Nature Photography (Formally Spring is in the Air)

[Gwangi]

The desert shots are beautiful, between the fossils and snakes and lizards I could almost consider moving to the south west. But then I would miss the trees, and water.

I have a quite a few snake, frog, salamander and other pictures to share. It's spring here, with amphibians mating and what not. IfI didn't have to upload my pictures on Photobucket I would be more inclined to share. It's a time consuming and tedious process.

[laticauda]

Spring is here, ducks have invaded my back yard.

[Doug Watson]

The desert shots are beautiful, between the fossils and snakes and lizards I could almost consider moving to the south west. But then I would miss the trees, and water.

I have a quite a few snake, frog, salamander and other pictures to share. It's spring here, with amphibians mating and what not. IfI didn't have to upload my pictures on Photobucket I would be more inclined to share. It's a time consuming and tedious process.

Yes, once the water bottles are empty it is pretty much time to suck on a cactus!

It is amazing by my count you are only about 377 KM and a 3.5 hour drive south and you are easily a month if not more ahead of us up here. We still have ice on the water. It is amazing what getting a little closer to the equator can do for you.

Photobucket is the only way that works for me as well and it does take a heck of a long time. I find myself doing it late at night and uploading here in the morning.

[Doug Watson]

Spring is here, ducks have invaded my back yard.

Mallards will take over the world! I see them everywhere, we saw them down in California and Nevada! At Disneyland my daughter almost got nailed by a pair coming in to land. It was the one time in my life I was able to yell "Duck!" and meant it both ways!

[Halichoeres]

I'm inspired to share some pictures from the last time I was in the desert. Forgive the photos--I've never owned a camera, so these are all from my old phone. It did some jobs reasonably well, but it did others extremely poorly.

White-tailed deer, southeast Arizona. Believe it or not, this is the best of more than a dozen pictures I tried to take of her at dusk.


Cholla cactus in bloom near Tucson. Look, but don't touch. My brother once flew off his bike at the bottom of a steep hill, right into a patch of these. Another time I stepped on a segment getting out of someone's swimming pool. My brother's story wins, of course.


Joshua tree in Joshua Tree National Park about 200 km from Los Angeles.


Desert bighorns, Zion National Park in southern Utah. Again, the least-worst of several pictures. One crossed the road right in front of me, but I only managed to get a picture of its feet.


Abert's squirrel at the Grand Canyon. My phone had atrocious zoom, so I took this picture through one lens of my binoculars.


I'd welcome an ID on this lizard in the middle of eating what I think is a cricket. South rim, Grand Canyon if that helps. My guess is something in the  Sceloporus undulatus complex.


Some kind of penstemon. Southern Utah.


It had weird leaves!


Greater short-horned lizard, Mesa Verde National Park, southwestern Colorado. My friend's hand.


Velvet ant! We didn't pick it up.

[Gwangi]

The desert shots are beautiful, between the fossils and snakes and lizards I could almost consider moving to the south west. But then I would miss the trees, and water.

I have a quite a few snake, frog, salamander and other pictures to share. It's spring here, with amphibians mating and what not. IfI didn't have to upload my pictures on Photobucket I would be more inclined to share. It's a time consuming and tedious process.

Yes, once the water bottles are empty it is pretty much time to suck on a cactus!

It is amazing by my count you are only about 377 KM and a 3.5 hour drive south and you are easily a month if not more ahead of us up here. We still have ice on the water. It is amazing what getting a little closer to the equator can do for you.

Photobucket is the only way that works for me as well and it does take a heck of a long time. I find myself doing it late at night and uploading here in the morning.

Yup, and the people down in New Jersey and Maryland are a month ahead of me! It really is amazing. I guess the distance really is farther than we comprehend, vehicles make us seem much closer than we actually are. I remember when I went to Philly in October some years ago. Most of our leaves were dropping, most of theirs were still green. When we came back home there was snow on the ground!

Photobucket slows my computer right down. So many advertisements. My poor cheap laptop can't handle it. I wish this forum had the capacity to upload photos directly.

[Doug Watson]

I'd welcome an ID on this lizard in the middle of eating what I think is a cricket. South rim, Grand Canyon if that helps. My guess is something in the  Sceloporus undulatus complex.

Greater short-horned lizard, Mesa Verde National Park, southwestern Colorado. My friend's hand.

My guess on the lizard would be Plateau Fence Lizard (Sceloporus tristichus) but just like my lizard I can't be sure.

I was hoping to see my first "Horny Toad" that would have been neat and to hold it too! Sweet!

[Gwangi]

I forgot to mention how cool the shots of the horned toad and velvet ant are. It's a shame horned toads don't make for good captives, I wouldn't mind having one.

[Halichoeres]

I'd welcome an ID on this lizard in the middle of eating what I think is a cricket. South rim, Grand Canyon if that helps. My guess is something in the  Sceloporus undulatus complex.

Greater short-horned lizard, Mesa Verde National Park, southwestern Colorado. My friend's hand.

My guess on the lizard would be Plateau Fence Lizard (Sceloporus tristichus) but just like my lizard I can't be sure.

I was hoping to see my first "Horny Toad" that would have been neat and to hold it too! Sweet!

Thanks for that, I think you're right on the lizard.

I forgot to mention how cool the shots of the horned toad and velvet ant are. It's a shame horned toads don't make for good captives, I wouldn't mind having one.

Yeah, they're so cute but they just waste away in terraria. My cousin used to try to keep anything he found in his yard (sidewinders, scorpions, king snakes), but he gave up on the horned lizard after just a couple of weeks.

[stargatedalek]

I've heard they aren't that hard if you can replicate their diet, which is entirely ants and so is very difficult to replicate...

