The scarp was just too steep for her to climb. I'm sure with the tide coming in she was able to nest farther north on the beach. To check out other great Skywatch Friday posts make sure you visit their website!

Night Frog

This little guy was hanging out at our water spigot at the Kissimee Prairie State Park. I went to brush my teeth and found a cute Green Treefrog instead. I scared him off the faucet and after closer inspection I think it decided to escape me by ducking into a hole in the PVC.

Caught on Camera

While uploading photos of that alligator on Monday I noticed that a few more night sensor camera shots have come out over the past few months. These also were all taken during the day and they show a nice variety of birds that can bee seen at Green Cay.

Great pose of a Mottled Duck.

Curious White Ibis.

A feeding Wood Stork.

A personal favorite, a young Little Blue Heron.

This sight will be all too common this summer as all the Mottled Ducks start having babies and leading them all about the wetlands.

Gator Stroll

I thought this was a great capture on our night vision motion sensor camera. That's one good looking gator on a walk. My guess on the purple color, the gator tripped the flash during the day which caused the colors to be off....either that or we have purple alligators roaming the wetlands.

Keys, Quite An Adventure

When friends arrive at your doorstep and say "Let's go to the Keys!" You don't argue, you merely pack your bags, call in sick, and hit the road. That's what happened when my favorite Orlando girls rolled into town. Due to my work schedule it would be just an overnighter but I knew it would certainly be worth it.

We arrived early afternnon at Bahia Honda State Park where we would be staying with one of the park rangers, Joey. As you can see in the photo above the man always has a smile on his face and per his reputation, he showed us a great time. While most of the group went with him into town for groceries, Amber and I hit the kayaks.

Joey has his own small kayak launch where we paddled out to Bare Beach. This was a great stretch of Mangrove habitat. Amber and I had some fun walking around picking up trash and exploring the shallow areas for wildlife. On the sand flats where a few dowitchers, one Reddish Egret, and some Willets.

By this time it was late afternoon and the water was like a hot bathtub. We decided to forego swimming and took a leisurely paddle back to the house.

As the sun starting sinking into the horizon Joey informed us of a surprise he had in store for our afternoon. Previously that morning he had dug up a sea turtle nest and found three stragglers alive. We were set to release them at sunset. So off we hopped into the car to release the turtles. First we took a detour to fold the flags and pick up the babies.

For those that know me, it comes as no surprise that this was a lifetime experience. I fell in love with sea turtles as a young girl and it possibily could be the main reason I went into the science field. So with great pleasure I held the baby Loggerhead Sea Turtle, let it crawl on the sand, and then scooped it up to release it out into the warm waters of the Gulf.

All photos in this post were taken by Amber Lovelace.

This certainly was one of the highlights of the trip but the party was no where near over. After a great meal we went swimming in the bioluminescence and stared up at the Milky Way. I love swimming in the ocean at night, especially on clear nights when the stars cease to end. We had a late night of celebrating and the next day we were slow to rise. But eventually we made it out to do some snorkeling before heading home. All in all, the trip was one of the highlights of summer. I wish I could have stayed longer but there's always next time.

Just remember folks, if they ask you to go to the Keys, don't turn down the offer. You will find no better place to relax. It really is like a tropical paradise, especially if you have the right friends and a cold beer to drink.

Green Cay Night Action

Most people don't believe we have Bobcats until they see them lurking about the parking lot. Of course you have to be here at the right time of day to see them hunting the rats and rabbits that frequent Green Cay. More likely you are to find their scat trails on the wetland berm. We have ramps that they love to mark on a weekly basis and wouldn't you know it, that's where we keep our game cameras. Above you'll see our resident cat and below is a photo of our more common raccoon.

Green Cay Game Cam

We have two game cameras on on the wetlands that provide us with night vision shots. They also give us some nice daytime shots as well like the ones above. The first is of a Cattle Egret which oddly enough we rarely see at Green Cay. The Limpkin has a much more steadfast presence and right now we have a pair with 6 babies. And lastly is a nice raccoon shot. They really like to dig holes in the muddy berm area where this photo was taken.

Tomorrow come back to see a couple of night shots including our favorite feline.

Night Shots

We have a healthy Bobcat population at Green Cay. Often visitors see them on the habitat islands or even in the parking lot. For the past couple of weeks we haven't had any sightings so we installed a night camera on the Bobcat's favorite scat marking area. Here is what we found, our Bobcat at the marking area. It was seen at 10:04PM and later again at 2:33AM. It's good to know that these guys are still around. Now if we could only have more kittens next spring!