Sad eagle news in Pinellas county. But all is not lost.

Eagle followers in Pinellas county received bad news earlier this week. The baby eaglet from Tierre Verde, just outside of Fort Desoto Park, died on Monday. It had been flying for several weeks now. Florida Fish and Wildlife have taken the eaglet and will perform test to see if they can determine what happened. I've always read 40% of baby eagles don't survive but it's still so sad. Someone from the St. Petersburg Audubon posted on facebook that out of the 48 baby eagles that were born in Pinellas county this spring, this is the 2nd one that has died. I didn't hear what happened to the first one. I guess the county is beating the statistics so far. Here is my post of the pictures I had taken when the baby was still on the nest - Fort Desoto eagle post.

Below are pictures of the baby eagles at the St. Petersburg cemetery taken a few weeks ago. Both babies are just starting to flap their wings. By now they are probably flying from tree to tree. We're all holding our breath these eagles make it.

Bald eagle family at Honeymoon Island

Parent sitting in a nearby tree.

I don't know what it was watching.

One of the babies standing on the nest.

One baby was trying to talk to the other one (who is hiding behind the pine needles).

The other baby did not move from this spot.

This is probably  my last check on the eagle family at Honeymoon Island. Both babies seem to be doing fine and they are probably flying by now. This was taken two weeks ago. The nest is closed off by more than 500 feet (which is the legal limit on public land). It's probably more like 800 feet. This family was far away and the pictures are extremely cropped. During my visit, one of the parents flew into a tree that was closer to the trail. It sat there for a few minutes and was watching something. Eventually it flew off into the distance. I do want to go back to check on the osprey nests in the next couple of weeks but by then the eagles will probably be gone.  Oh well, until next year!

Audubon Center for Birds of Prey

This barred owl had so much personality. The trainer would talk to him and he would look at her with these amazing expressions.

Injured hawk was recouping outside.

Female american kestrel was a permanent resident.

A male kestrel.

This little screech owl is missing an eye.

Barn owls in their home at the center.

The eagle above has a twisted beak.

After my stop at Gatorland in Orlando, I decided to drive north to visit the Audubon Center for Birds of Prey in Maitland. It was just outside of downtown Orlando. I had read so many articles about injured eagles and other birds being taken there that I wanted to see the place. There's a handful of large enclosures for permanent residents. In the back you see the even larger flight rehab buildings but you cannot go in those buildings. They don't want the recuperating birds exposed to visiting humans which makes sense. The place sits on a small lake and you can walk on a boardwalk out over the lake to a small covered dock. It was nice sitting out there resting for a while. These guys stay busy helping injured birds. Stop by there if you are ever in Orlando. 

Audubon Center for Birds of Prey

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Springtime Ducks

Today was the first off day that I had in a long while that was sunny and not pouring down rain. I had to get out and do some birding. The water is still very high just about everywhere, conditions that are very favorable for good water birds.

There were many coots walking around on the grass at the beach when I arrived at the lake. There were also a good deal of people walking around with dogs, but luckily for a change they were all on leashes. The birds only seemed to pay moderate attention to them.

Scanning the large flock of coots revealed about a dozen or so Bufflehead mixed in.

Male Bufflehead

The males were displaying and chasing one another.

And the females were uninterested of course...

After watching the Buffleheads, I rescanned the flock and found my first of the year/season Blue-winged Teal!

Blue-winged Teal

One decided to start swimming towards to me!

The teal came all the way up to the shore and stared me down, as if to say "I know I am a handsome duck, so quit staring at me!"

I preceded to walk along the shore, looking for birds and rescanning the flock of coots. I noticed 3 Bald Eagles flying high above the lake. Also, my FOS Double-crested Cormorants and Bonapartes Gulls. Scoping out the lake revealed a huge raft of ducks consisting mostly of scaup and bufflehead.

A group of highschool rowers started to pile into the park, so I decided to head for the car. That is when I noticed this sad sight:

A Ring-billed Gull with a lure stuck in its neck. There really wasn't anything that I could do, as the bird spooked and starting swimming to the middle of the lake. This is why fishermen should try to prevent the snapping of line as much as possible. However, I didn't have to end the day on this sad note. As I was getting near the car, my FOS Tree Swallows came out of nowhere and were flying all around me. Spring is here!

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Eagles at Fort Desoto

Another baby eagle family near Fort Desoto. These are extremely cropped. The nest is across the lake and there's no way around the lake.