[Gwangi]

Unfortunately the horned lizards are also over harvested for the pet trade, even sadder knowing most of them waste away. Even if I could keep one, I wouldn't want to support their wild capture.

[Halichoeres]

Unfortunately the horned lizards are also over harvested for the pet trade, even sadder knowing most of them waste away. Even if I could keep one, I wouldn't want to support their wild capture.

I actually didn't know they were in the pet trade at all. That's really sad.

[Doug Watson]

Unfortunately the horned lizards are also over harvested for the pet trade, even sadder knowing most of them waste away. Even if I could keep one, I wouldn't want to support their wild capture.

I actually didn't know they were in the pet trade at all. That's really sad.

With all the breeders and dealers out there dealing in captive bred species that are proven survivors there really should be laws about taking species from the wild especially those that are difficult to keep. I know up here that at least in our provincial and federal parks it is against the law to remove animals or plants.

[Gwangi]

With all the breeders and dealers out there dealing in captive bred species that are proven survivors there really should be laws about taking species from the wild especially those that are difficult to keep. I know up here that at least in our provincial and federal parks it is against the law to remove animals or plants.

That's the law here too, but those are laws that are hard to enforce and people do what they want anyway. I can't say too much about wild caught pet trade without being hypocritical, I have a few myself. It's something I'm becoming increasingly concered with and aware of however. Now if the animals are harvested sustainably and like you say, easier to care for, then I'm more forgiving of the process but considering how many likely die in transport it is hard to justify even exporting the hardier species. I think that whenever it is possible, hobbyists should strive to captive breed these wild caught species. And buyers should strive to buy captive bred animals as well. It's something I would like to get involved in some day. It takes pressure off of the wild populations and for some of the endangered species it might be their only hope for long term survival. The axolotl is almost completely extinct in the wild but as one of the most popular pet amphibians it's far from rare in captivity, and quite easy to breed. The same for the threatened crested gecko which was thought extinct until 1994, now they're one of the most popular lizards in the pet trade, not due to exportation but due to captive breeding.

[stargatedalek]

There's also a huge difference between legalizing an animal for commercial scale wild catching and making it legal to own wild caught animals (but this comes up a lot more often with fish, at least around here). Unfortunately it seems this distinction isn't normally drawn with the law.

[laticauda]

Spring is here, ducks have invaded my back yard.

Mallards will take over the world! I see them everywhere, we saw them down in California and Nevada! At Disneyland my daughter almost got nailed by a pair coming in to land. It was the one time in my life I was able to yell "Duck!" and meant it both ways!

A neighborhood cat sat at the edge of my flooded backyard watching them for an hour.  Hoping and waiting for them to come out of the water.  The Mallards stayed in the water and eventually flew away.

[Doug Watson]

After our trip to the Southwest we returned home to more snow but luckily my wife had another conference in Orlando Florida on April 7 so when we left we still had snow on the ground. Thankfully when we returned on the 15th it had melted and it actually looks like it might be spring now.
While we were in Orlando we spent a day kayaking at the Blue Spring State park about an hour away. It is a Manatee preserve and in the 2.5 hours of kayaking we saw 6 Manatees and 5 BIG alligators.

This is one of 5 Manatees we saw in the Ox Bow section. You can see the nostrils and an eye on this one.


A couple Manatees boil the water. At one point we could see five of them side by side under the surface. We saw others in different areas but hard to tell if they were different ones since they moved around


The tail of one of the Manatees


Three Manatees munching on water plants.


In the same area of the Ox Bow this big alligator passed through, that's him over my wife's shoulder. I guessed it was at least 10 feet or more. All the alligators we saw here were BIG. It was mating season and there was bellowing going on from the bulls. First time I had heard that first hand.

Same alligator only closer.


This is another big bull that we heard bellowing. At this point the water narrowed and there was only about 25 feet to get around him and just as we passed he submerged. Even though attacks on kayaks are rare I have to admit I was a bit tense after I lost sight of him.


A Peninsula Cooter. These guys took stretching and sunning to the extreme. This guy looked like he was in flight.


A Red Bellied Turtle


We had an Osprey fly right at us with a fish in its talons only to veer off at the last second. Right after that we saw another osprey chase this immature Bald Eagle into a tree.

Same Bald Eagle taking off.


Great Blue Heron


Great Blue Heron on its nest with two chicks.


White morph of a Great Blue Heron, it has yellow/green legs compared to the Great Egret that has black legs.


Little Blue Heron


Snowy Egret


I'll have some snake shots in my next post.

[Newt]

Great shots, Doug! I especially like that GBH on the branch. I admit to some jealousy - while I've been to Florida several times, I've never been that far south. North Florida is not that much different from most of the Deep South, but South Florida is something else entirely.

[Doug Watson]

Great shots, Doug! I especially like that GBH on the branch. I admit to some jealousy - while I've been to Florida several times, I've never been that far south. North Florida is not that much different from most of the Deep South, but South Florida is something else entirely.

Thanks. I think staying in North America it would be hard to beat the biodiversity of South Florida. It never disappoints me anyway.

[Gwangi]

Great shots, Doug! I especially like that GBH on the branch. I admit to some jealousy - while I've been to Florida several times, I've never been that far south. North Florida is not that much different from most of the Deep South, but South Florida is something else entirely.

Thanks. I think staying in North America it would be hard to beat the biodiversity of South Florida. It never disappoints me anyway.

And new species are being added ALL THE TIME! 

Great shots as usual Doug, I especially like the cooter, I almost thought it was an underwater shot. Bald eagles look a little out of place in Florida, I just associate them with more northerly places.