Merritt Island trip nets two new birds and some familiar ones
Roger Simmons,
With the addition of two new birds that I spotted on Sunday at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, my Bird Catalog total now is 120.
The two newcomers came from high and low.
There’s the Great Horned Owl, who I spotted off in the distance up high. And there’s a little Killdeer, who was wading around below the road in a marsh area.
The Great Horned Owl was hanging out in a pine tree near Blair’s Cove and Haulover Canal when I first saw it. As I mentioned, it was pretty far away – and even with my Sigma 150-600mm lens, I didn’t get as clear a shot as I would have liked.
The Killdeer was with a group of other shore birds in a marsh along the Black Point Wildlife Drive. The others flew away, but this one was content to let me take its photo.
I almost wonder if it had a nest nearby since it seemed to feign an injured wing at one point. That’s a trademark of this bird; when it wants to try to lure intruders away from its nest, it pretends it’s injured.
And, though not new to me, I saw more Green Herons on this trip than I have ever seen before. There’s a hatchery along the Black Point Drive where adults, juveniles and very young Green Herons were hanging out.
Overall, even with it being the slow summertime for birding, it was a great trip. And I saw some creature that weren’t birds at all.
The first thing that came to my mind when seeing them was how prehistoric they look, like some character out of one of the Jurassic Park franchise movies.
The Lake Eola swans have been iconic symbols of downtown Orlando’s central park for more than 100 years. Last weekend I went to the park to photograph the swans, which prompted me to learn more about them.