Feilds of Water Lillies

      On June 3rd, Priscilla & I went to Savannah National Wildlife Refuge.  We were looking for a Purple Gullinule.  The refuge is actually in South Carolina along the Savannah River.  We were going to explore the Wildlife Drive.

Here are a few things we found:
                   Fields of Water Lillies.

Lots of baby Common Gallinules. 

 

                                                                                  Lots of alligators

  

Everyone was looking for them

We were looking through the field of water lillies past all the alligators, and Common Gallinules.  Our patience paid off. There were the amazing Purple Gallinule. 

 

As we were leaving, I looked up there were lots of Mississippi Kites.  It was a great day!  And Priscilla got to she her first Purple Gallinule! 

Shared blog on Plover Patrol

While I've been busy working at the Jekyll Island Guest Information Center and doing desk work for the Plover Patrol, other folks have been going out and volunteering for the Plover Patrol.  Here is Cindy McIntyre's blog post .  They are still  surviving out there with the help of people like Cindy  Thank you Cindy.
http://cindymcintyre.wordpress.com/2013/05/23/jekyll-island-my-second-home/

Rambling on November 30, 2012

Got a chance to ramble around to a couple of my favorite places on Jekyll.  Jekyll Point has taken a beating from the wind and super high tides.  Still the skimmers love it. 


At the Amphitheater Pond, the alligators were out in force.  It was good to see them.  Last April, the pond was at it lowest point.  There were around 30 nests of Wood Storks. Almost over night the nests were gone- just gone.  What got them?  Well,  it is thought that raccoons climb the tall pine trees and ate the eggs.  Alligators protect nesting egrets, herons and Wood Storks from raccoons but the pond was so low. The alligators couldn't do there job.  Over the summer the rain restored the water level.  Here is a picture of a mama gator with her kids. This is a very large gator.  She isn't the only big alligator in the pond.  I wonder how the nesting egrets and herons will do next season?

 

I tried to show all the creatures surrounding this big gator.

 

Good News for the plovers and bad news for a deer

It was an exciting Wednesday July 27. First, I heard from the Georgia Sea Turtle Center’s Turtle Patrol that at least one of the Wilson’s Plover chicks made it through the rains and high tides. It must have been hiding in the dunes. That the way these birds survive. So now the chick watch begins.

I had a nice family last night for the Golf Cart Nature Tour. It was fairly quiet. There were Brown-headed Nuthatches all around us. An Eastern Kingbird was hawking for insects. There were lots of insects to find. They were finding us. However the insect couldn’t bug us too much at the tee at Pine Lake number 7.
There is a pond. In that pond there were Roseate Spoonbills, Wood Storks, Anhingas but something else caught our attention.
There was something moving in the water. It looked like a brown ball. It was bouncing around. Then the alligator head popped up. It was pushing the brown ball around. The gator then proceeded to turn in the water. There was lots of splashing and the water around the brown ball turned dark. Oh my goodness, the brown ball was a deer. If that was not enough across the pond a large alligator began swimming for the brown ball and smaller alligator. This gator just ran into the ball and splashing followed by the big gator holding the brown ball. Wow! That is second time I have seen gators fighting over food this year.
Sorry there are no pictures of the food fight. I will leave you with a more peaceful picture of another pond on Pine Lakes number 7.