More birds from North Carolina: 11-26-17

Handsome Male Eastern Bluebird

This bird is the state bird of both Missouri and New York

Acrobatic Carolina Chickadee

 These birds will regularly visit bird feeders but prefer to take the food to a nearby branch to eat.

Left to right: Lindsay, Marti, Toby and Belle

American Bittersweet Vine

Hawks in North Carolina: 11-26-17

Today is Monday, 11-27-17 and we will start home this morning traveling a good portion of the way today so we can get up and going early on Tuesday and get home in the early afternoon to avoid the traffic inTampa.  It’s been a great trip with family at sister Marti’s home in Winston-Salem, NC.  We will be taking an advanced Florida Master Naturalist course on Coastal Restoration all day Wed, Thurs, and Fri so check our blog, tandlontheroad.blogspot.com, each day for more images.

Red-shouldered Hawk

These hawks occupy the same range as the Barred Owl in the eastern U.S.  Both species prefer the same moist woodland habitats and eat similar animals.  However, since the hawks are active during the day and the owls are active at night, they don’t compete against each other for prey items. 

We took this shot through a screen window of a Red-shouldered Hawk leaving sister Marti’s bird feeder where it had been resting.

Red-tailed Hawk

These beautiful hawks can spot prey the size of a mouse from a height of 100 feet or more.

American Crows

Male Downy Woodpecker

North America’s smallest woodpecker

Male House Finch

The coloring of the male House Finch can range from deep red to golden yellow, depending on available diet during molting.

White-breasted Nuthatch

Lunch time

Long-spined Sea Urchins

We have 4 of these urchins in our tank.  Interestingly,  there are some 750 species of sea urchins. However,  all of our marine biology reference books only show Long-spined Urchins with all black spines and correspondingly dark mouth parts.  

This is true on two of our four.

Their “eye” is weird-looking.

However, one of our urchins has about half its spines black and the other half white.

And white mouth parts

And another one has barber pole-like spines that alternate black and white on the same spine.

Florida Butterfly Museum: Gainesville, FL 10-27-17

White-tailed Deer

Skeleton of a Burmese Python caught in the Everglades

Wheel Bug

Silver-spotted Skipper

Female Red-cheeked Cordonbleu

This species has a huge range that is estimated globally at almost 3 million square miles!  They are found primarily in Africa and the U.S.

Handsome Spice Finch

These birds are monomorphic (males and females look alike) but the male is distinguished by his soft, complex song.