31 March 2021
Today is Manatee Appreciation Day! Not that we're heading out to see manatees today, we'll wait for some time during the next few weeks. Too cold and too much rain expected this week.
But we will get there, definitely! And there will hopefully be plenty of 
manatee photos!
6 April 2021
We did our weekly supermarket shopping trip. The parking lot seemed to be Bird Central today! It all started with a 
small egret wandering around the planted area at the end of a parking row. (I think it was a cattle egret, or what we called "cow birds" in Liberia.)
I watched at least two pair of osprey, one pair in their nest and the other flying around; an ibis flew by overhead; and then a pelican came through. 
The osprey in their nest seemed to be taking turns leaving and coming back, so I'm guessing there are eggs in the nest.
The grand finale was a great blue heron circling over head, slowly flapping those huge wings as it soared overhead.
Definitely Bird Central!
20 April 2021
Well, we didn't get out to the west coast of Florida until the 13th, but we did manage to find some manatees!!! We took a variety of county and state highways to get to Homosassa Springs on the 
Gulf coast (maps at the end). Of course, things took us longer that expected, but we had a nice drive through the Ocala National Forest, and even saw several tortoises along the way.
The towns along the Gulf coast are visited by manatees each winter, and the tourists who come to see the manatees. So 
there are all kinds of manatee murals, sculptures, manatee cafés, on and on. I did like one mural though!
So, manatees. As most people know, manatees are aquatic mammals, like seals and that family of animals. They aren't fish, 
even though they don't have back legs and instead only have a very wide tail shaped like a paddle. Manatees migrate to Florida for the winter, and spend the cold months clustered in the various rivers near warm springs. During the summer months, the manatees have been seen as far north as Massachusetts, west to 
Texas, and as far south as Central America.
This past winter, there were up to maybe 500 or so manatees in the deep pools of the Homosassa River. Most manatees head out in early April as the water warms up. So no, we didn't see hundreds of manatees, though I've 
seen photos and it's quite a sight to behold!
Instead, we visited the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park - their website is here: www.floridastateparks.org/parks-and-trails/ellie-schiller-homosassa-springs-wildlife-state-park
This particular state park is an animal refuge and sanctuary, so they house animals that needed to be rescued, or were ill or injured and needed medical care, or were orphaned and needed to be raised by humans rather than their parents. They are best known as a rehabilitation center for injured and orphaned 
West Indian manatees, the species that lives in this region.
The entrance opens onto the freshwater springs forming a huge pool, where manatees gather in the winter, and the overflow continues on to form the Homosassa River. It really was a 
beautiful and peaceful pool. No swimming, though, the water is there for the manatees, not we humans.
One section was fenced off, and a mother manatee and her two babies were in that area. It looked like Mama Manatee had some scars on her tail, so that 
may be why she was in that separate area. Her two babies weren't exactly babies - they were maybe teenage manatees, judging by the size of them.
I really can't explain the size of manatees. Think of Mama as maybe about the size of a full size couch in length, but wider, like the width of a twin size bed. The babies might be more like the length of a shorter couch, and only as wide as a cot. A little research has more info: adult manatees average about 10 feet (3 meters) long, and can be up to 13 feet (about 4 m) long!!! And a fully grown adult weighs between 800 and 1200 pounds (360 to 545 kg)!!!! (Side note - the manatees' closest living relative is the elephant - that might explain their size!)
Add in that while manatees have what look vaguely like front legs but are more like fins or flippers, they don't bend in the middle. So to move around, they need to navigate like a boat - they can move forward, backward, and pivot diagonally, but they move slowly and can't bend and pivot the way seals or dolphins might. Really cumbersome animals!
Even though manatees look like giant grey sacks of rock with some green algae on their backs, they have cute little faces that are almost like a little puppy!! Seriously cute faces, looking up at us as they were waiting (and hoping) for lunch.
The freshwater pool and the river form the center of this animal refuge, and there are a variety of cement and boarded walkways on both sides of the water, making a big loop of a trail to see all the rescued animals living here. Bridges crisscross the water as well, providing opportunities to see the manatees as they rested. We saw a few park personnel who were working on the water pump by the manatees, and of course the manatees swam over hoping these people had lunch. One woman told me that feeding time was in 20 minutes, and I waited a bit, but I think they were running late that day.
(LOTS more manatee photos at the end!)
So of course I stood and watched the manatees, but after a while decided I should visit some other animals. I met Yuma the Florida panther (also known as a puma, so yes, this was Yuma the puma). There was a photo of him as a kitten, so I think he was one of the orphaned animals raised here, and thus he can't be released 
into the wild.
Yuma was gorgeous, and he was pacing back and forth, so I was able to get some good photos of his very sweet face. They really do look like huge kittens.
But Yuma's enclosure had 
six or eight black vultures hanging out on one side, wings wide open. To me, it looked like either they were paying homage to Yuma as king of the refuge, or they were trying to look big and intimidating. Or warming up? Cooling off? I have NO idea what they were doing, but they really were rather creepy looking. They also seemed to be either confusing or scaring Yuma - he wouldn't get close to them, but in his pacing he'd stop and stare at that, making sure they were still there, trying to figure out what they were doing.
See why I call the vultures here Dementers? They really look as evil and creepy!
I liked the wood stork who was practicing his Karate Kid moves. Seriously, I took one look at this bird and could think of nothing else - he looks exactly like the karate stork pose!!! Magnificent bird, though, even with the rather ugly head that has no feathers. But beautiful feathers and a gorgeous pose!
There were a few whooping cranes, and I even saw several small groups of sandhill cranes on our drive back to St. Augustine! I had to look them up, since I wasn't sure if they were storks, cranes, herons, brown egrets. But very tall long-legged birds, sort of a dusty brown or fawn color, with black legs and a dark 
spot on their forehead. Best guess is sandhill cranes - how exciting!
The Ellie Schiller Wildlife State Park had other animals that were either napping or hiding, such as a Florida black bear, a few foxes, several alligators, and (oddly) a Nile hippo. I'm guessing the hippo 
was there as a contrast to the manatee, but who knows.
And of course there was a manatee cutout photo opp so people could stand and have their faces in the manatee painting. So silly, but I do love the absurdity of it!
It was a wonderful short visit, and we were happy to see the manatees in person!
We drove back on the 15th, taking the state highway that heads east, and then then interstate highway - supposedly the most direct route, but there certainly were turns and overlaps and things got a little confusing. We managed to get back safely, that's what really matters.
So, that was our little exciting side trip. It's nice being vaccinated and starting to travel a little more, though still maintaining masking, distancing, and that constant hand washing.
Okay, lots of manatee photos in slo-mo action!!!
Blue route is our route to the hotel in Crystal River; fuchsia route is the route we took to return home.
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