Oscar (Not Grouch)

Some of you may be getting tired of the pictures from the airshow, so just for a change of pace, here are some pictures from my trip out Sunday. I visited Oscar Scherer State Park, which is just south of Sarasota on US 41. Not sure why I'd never been, but it may have had something to do with the $4 cover charge. But once I got in, there was plenty to see and do. The shot above is the beautiful blossom of the coral bean plant. They are absolutely gorgeous when they are in bloom, but the rest of the year they are the sort of thing you hire lawn people to get rid of. They are composed of long thorny stems that will hurt you if you are unlucky enough to run into one. But those flowers...

The caterpillars above seemed to be really enjoying the fern they had just devoured, crawling up and down each stem to make sure they hadn't left anything edible behind.

They say that beauty is where you find it, and also in the eye of the beholder, so that may be two strikes against this little scene. What you are looking at is the aftermath of a forest fire on a palmetto bush. The fire killed part of a new frond that hadn't emerged from the stalk of the plant yet. That's the brown part of the fan. The green part you see survived the fire. Then the whole thing sprouted, and voila! I think it makes for a nice picture, with the juxtaposition of the two colors like that.