The only baby's thinking "What are you looking at?"

Flock of white pelicans circling around Fort Desoto.

Snowy egret posing on the fishing pier.

There's always a lot of great egrets on the pier.

Great blue heron flying into the lake.

I can't go to the Fort Desoto fishing pier and not take pictures of dolphins.

It's that time of the year. Warmer days means heading to the beach at Fort Desoto park. Recently, we had our first real warm day and the hubby and I headed out.  Our first stop was the duck ponds just outside of the park. There's an eagle's nest across the pond. As we drove near it you could see all of the photographers standing on the side of the road with their big lenses pointed at the nest. We got out and I took a handful of pictures. We waited for about an hour but the other mate didn't return.  Another photographer said the mate did not return until noon the day before so we left and headed to the beach.

After a picnic lunch on the beach, I walked down to the fishing pier. In the past you would see lots of pelicans swimming around the pier. It's a good place to practice birds in flight photography and pelicans diving for food photography. No such luck on this day. For some reason there wasn't a single pelican around. The fishermen didn't seem to be catching much either so maybe that's why.



Birds at Lowry Park Zoo

Found this little sparrow on a railing.

Wild great egrets are starting to nest over the alligator exhibit at the zoo.

Permanently injured eagles live at the zoo. This is the first time I've seen them this close together.

Mates.

Love was in the air at the lorikeet exhibit. They were all busy preening each other.

Pink flamingo in the African aviary.

There's always something interesting to find at the Lowry Park Zoo. When my sister came to visit recently from South Dakota we spent an afternoon at the zoo. She was excited to be outside in the warm weather. It felt like spring. I was anxious to see if any of the blue herons were nesting over the alligator exhibit. There was no sign of them there but it's still a month or two early for them. There are a handful of great egrets nesting high up in the trees already. Last year blue herons filled the small palm trees along the exhibit with nests and by May there were baby blues everywhere. I'll check back in another month.

Baby eagle getting fed - Skywatch Friday

  

Eagle parent in the nest.

Juvenile eagle flying overhead. I don't know where he came from. He started flying around in circles over the nest and then took off.

Parent chasing off the juvenile eagle intruder.

Parent sitting on a snag close by the nest.

Parent sitting on the nest with the baby thinking "Where's that bird with the fish?"

Feeding the baby.

There are 2 babies on the nest but I could only see the one on the left.

Baby says "Yuck Dad, this taste like chicken." Dad probably said "That's cause it is chicken."

I left work early on the Friday before President's day. Since I had about 2 hours before dark I decided to check on the eagle's nest in the cemetery in St. Petersburg. When I got there I could see one little baby eagle head sticking up and looking around. There are two babies in the nest but I could really only see one baby. The other was sitting lower in the nest and a couple of times I could see the top of it's fuzzy head. One of the parents flew in right before dark with a fish and I was able to get a couple of pictures with the parent feeding the baby. These pictures were highly cropped. I think the babies were about 2-3 weeks old when I took these pictures. They are about 6-7 weeks old now. They are usually gone from the nest for good around 20 weeks so I'm going to try and check back every couple of weeks to see them grow up. 

It started getting dark and I had to meet the hubby for dinner so I left the eagle family and headed back to Tampa. The moon was hanging over the bay so I stopped on the access road on the causeway and snapped the below. It was a beautiful night out.

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American Oystercatchers and an eagle - Skywatch Friday

American oystercatcher on an oyster bed. I took this from the car. These birds are very skittish. If I had stopped the car and got out he would have been gone in seconds after I opened the door.

He's like "Hey dude, turn around, she wants to take our picture."

Bald eagle sitting on the causeway light post.

I was crossing the Courtney Campbell Causeway from Tampa into Clearwater on a recent Sunday afternoon and just happened to have my camera in the car. I'm usually on the lookout for osprey on the light posts. There are always a handful across the causeway. I did a double take when I saw the above sitting on the post with cars flying by underneath. When I got to the end of the causeway I turned around and came back on the access road. I was able to snap a couple of pictures before the eagle flew off. Then I noticed the large flock of oystercatchers sitting on the side of the access road and had to take a few pictures of them. I wonder how many other people driving by noticed that was an eagle sitting there. I'm thinking it must be one of the Safety Harbor eagles. I see them at Philippe Park but haven't found their nest yet.

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