We wanted to take advantage of highs only in the mid seventies on a weekend in mid April (forever ago!), so we headed up to Withlacoochee River Park. When we were nearly at the park, which is down 5 miles of a country road, a fire truck was blocking the road. There were no accidents, but we later passed a utility truck, so maybe a power line had come down. We were driving the GTO, and there is no alternate route that we know of that is paved, so we drove back to Dade City and looked for alternate parks, but decided just to try Withlachoochee River Park again, and by then the fire truck had left.

There was a chance of rain, but we only got a few small drops while we were at the park. It remained overcast all day, which left us at the edge of enough light to take photos much of the time, but we never had the harsh contrast from bright sunshine to shadow either. The ressurection ferns were fully unfurled, covering the oak branches.

There were a substantial number of frogs, but we’ve posted those before, so instead here are some interesting fungi and lichen.

A buzzing on the forest floor brought our attention to a fight between a cicada and a wasp. After a minute or two, the wasp flew away, leaving the cicada twitching on the ground. There is a cicada killer wasp, but that wasp doesn’t seem to have the painted stripes on its thorax that ours did, and it’s a digger that hauls the cicada to its burrow.

Crickets, like cicadas, are much more often heard than seen.

This looks like an eastern pondhawk to me, which are not described as dragonfly hunters, but perhaps the victim presented itself as too easy a catch

A ball of baby spiders

Pipewort!

We don’t know what kinds of moths these are.

Mike did the conversions. I took the pipewort, papery fungi and cricket picture. The rest are his.

Way back in early April we went to Alligator Lake. My pictures are the birds and the second snake and the others are Mike’s.

It was dewey in the morning and the rain lilies were out.

The water has remained higher than our visits in previous years. Joining back to the main loop trail around the lake, two large alligators were sunning on the trail. Luckily they went back to the water. Then we found two snakes. This patient one I think is a mud snake.

this song sparrow (?), had no trouble hopping along on top of the water plants

we peeked at this hunting bittern for several minutes trying to get a clear shot

lantana

female red-winged blackbird, who looks very different than the nearly all black male

palm warbler

white pelican, with a cormorant behind

metallic leopard frog

southern water snake

We’ve had a green iguana kicking it in one of the trees outside the master bedroom windows for a few days this week. This is about their northern limit. We’ve only seen one other iguana, which really was green, two or three years ago.

In early April, Inglis had ticks, but was still fairly brown (by Florida’s standards), and fewer butterflies were out.

American lady

White m hairstreak. This and the following three are Mike’s. (And he did the photo conversion on this post.)

Blue-eyed grass

A robber fly.

We saw several red-winged blackbirds.

The light was fading and I never got a really sharp image of this tufted titmouse.

Hacklebarney: park of a thousand picnic tables.

This New Jersey State park was a bit higher elevation and a bit colder than Lord Stirling on our visit in late March, Hacklebarney’s trails scramble down into the ravine of the Black River, Trout Brook and Rhinehart Brook.

A few last shadows of snow remained

There were several of these some early bugs about

We found what turned out to be blooming skunk cabbage. The plant produces its own heat, allowing it it bloom before the ground thaws. I don’t remember who took which pictures, except Mike took the skunk cabbage pictures. He did the conversions too.

Visiting New Jersey in late March, spring was not yet taking hold at Lord Stirling Park. The deciduous forests looked delicate and crisp with their bare branches, all shades of brown and cream from the mud to last years leaves to the tree bark. Still, some moss, some bulbs, and a fern here and there were peeking through, and then a beautiful blue sky above added color.

We were sharing the NEX 5n. I took the robin and swamp picture. Mike did the photo conversions.

This is a lowland park, marshy with sections that are seasonally flooded near the Passaic River. There are boardwalks in some places. Trail maps are posted at intersections. There was quite a bit of damage remaining from Sandy. The holes left from uprooted trees had filled to make small ponds. There northern trails were still closed.

Tussocks in the Woodpecker Swamp

When researching the park, we found reports of seeing bluebirds. We were lucky to see one too.

Several times we heard croaky choruses, which we figured were far off geese, but as we came nearer to some of the calls, it sounded more like frogs to us. We thought it must be too cold for frogs (I think it was in the upper 40s). At Earwig Bridge we decided to stay still for a few minutes, and probably a dozen frogs popped up.

Walking past the pond almost back to the parking lot, there were more geese and swans.