Phil Lanoue Photography

Scenes From The Marsh

It was a real hot one over at the marsh pond yesterday, but that didn’t mean the wildlife could stay inside and keep cool. Many of the local residents were out earning a living as usual despite the heat. The anhinga was flipping fish in the air as it normally does, and a great blue heron was busy plucking out his dinner since take away service is not available at the marsh. A juvenile white ibis was in a hurry to catch up to his friends that had all decided they needed to immediately move to the other side of the pond. And Mr. Gator seemed to be the coolest of them all (well isn’t he always?!) by relaxing in the water and watching everyone else rush around like crazy. Just another day in marsh world.

Pulling A Trailer

This morning a great egret flew by above the marsh pond looking like he is about to lose one of his long tail feathers. But for now the feather is still attached and trailing behind the bird!

Spear Fishing

There were a few anhingas out in the marsh pond this morning, doing their usual routine of spearing fish on the end of their sharp bill, and then flipping the fish in mid air for a head first swallow. I thought it might be interesting to show birds with a speared fish, and then one doing the patented “Anhinga Fish Flip”!

Mid Air Crisis…Averted

This morning we saw a Swallow-tailed Kite flying along the treetops at the far edge of the marsh pond. Quickly the kite circled around and headed back in our direction and we realized it had something in it’s feet. Snakes are it’s primary food source so seeing it had a Rough Green Snake was not a surprise. What was a surprise was not just how long the snake was, but how it wrapped it’s tail first around the beak of the kite then around the bird’s head and neck. After a bit of a struggle the kite managed to untangle itself from the snake’s grasp, and continue off with it’s prey…crisis averted.

In general, Swallow-tailed Kites are an uncommon species in our area so it’s always a treat just to get a glimpse of one and even better to see the kite with it’s prize catch!

Last Night At The Marsh Pond

It was a pleasant evening at the marsh pond last night. I took an overall shot of the pond with the 8mm fisheye just prior to sunset. The usual bird suspects were out doing their thing… we had a great egret and great blue heron fishing successfully. Naturally I had to include the obligatory shot of a young alligator lurking in the side corner of the marsh trying to stay out of trouble, which means keeping out of the way of the larger gators. Very nice evening and I might just go back and do it again tonight!

Marsh Baby

Yesterday at early evening we saw this baby alligator (we call any gator 5 feet and under a “baby”) slogging his way along the salt marsh area at low tide. He made only a few half-hearted attempts at catching fish or crabs so we figured he was not interested in feeding and more then likely just wanted to get out of the salt water and back to his regular pond. This turned out to indeed be the case as he started slowly slinking up onto the mud and over to the edge of the marsh. After taking a brief look around the ‘baby’ climbed over the rocks and carefully ambled his way up out of the salt marsh and over to his pond.

Time Lapse At The Salt Marsh

Here is a 51 second time lapse video I took today looking over the salt marsh as the leftover storm clouds blew by giving way to a sunny day with bright blue skies.

Resourseful Anhinga

This morning started out with heavy rain but during a break between showers, we decided to go check out the marsh and see if anything was happening. There were quite a few alligators out swimming around which we expected. They always seem to like coming out after a rain for a swim in the nice fresh water. We also saw several anhingas flying around and I hoped one or two might drop in for some morning fishing which can be exciting and entertaining. The anhingas wisely prefer to pick out a spot in the pond to fish that is free of gators. I know just the corner that they like and sure enough one hopped in to start fishing. We saw it catch a few fish, including this one, so it was a successful morning for the resourceful anhinga!