It may not be a pretty flower, but it's a little exotic. I don't know the name of it, but the little group of plants you see here are some sort of orchid. Each of the bulbs is an individual plant, and each one sprouts a single leaf. Later on in the year, each of these will put out a single sprig of flowers. The only place I've ever seen these is along the Manatee River in the Desoto National Memorial in Bradenton, FL.
You don't live in Florida for very long without getting very close to some alligators. I stumbled across this guy at the Ding Darling National Wildlife Refuge on Sanibel Island here in Florida. I didn't hang around him any longer than it took to get this picture.
Another day, another hawk. Pretty much every week, I see hawks on the way home. Today, as usual, it was this red-shoulder fellow. I don't know if it's always the same one, or one of the same pair. I sort of doubt it. I think it's a couple of different pair, or maybe even three pair. Anyhow, here's a not-so-exciting, non-action shot, but at least you can see the banding on the tail quite clearly. Enjoy!
As part of an ongoing tradition, here's another marvelous sunrise scarred by some inconvenient power lines. This was the view this morning from work. It was more spectacular in person, but I wasn't able to catch it with my lens. I know some of you folks don't like it when I point out the faults with my own pictures, but they really stand out to me.
I noticed in my logs that someone had run my blog through a translator. I'd never thought to do that. So if you're curious, have a look at what I might sound like in Spanish. Or German, perhaps. How about French? You didn't know I was so literate, did you? Not bad for a boy who's only left the country once. Wait, you haven't seen anything yet. Chinese, Japanese, Korean? I'm all over the place! (OK, so those don't work so well if you don't have the correct language packs and fonts installed.) Back to some countries that use the western alphabet. Here's Italian & Portuguese. Why don't they have Russian? I wish I had a picture to go with this.
Just in time for St. Valentine's Day, a blossoming bombax tree for your enjoyment. Those flowers are about 6" across, and the bud below is almost three inches tall.
Here's another great sunset for all my fans out there (both of you). This is Egmont Key in Tampa Bay, Florida. You can see the small lighthouse out on the island, and if you look closely, it's lit! I don't know how many pictures I had to take to get one where the light was pointed in the right direction. There are no bridges to this island, you have to take a ferry to visit it. This shot was taken from Ft. Desoto, which has been very well documented here on the blog.
Here are some more flowering trees to show you what life is like in Florida in the winter. I shot these a couple of weekends ago out on Longboat Key. These clusters of red flowers are on an African Tulip Tree (Spathodea Companulata). It took me a long time to figure out what the name of the tree was, but sometimes you just get lucky and happen to stumble across a name. It also helps to have a little competition. (Big thanks to you-know-who-you-are!) I've only ever seen these trees in one place in front of a resort out on Longboat, the red ones on one side of the road, and a single yellow-blossomed tree on the other. I may have thrown a shot of this same flower up on the blog last year sometime in hopes that someone could identify it, but I can't find that post now, and no one ever offered any help. (Ha! Found it!)
They say the devil is in the details, but evidently, so are the dolphins. The shot above is one of the many pictures I took Sunday. I shot it only a few minutes later than this other shot I showed you yesterday that I felt was much better. This shot was from up on a bridge about 60 feet above the waterline, and I thought it would be nice with the boat leaving a sharp white trail across the green water. It wasn't as nice as I wanted, so I breezed past it when posting last night. But today I flip by it again and notice something that I missed before. Look in the water down beneath the boat. Yep, there's a dolphin in there. You can clearly see him in the detail below. He's there in the shot before this one as well (but only as a vague shadow in the water), but not in the next shot. Those shots are only separated by about a third of a second, so this guy is fast! It was only last week that I got a semi-decent dolphin picture, so maybe my marine mammal luck is changing.
This week's calendar page is the Cleveland skyline. I think I shot this from the Hope Memorial Bridge, which was named after Bob Hope's father. Small world, I know...
As promised below, here's that same tree again, only this time it sports a pair of ospreys. Pretty rare to see two of them together like this, outside of a nest. There was a crowd of people gathered along the side of the road, all pointing and shooting pictures. I'd have loved to capture one or both of these birds hunting like I did before, but no such luck.
And the birds just keep coming. Here's a wood stork. These have to be one of the ugliest birds out there. I've seen buzzards I thought were more attractive than these fellows.
There's just something about birds that fascinates me. Here's an ibis. No, I didn't go to Egypt, this ibis comes from Ft. Desoto, south of St. Pete. Same place as the pelican just below.
Notice how this pelican has a dark head? That means it's a juvenile. As he gets older, it'll turn white. I'm getting much better at taking pictures of birds on the wing, don't you think? It's taken long enough.
It may not be a hawk on the wing like I got up in Ohio, but I think the composition on this one is pretty impressive. Yep, that's the moon you see behind this red-shouldered hawk. He was sitting in a dead tree up at Ft. Desoto near St. Pete today. You'll see this same tree again later tonight, if I don't get bored with posting early.
It's February, but it's Florida, so the trees are starting to bloom. Hard to believe, but true.
I've been looking at these trees for years, and I think today is the first time I've noticed the yellow centers on these blossoms. The flowers always look beatup for some reason, not sure why. I'm also not sure of the name. I know I used to know it, but I seem to be drawing a blank right now. I spot this at the credit union this morning. Gotta love flowers at the bank. Later in the year they get yellow flowers, too.
"Because the sky is blue, it makes me cry"-The Beatles.
(I've been waiting forever to use that quote. I had to find just the right picture.) This was the view along the northern approach of the Sunshine Skyway this morning. I love my polarizing filter.
