Phil Lanoue Photography

“I Got One!!”

Yesterday evening just prior to sunset we were watching this black skimmer working the salt marsh doing his thing skimming in and around the reeds in hopes of coming up with a fish. The black skimmers are one of the only birds whose lower portion of it’s mouth is longer then the upper portion, and they use that extended lower section to ‘skim’ the water as their feeding technique. This one last night was super fast, swooping and darting about like a fighter jet on a mission. During one pass it was successful and snagged itself a small fish which it swallowed during mid air flight. It never fails to amaze me that they ever catch a fish as this method appears rather random, but catch fish they do and it’s exciting to see every time!

Stay tuned for another exciting episode of “Marsh Skimmer”…I’ll post more later this week!

Big Catch For Little Guy

For the past several days I noticed a young alligator lurking at the edge of the marsh pond in the same spot almost every time. It’s only about a four footer and I figured it was just trying to stay out of the way of the big guys. The wading birds paid almost no attention to the youngster as they went about their business trying to pluck fish from the pond. Yesterday evening the little guy was there once again in his usual location when I suddenly heard a splashing sound. I looked over and saw our young friend bust up out of the water with a really good size blue crab! The gator quickly crunched it’s catch and gulped it down. He seemed so satisfied and pleased with himself at the end. But he is doing the right thing because if he ever wants to grow up to be a big boy he has to be able to hunt for food like the big boys!

Spear Fishing

Yesterday evening I was watching an anhinga out fishing in the marsh pond. The anhinga is a water bird that fishes by swimming under water and spearing a fish on the end of it’s sharp bill. To swallow the fish, the anhinga will often flip it into the air and then catch it headfirst down. This bird was having a very successful evening…catching several fish for a tasty dinner. Just watching this amazing bird in action is a real treat and photographing them can be quite a challenge!

Getting In Some Fishing Before The Storm

Yesterday evening started off nice enough at the marsh pond with a mix of sun and big white fluffy clouds. We knew there was a possibility of thunder storms rolling in but at the beach you never know, the wind off the ocean often beats back the rain storms and keeps them inland. Life goes on however for the marsh wildlife as they need to hunt for a meal regardless of weather forecasts. At first this great blue heron was working the popular fishing hole, but then he was joined by a great egret. They both were having success fishing so no major arguments or disagreements broke out over who’s territory this was. All this took place under the watchful eye of one particularly sneaky alligator that was lurking among the pond weeds in the same fishing spot. The birds knew it was there and kept one eye on the fish and the other on Mr. Gator. At one point the alligator chased the blue heron along the side of the marsh pond, but the heron didn’t want to leave the fishing hot spot so it just moved over a bit after complaining loudly at the alligator who seemed unimpressed by the bird’s display.

The thunder storm clouds did finally make their way into the marsh area so we packed up and left the beach. Last we saw the birds and alligators were still hanging in hoping to scoop up a another fish or two before having to call it a (stormy) night.

Egret In The Evening

This past Tue. night the sun was still out but starting to set when I saw this great egret fishing patiently in the marsh pond. The sun was almost directly behind the bird so I purposely exposed for a silhouette. The colors of the water were not created later in any kind of post processing…that is how it really looked!

Time Lapse of Sunset

Here is a 30 second time lapse of last night’s sunset at the marsh pond, taken over a period of about an hour. It was a beautiful evening and there had to be 15 alligators out floating and splashing around hunting for a night time snack! Oh…and watch for the jet contrails as they zip by, can you count how many there are?!

“Hey! Look What I Can Do!!”

Yesterday afternoon I saw this great egret hanging around with a napping alligator. Now of course the egret does not wish to be harassed in any way by the gator, but evidently the egret did not want to be ignored either. So the egret started doing these show off gymnastics routines right next to the alligator in an apparent move to impress our sleeping friend. The plan failed miserably. I don’t think the alligator even so much as opened his eyes and the egret walked away looking both a bit dejected and possibly even a bit miffed. On the other hand… had the alligator paid too much attention to the egret and tried to snap at it, the egret would have thrown a huge fit and made a giant fuss about it. Maybe the egret should reconsider his plans…it is far likely better to be ignored by the gator then to get too much of the wrong attention!

Nice Morning For A Walk

Well it sure was a lovely morning to take a nice walk along the marsh. Except I was not the one doing the walking…it was our old pal Mr. Alligator who came lumbering up out of the marsh to take a little stroll and check out the area. After he took a brief look around, he headed down into the adjoining pond for a pleasant swim before finding a comfy spot for a long nap in the sun. Nice life!