Lizards and Turtles and Snakes - OH MY!!!!!
Florida is FILLED with all kinds of creepy, crawly, nasty, cute and amazing things. Only a few captured in photos below.
Hiking to the top of an overlook point in one of the nature preserve parks.
These are bananas spiders and they are as big as the palm of your hand - they are everywhere. When Darren runs in the morning, he hates it when he hits a spider web in the dark....because you never know what is on the end of the web string!!!
One of the many snakes we found in our yard - let's not even mention the ants and 50 year old insidious mold IN the house. The first few months were a trial of my OCD clean-freak tendencies for sure.
Jared has VERY quick hands, catching even the smallest of lizards
Over the course of a few days we watched this little lizard become a meal for ants and bugs. We thought the skeleton was cool.
Yet another lizard
We have a camera full of lizard pictures, but you get the drift. Another crazy animal story was an encounter at 2:00 in the middle of the night. Right outside our room, we heard this banging and crashing sound. It woke Darren and I up with a fright and ready to find a baseball bat. Come to find out, a frog had accidentally jumped into the AC fan outside and got thrown about making the banging. It was not pretty to say the least, but just happy it wasn't the boogieman. Lots of rats, other rodents, and squirrels about. When I questioned the locals if it was just "the area" we were in. The scoffed response was, "in Florida, there is a thousand rodents per person. Best not to worry too much about it." This doesn't even TOUCH on the mosquitos and no-see-ums and biting flies. Those are just a given! At one point Rachel and I looked like we had chicken pox with so many bite welts. Ahhhhh, Florida in the summer....
Monarch Butterfly
On several occasions we would run into the volunteers for the animal rescue center on the beaches. So we had amazing, once in a life time opportunities to assist in some of the turtle nest digs. We even happened upon a nest just as it was hatching, which was the most beautiful thing we have experienced EVER! 89 turtles emerged from just this one nest. People live in Florida all their lives and never get this rare opportunity. The other occasions were 1-2 days following a hatch where we would assist the volunteers as they dug out the nests. They would count how many eggs hatched and how many did not make it, document dates, locations, turtle species, etc. On a few occasions we would find live baby turtles that could not get out of the sand, so Rachel and Jared thought they were TRUE animal rescuers as they saved these turtles! It was some of the most phenomenal experiences we have ever had and memories to last a lifetime.
A turtle marker - these were ALL OVER the beaches to keep people from destroying the beautiful nests
Hi,Berry Family!
ReplyDeleteGrandpa Voss's computer was attacked, not by alligator's or banana spiders, but by virus. We didn't find a doctor (Grandpa's son, Chris) until last night. Glad I (Grandma) was there to experience some of Florida with you firthand.
The turtles birthing is amazing. Thanks for sharing. Grandpa and I loved your blog. It was the coldest Thanksgiving on record in Utah. Aren't you sad you missed it? We missed you LOTS. But we are happy for you, honest!
:ove you SO MUCH! XO XO