Exploring

We have had two four-day weekends in a row, so we have done quite a bit of exploring. The Everglades are huge and there are no thru roads so one weekend we went to the northwest part and explored the Gulf Coast side and the 10,000 islands. It is 50 miles as the crow flies, but more than a hundred via roads. Everglades City is classic "old Florida", having been the county seat until the 50's, when that was moved to Naples. Nothing much has been built there since. It was a company town for Barron Collier, who had all sorts of ideas for making money there-land, oil, timber, tourism. He was a prime mover behind the Tamiami Trail getting finished. There is a very good museum with lots of photos of the old days. Lots of people actually lived there, both Indians and homesteaders. It must have been a very tough life. We took a four hour ranger led canoe trip out into the ten thousand islands and were pleased we did as well as we did since its been a while since we canoed. A nice thing happened in that when we went in to register on Friday we mentioned that we were volunteers at the south part of the park. The next day when we showed up, one of the rangers took us aside and said not to rent a canoe ($24) because they had arranged for us to use one of the park canoes. Nice!

We also saw quite a bit of Big Cypress Preserve and met a couple of python hunters out for the big Python Challenge. They had actually caught a seven footer. Last I heard, only 20 pythons had been turned in. To be clear, no hunting is allowed in the Everglades national park itself (although law enforcement rangers can and do shoot them on sight and the park has 30 licensed hunters that work year round), so the idea that this hunt is going to give them an idea of where and how many there are seems foolish. (NY Times has an article on the hunt today, jan. 23.)

Our other trip was to the Keys. We are just at the spot where the Keys begin and it's 20 miles to the closest, Key Largo, and 130 miles to Key West. We had planned to stay in the mid Keys and not go all the way to Key West, but it was raining quite a bit, so we decided to go all the way, arriving about 2PM. The main attraction for us was the Truman Little White House. Truman, and later, Ike, spent time there. It was part of a sub base so pretty secure. Truman loved it, but Bess turned up her nose and called it a "fishing camp", whereupon the Navy hired the foremost interior decorator in Miami to do it up right. Lots of money was spent and most of those original furnishings remain. Our tour guide was excellent and many folks remarked that it was like going to their parents or grandparents house . It is still used on occasion (has the Presidential seal over the door). Colin Powell had some negotiations there when he was Secretary of State and there was to be some sort of Inaugural Ball there tonight. After that there was just time enough to wander through the old funky part of town and decide that we should come back and spend the night while we are this close. Quite expensive to stay in the downtown area. Then we got hung up in a nasty traffic jam with tourists leaving amid rush hour and some construction detours. They say they have only 25000 residents, but you would never have believed it. We also learned about Henry Flagler and his RR to Key West, built in 1912 and destroyed in a hurricane in 1935. It was an engineering marvel and we visited the quarries where they dug the stone, which is fossilized coral reefs. US Rt 1 was built on the ruins of the old railroad. Meanwhile we visited many of the state parks on the Keys and did some hiking. There is a state park well known for snorkeling and glass bottom boat viewing, but with the rain we decided to save that for another day.

All in all a good reconnaissance trip.

Another thing we did in the park was a slough slog (pronounced slew slog). A slough is a moving body of water, I.e. not a swamp. You go for a wade into water knee to thigh high into places like cypress domes which are a unique habitat. It's too much to get into all the hydrology, but it was fun. I include pictures.

Since many of my readers did not like the python autopsy pictures and told me not to use them anymore, I am instead including pictures of extraordinary beauty. There is a well known orchid grower/seller nearby which offered tour on the weekends. I assumed it would be through the greenhouses, but it actually was through the grounds of the private home of the third generation owner. It was spectacular, both the orchids integrated into the landscape, and the other tropical plants gathered from all over the world. Enjoy.

Our team leaders are back and tomorrow we go on our first field trip to collect lichen samples.

i continue to be completely frustrated about how the pictures look in the blog. If I rotate these pic, then i cant upload them to the blog so i send them this way. also they don't go where i want them. Oh, well.

Anne

 

 

 

 

Everglades

I had assumed my blogging days were over, but I have been asked to blog about our volunteer season in the Everglades, so here we go.

