Dear Tweetians,

I better get to this report on my Florida trip or it'll slip on by. Nancy
Taylor and I met in Orlando where we went by my boyhood home in the College
Park area. We birded down through Central Florida to Sanibel Island where we
stayed for four days.This was my first visit to Florida since moving to the
Northwest in 1959. Needless to say, there is no way the mind can prepare
itself for the onslaught of "progress." Orlando, and the entire state for
that matter, has been assaulted by a population explosion. Too much asphalt,
too many cars, too many massive religious edifices and temples to mindless
"entertainment," and bodies, bodies, bodies. No new news, I'm sure, but the
sense of sadness for what I remember was palpable throughout the trip. But
we still had a great trip, with a good balance between birding and beach
time. Temperatures 80-85 degrees daytime, 65-70 nights; water temp, 74. A
couple of light showers at night (Florida is in the middle of a prolonged
drought. We speculated that may have accounted for our low numbers of marsh
birds).

With a modicum of planning we were able to visit areas where the native
ecology is being preserved. And we saw some good birds. The final tally
shows 114 species, with 49 life birds for me (fewer for Nancy who has taken
some Eastern birding trips over the last few years). We visited Avon Park
area, Lake Arbuckle, Placid Lake area, Sanibel Island, and several state
parks (Highland Hammock, Oscar Scherrer, Myakka River, and Saddle Creek).
Some highlight experiences stand out. On a daily basis we were seeing
hundreds, even thousands of Turkey and Black Vultures. The sky was thick
with them. They may have been assembling for migration. Some seemed to be
kettling and beginning to moving north, but our overall impression was we
were probably seeing wintering populations. We also could not help but
notice that the Osprey population has rebounded to what we would guess must
be pre-DDT days. In virtually every location, more often than not we would
see occupied nests and birds actively hunting. A memorable sight on the
Sanibel beach was watching an Osprey (with those dramatic black and white
markings) take an 18" Sheepshead Perch (with vertical black and white
stripes) immediately offshore, then making a beeline back to the nest with
the fish still wiggling vigorously. What a view, what a way to go. We also
had a really tame, mated pair of Red-shouldered Hawks at the Bailey Tract of
the "Ding" Darling Refuge on Sanibel. One of them landed in a small tree not
15' away and watched us watching it for a good 15 minutes. We actually
walked away from it. Can't wait to see if our photos turn out. Later, one of
the same pair took a snake on the trail about 50' in front of us. Also saw a
Bobcat take a rabbit in the Placid Lake area, plus alligators, dolphins,
turtles, a Yellow-crowned Night Heron at night on the beach by the edge of
the surf under an almost full moon, not 5' away. AHD, the tropics.

Overall, I would say the best birds for me were migratory passerines that we
saw primarily in the inland areas. The water birds are dramatic and very
popular, but hunting down the small guys moving through pine/palmetto/oak
scrub in migratory waves is more satisfying to my mind. Overall, the best
birds for me were: 3 vireos (Blue-headed, White-eyed, Thick-billed); 6
warblers (Pine, Palm, Prairie, Yellow-throated, Black-and-white, Northern
Parula); Florida Scrub Jay; Limpkin; Glossy, White-faced, and White Ibis;
Reddish, Little Blue, and Tri-colored Heron; Roseate Spoonbill; Wilson's
Plover; Sandwich, Royal, Common, and Least Tern; Zenaida, Eurasian
Collared-, White-winged, and Common Ground-Dove;Swallow-tailed Kite; Crested
Caracara; Red-shouldered, and Short-tailed Hawk. Migration was just getting
underway, and in the future I want to take a trip to a landfall site
somewhere along the Gulf coast and witness that fallout phenomena. That's on
my "still to do" list.

Eyes to the skies,
Joe Mackie
jmackie at cc.wwu.edu
Bellingham