Florida: A Range of Reptiles

January 2015 found Eileen, Ryan and I in Florida for much of the month, which meant more trips, camera in hand, to the Wakodahatchee and Green Cay Reserves in search of wildlife. As I have said many times before, these are primarily places to experience Florida’s birdlife (in fact these artificially-constructed wetlands are often better for that than "natural" places like Everglades National Park). I’ll come back to the birds in my next post, but for now I want to spend time with the reserves’ reptiles (and, to fill out the post, a few other critters besides).

The most obvious of the lot is the American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis); a large adult can often be seen basking at the water’s edge. 

Florida Red-bellied Turtles (Pseudemys nelsoni), the stars of my previous post on turtle courtship rituals, are also frequent  baskets on sunny days. 

Florida Softshell Turtles (Apalone ferox) bask too, but not as much as the previous species; they are more likely to be seen in the water. 

A less common sight, though they are probably numerous enough in the area, is the Florida Water Snake (Nerodia fasciata pictiventris). 

I introduced these two species together to set up this series of photographs,  showing a softshell methodically eating its way through the shed skin of a (presumed) watersnake. Florida Softshells are both active hunters and scavengers (indeed they will eat almost anything, plant or (preferably) animal). 

The Green Iguana (Iguana iguana), though, is a confirmed vegetarian. Iguanas are not native to Florida. Like so many other reptiles they are here as castoffs or escapees from the exotic pet trade. They are now well established in the area, where they are rapidly being treated as a pest as their population booms.

 Fully grown iguanas are large and spectacular creatures, and are undoubtedly frightening to those not aware of their gentle nature. They can eat their way through a lot of landscape plantings, though (according to the article I linked to above), their droppings create sanitation issues and their burrowing habits are undermining pathways, seawalls and levees. Like most exotics, they should have been left in their native range. 

Moving on from the reptiles: here, ensconced in his mudbank, is a male Fiddler crab (Uca sp). 

The waters of the two refuges are full of fishes, mostly little ones like these. 

Like the iguana above the water, however, many of the most obvious fishes in the area do not belong here. The Mayan Cichlid (Cichlasoma urophthalmus) arrived in the state in 1983 and is now abundant in South Florida. It is just one of a range of escapees from the aquarium trade that are crowding out native fishes despite frantic, though chronically underfunded, efforts to control them. 

Northern Raccoons (Procyon lotor), however, probably welcome the exotics with the same enthusiasm they do native fishes. They are certainly thriving in the area, where (as almost everywhere else in their range) they seem to do almost better in man-made habitats than we do. 

I’ll finish with a butterfly, one of the numerous South Florida skippers. It probably says something for the lack of enthusiasm for skippers even among butterfly-watchers that this species has to put up with a particularly cumbersome English name: the Southern Broken-Dash Skipper (Wallengrenia otho). It is a widespread species, ranging from the southeastern US to Central America. 

Florida: Love Among the Turtles

A good many years ago, my then publishers, Key Porter Books, called me into their office for a conference. When I arrived, I was told that they wanted me to write a book about turtles. I replied that I would have thought that they would've preferred to get a turtle expert to do the job. I was told that indeed they had tried, but could not find an expert on land and freshwater turtles was prepared to tackle sea turtles, nor could they find an expert on sea turtles that was prepared to take on the land and freshwater turtles. I replied that I was equally ignorant of both groups, and on that basis was prepared to take on the job.

That meant, of course, that in order to write an intelligent book about my subject I had to do a lot of  desktop research. Now, desktop research is all very well, but it does have one major frustration - reading about a remarkable natural phenomenon makes you want to see it for yourself, and you can't see too many turtles from a desk. The book (now in a second edition published by Firefly Books) went to print without my having had first-hand experience of some of the fascinating bits of turtle behaviour I had described from the scientific literature. 

This entry, then, is to share my pleasure in having caught up with one of these bits, on December 28, 2014: the remarkable courtship behaviour of the Florida Red-bellied Turtle (Pseudemys nelsoni),

As in many turtles, male turtles of the genus Pseudemys are smaller - often a lot smaller - than females.  A courting male has to clamber over his female's shell like an alpinist if he is to get anywhere.

Obviously, for actual copulation to occur he has to bring their hind ends into contact.  His first goal, though, is her head.  A good many male turtles appear to get their females in the mood by stroking her face with their front claws, but Pseudemys turtles go one better.

Male Pseudemys turtles have long, straight front claws; in my book I remarked that they looked like they were clutching a handful of knitting needles.  A courting male brings these claws to either side of the female's head, but he does not actually touch her with them.

Instead, he vibrates them in the water along the sides of her head.  As I noted in my book, "A courting river cooter (Pseudemys concinna) swims above the female, positions his foreclaws beside her face, and uses a quite uniform pattern of vibratory titillation, lasting an average of 506 milliseconds.  Perhaps, for the female, the sensation is somewhat akin to the pulsations of a whirlpool bath."