This first blog will also go by email to those I think might be interested. Otherwise just up to the blog:

Http://gardenladyanne.blogspot.com

We arrived on New Year's Day and got into our apartment. It's a kind of duplex with our unit on one end and Cindy and Tom on the other end with a shared laundry room in between. It is small but functional and was recently upgraded with new appliances and furniture. And, sacre bleu, we have granite countertops! Much to the envy of some other volunteers. The best part is a large screened porch, about 12 x 15 feet. The worst is lack of counter space. Those granite countertops consist of about six inches on either side of the sink and about 18 inches on each side of the stove. But, we will be fine. I even have some space to try a couple of tomato plants.

The weather is fine, even a bit too warm and humid sometimes, although I know I won't get much sympathy on that issue. I will try to refrain from talking about the weather any more.

As many of you know we will be on a lichen research team. Our second day we met the rest of the team. The leaders are a husband and wife team (they are quite fascinating and will warrant more remarks later), Rick and Jean. There is a returning volunteer named Keek from Montana and another new volunteer named Lucinda from Vermont. Rick spent about an hour giving us an overview and then said, "Go get settled in and get acquainted with the park. See you next Monday (Jan. 7)". Unfortunately since then his mother has had some serious health issues and they left last Sat. to deal with that, which means that Keek was in charge today. She is very competent and it was already the plan to have her train us on the database entry, which is very detailed and punctilious. Basically we are taking their field notes and inputting into the database the different samples they have collected. You will realize how detailed it is when I tell you that each of the three new volunteers managed to input two samples today. Our workday is 9 to 4 because he realizes that longer hours invite errors. Accuracy is vital for being able to search the database. At some point we will get to go along on some of these field trips. They collect samples and input into the database, using the volunteers, in the winter and spend the warmer weather crunching the data. So far they have identified 40 lichens new to North America and 10 that are new To science. Already with the data entry we are learning a lot about lichens. I think it will be fun.

(Lady below is camp host where python was caught)

But the most fun thing we did today had nothing to do with lichens. We are adjacent to the "wet lab" and they were autopsying a Burmese python. We didn't see him make the original cut, but she was cut from end to end and we saw the heart and liver and egg sac (she was not pregnant, but had eggs waiting to be fertilized). The stomach had a largely digested meal, but there was evidence an alligator was part of it. (The bony protuberances on an alligators back are called scoots and are very distinctive- they were there-even I could see that). The researcher, Skip, was very willing to talk about everything with us, I.e., we were not considered a nuisance. He said it was the biggest one he has ever done at 17 ft. 4 in. The record is 17 ft. 8 in. So he said he stretched it out as long as he could but no record. The other person at the autopsy was in charge of the day use area where it was captured. It was in a picnic area and the snake was just lying out in the sun. People assumed it was dead and were walking around looking at it. Then somebody poked it and it raised its head and hissed. She said the hiss was really something-like the air rushing out of a balloon. So she shooed the people away and called a law enforcement ranger who can shoot it, and then tried to keep it in the area. They like to kill or capture them if possible as they are killing a lot of the small game and changing the ecosystem. At one point her husband tried to whack the head off with his machete, but it barely made a scratch. Skip said that probably was not a good idea. The autopsy room smelled like a seafood shop where all the fish are a little old. In other words, kind of stinky. [i found out CNN did a piece on the capture in the picnic area. If you google CNN python Florida, you should find it.]

We also in our wanderings these first few days have seen a crocodile. A big one. Crocs only exist in the very tip of Florida and the keys and this is the only area in the world where both exist. We also got a brief glimpse of a manatee surfacing.

Day 2. Another python. This time it was only 12 feet long and had been run over by a vehicle in town. No autopsy today. Our work is going better. I did 5 specimens today and we quit at 3 PM. Keek has managed to stir up a hornet's nest and says that she is going to leave as soon as Rick and Jean are back and we new volunteers are up to speed. I hope she stays as I like her. We only heard her side of the story and there are always two (or more) so I can't take sides but she has certainly made some enemies.

Enough. I want to get this out today.

Anne