Florida 'Field Trip'

This past week I was very blessed to have been able to be a part of a Wycliffe Associates Door43 Translation Notes workshop.

It was a very special thing to be a part of in several ways.  Number one was the wonderful people I met; who came from across the country and around the world to work together on writing notes for Bible translators for the book of Jeremiah.  To give you a little idea of what it was like... I worked with a young lady who came to the states from Bolivia a year ago, had lunch with a lady from Ethiopia, had a conversation with another lady who had just returned from Papua New Guinea, and chatted with people who were either from or who had been to Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, the Philippines... well, you get the idea!

Number two was that the Wycliffe Associates headquarters are in Orlando, Florida.  A week in warm, sunny Florida in December?  Sounds good, and it was!

Number three... even though we were inside from 8 a.m. til 5:00 p.m., with only a 5 minute walk to get to where we had lunch, I was still able to get a little birding and nature-watching in before and after that almost everyday.

Northern mockingbirds are very common there, but I enjoyed them because I don't usually see them at home.  That is true of most of the birds I saw in Florida, though not all. Yellow-rumped warblers were everywhere.  They only left our area in October, but it was nice to see them again.  I saw several Palm Warblers and a Black-and-White Warbler (other warblers that migrate thru Pennsylvania).

I also saw (but didn't get any photos of)  a small flock of tree swallows.  I wondered if any of them were 'ours' or had been in the huge flock we saw in Stone Harbor, NJ in September.  The tree swallows in Orlando were circling around this lake. 

It is also where I saw this Anhinga, drying its wings in the sun.

I saw three different large, white water birds on different days, which I had to study a bit to identify.  These are not birds I'm used to seeing in Pennsylvania!  The first was a Wood Stork, with a black head and black on its wings.

Next, a juvenile Little Blue Heron, with green legs and feet and a bi-colored bill.  They are white until they mature, when they are a steely gray-blue.

The third white bird was a Great Egret, with black legs and feet, long plumes, and an all yellow bill.

Sandhill cranes, which are rare in Pennsylvania (though we did have 3 fly over our house in May 2014) were common in Orlando.  Just about everyday, I saw a small flock of 4 flying one direction in the morning and back the other way in the evening.  There were usually some walking around in the parking lot, but I did manage to catch this pair looking more scenic one day in the grassy field.

Turkey vultures are common just about everywhere.  I counted 19 in a kettle one afternoon, and also happened to catch a photo of this one on the ground.

A bird I was hoping to see, as I knew they are seen fairly frequently in the south, was a Loggerhead Shrike.  There were 3 fenceposts way out in the middle of the field and one afternoon I could see something was on top of one post.  I got pretty excited when I raised my binoculars and saw this bird...

... a Loggerhead Shrike!  A very beautiful bird and an interesting one, too, because it is a songbird that acts like a raptor.   You can read more about them here.

The next day, I did see a raptor-- way out in the same field on a different 'lookout' -- this American Kestrel.

I really felt blessed with all the different birds I was able to see with only short early morning and late afternoon walks.  Though I would have enjoyed the walks anyway... especially this beautiful bougainvillea I passed each time I went from my apartment to the building I was working in.

There was still one more creature I was hoping to see and on my very last walk, I saw two of them!  The first scurried off so fast I didn't get a photo, but the next one didn't seem to hear me approach.

A Nine-banded Armadillo!

I know they are considered pests in Florida, but I was tickled to have a chance to watch this one for awhile.  He showed me all his sides-- front...

... and back!

One thing it didn't do was jump 3 to 4 feet straight up in the air, as I've read they can do when they are startled.  I guess it was too used to people coming along the sidewalk.  It just scurried off into the nearby shrubbery when it finally realized I was close by.

 It was almost time for me to leave and I had seen lots and lots of lizards but never had an opportunity to photograph one.  I was bringing my suitcase into the workshop room, and as I was finding a spot for it along the inside wall, there was this little guy posing for me!

 I don't know what kind it is, but I do know it had a really long tail!  So long that in the first photo I took, I cut part of it out of the picture.

From the small creatures to the big sky, it was a beautiful week in Florida.