Anyway, that is what this male turtle was doing, and to my great delight, he kept it up for some time, relaxing between bouts atop the female's shell...

...and occasionally, it seemed, checking with her to see what she thought of his performance.

Perhaps, in this case, she was not impressed.

Occasionally a rival tried to join the proceedings (or, as the newcomer is noticeably larger, is this another female with a voyeuristic bent?).  Obviously, whatever the case, I was not the only one excited by this wanton display of turtle courtship - even if I was the one who had written, at second hand, about it before.

Florida: A Marshland December

My abortive trip to Colombia in December 2014 was followed by a return to more familiar territory, my mother's house in Boca Raton, where Eileen, our grandson Ryan and I were to spend the holidays.    This meant visits to some of my favourite local nature reserves, including the Daggerwing Nature Centre where a row of planted cycads provides food for the caterpillars of the Atala Hairstreak (Eumaeus atala).

Daggerwing is also home to the Cassius Blue (Leptotes cassius), a tropical butterfly at the northern end of its normal range.

Besides butterflies, Daggerwing is a good place for dragonflies - in this case, a Great Pondhawk (Erythemis vesiculosa).

Most of my excursions, though - especially if Eileen and Ryan were with me - were to the more extensive wetlands at Wakodahatchee and (as here) Green Cay, both just north of Boca Raton in Delray.  I have featured these reserves, and their wildlife, many times here before, but there is always something new to see (both areas can swarm with wildlife photographers who must photograph the same animals countless times, so a bit of repetition on my part is surely a minor peccadillo).

As at Daggerwing, these can be good places for dragonflies.  Here is one I don't see too often, a male Roseate Skimmer (Orthemis ferruginea) - like the Cassius Blue, a tropical species near the northern edge of its range.

The small stands of trees in the reserves can be strung with the webs of the Spiny-backed Orbweaver (Gasteracantha cancriformis), a colourful and highly variable little spider (and one that it is difficult, at least in South Florida, to mistake for anything else).

For many of the numerous visitors to Green Cay or Wakodahatchee, the biggest thrill is spotting an American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) - not, usually, a difficult task.

I am more interested in turtles, having once committed a book on the subject.  One that I found hard to find for some years, but that appears to be increasingly common now in both reserves, is the Peninsula Cooter (Pseudemys peninsularis).

The easiest way to tell this turtle from the much commoner Florida Red-bellied Turtle (Pseudemys nelsoni) is by looking for the paired yellow "hairpin" lines on the top of its head.

The chief glory of these reserves, though, is surely their birdlife, the target of many an expert or beginning birder (in this case, Ryan, actually in Mom's back garden).

In recent years the birds at both places have been dominated by an influx of breeding Wood Storks (Mycteria americana).  

At times, these days, there seem to be storks on almost every tree.

 This one is sharing a perch with a Red-shouldered Hawk (Buteo lineatus).

The most spectacular bird in the area, though, remains the Roseate Spoonbill (Platalea ajaja).  Spoonbills tend to prefer brackish water, and they are not always present at these two freshwater reserves.

When they are around, though, they draw everyone's eye.

At the other end of the water bird size scale from the Wood Stork is the Sora (Porzana carolinensis), a little crake that is probably common in the marshes but, because of its shy behaviour, can be difficult to see.

The little Palm Warbler (Setophaga palmarum) is a nearly ubiquitous winter visitor.

Larger visitors include a few hawks.  The Broad-winged Hawk (Buteo platypterus) is a common migrant and winter visitor in Florida.

One some winter days you can find a Northern Harrier (Circus cyaneus) coursing back and forth over the marshes.

Herons are everywhere, from the delicately graceful Snowy Egret (Egretta thula)...

...to the Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias), here gathering twigs to add to its massive nest.

The Tricoloured Heron (Egretta tricolor) may be the most numerous of the herons in the area.

Green Herons (Butorides virescens) are a bit harder to spot, but will pose quite nicely once they are found.

 For some reason I have trouble getting a shot of a Glossy Ibis (Plegadis falcinellus) without a lot of vegetation in the way, so I am quite happy with this photo.

Pied-billed Grebes (Podilymbus podiceps) aer delightful little birds.  I cannot help looking at them without thinking of my late graduate supervisor Robert W. Storer, the world authority on the family and a lovely human being besides.

This bird has, rather surprisingly, retained its breeding colour into December - for once, showing why the bird is called the Pied-billed Grebe.

Finally, here is an immature Purple Gallinule (Porphyrio martinicus), without the high gloss and bright colours of the adult but already agile enough to clamber about on the emergent vegetation in its search for flower buds and other delicacies.