Category Florida Critter Stories

Quest for the purple gallinule
Seeing the purple gallinule has been a quest of mine for some time. If you’ve not seen a gallinule, they are quite a visual treat. With their bright purple-blue, green-turquoise feathers they don’t seem real. They have bright red and yellow beaks with a turquoise head marking. Only once had I seen and photographed […]

Osprey Fishing: Bentfeather
If you have ever witnessed the beauty of an osprey fishing, then you will know it is an amazing moment when the osprey emerges from the water with a fish. The osprey circle above water looking into the depths for a fish. Once they see a fish, they dive into the water to grasp it with […]

Walking La Chua Trail
Walking the La Chua Trail always is a nature treat. The 1.5-mile walk to an observation platform takes you on a path through Paynes Prairie State Park. My most recent visit to La Chua Trail provided a variety of wildlife. Alligators slowly cruised through the waterways or were sunning on the banks — or sometimes were […]

Squirrels in my car’s engine
As I was cleaning off an old, slow computer, I found some photos that reminded me of my experience with squirrels. About 10 years ago, I was driving home from work and all the lights in my dashboard suddenly started blinking and going rather wild. I continued the 5 minutes home wondering what was wrong […]

Didgeridoo Mouthpiece: Searching for Organic Beeswax
It is not easy to find “organic beeswax” in Gainesville. After driving to many different stores that you’d think would carry organic beeswax, I returned home to the search the Web. And found Cross Creek Honey Company, a local provider in Cross Creek. I had associated Cross Creek with Marjorie Kinnan-Rawlings, the author of […]

Earth, Wind & Fire: Bead Soup Blog Hop
It’s my second time to participate in the Bead Soup Blog Hop. You can read here about the first time. For the 8th Annual Bead Soup Blog Hop, I decided to commemorate it by woodturning Mandi (my partner) and myself “bead soup bowls.” Sorry but I did forget to take pictures both of what I sent and […]

Weaving with Spanish Moss: Tales & Details, Part 2
If you are unfamiliar with the critter that crawled from my Spanish Moss sample, you can read Part 1 here. The story does end as you would expect it — without a glowing review of class decorum . The principal would return to conduct a another review when there would be no disruptions. Specifically: Everyone would remain at […]

Florida Critter Stories: Desire to Weave Spanish Moss
Spanish Moss — grayish green wisps that drip and sway from trees. The moss has held me in its spell for some years now. It is the stuff of movies and wonderful mood photographs. Yet, in some sense is so ethereal no one notices it. I have my own stories of Spanish Moss. I write […]