2017 Kissimmee Week 8

Here we are starting our last week in Kissimmee.  We didn't do as much biking this week, so not as many pictures.  Consequently, Anna and Rylee, you are getting off a little bit lighter this week.  Hope you enjoy the pictures, anyway.  

One of my favorite things to see in Florida are the pelicans.  There are lots of Brown Pelicans near the coasts, but I love to see the white ones.  We went to a lake in Lakeland, and found a bunch of them one day this week.  This one was taking a bath, doing a lot of splashing.  

                                      There were also a lot of swans in the lake.  It always surprises me to see the black ones.  They are also very pretty.  

    
There are also swans which are called Black-necked Swans, and this one was sitting on a nest.  She did not want me to come any closer, and was making that very plain!  

      

And if that wasn't enough, she sent her mate after me!  I started to back away as fast as possible as he came toward me, then I turned tail and RAN!  Fortunately for me, he gave up the chase.  

    Here is the kind of swan that we see most often.  It's called a "Mute Swan".  #1  Look up "mute" in the dictionary, and tell me why you think this one is called a Mute Swan  

#2  Where do you think you would be most likely to find geese like these?

Here's a new kind of duck for you.  It is called a Bufflehead.  I believe this one is a female, as the male is more black and white, and I never saw any males.  It is a diving duck.  

  This is one of the lovely scenes by the lake in the middle of the city.  Remember last week I told you about the cyprus trees, and how the bottoms "butress" out when they stand in water?  There are also lots of "knees" around the trees.

     Here's a good look at the "beak pouches" on the pelicans.  #3 How do you think these pouches would help a pelican when it is finding something to eat?

#4  Do you remember the name of this duck?  What did I say it should be called instead?  








 "You kids get back here and stay close to me!"  #5  What might happen to them if they don't obey?






      This is a feeding box, which the city puts up to feed the swans.  There are several of them around the lake, and I think there is corn in them.  The swans can reach them with their long necks, but often spill some of the corn, and the diving ducks hang around waiting for it to spill into the water.  It's an easy meal for them!

Another day this week, we biked around the small town of Celebration, a town built by Disney.  There are a few miles of elevated wooden boardwalks through some swampy areas, and it makes for great biking!                    

This week, for the first time, I smelled orange blossoms, so I stopped to take a picture.  They smell so sweet!

 It seems funny to us northerners, but the blossoms are on the trees at the same time as the oranges.  #6  Why do you think that is possible in the south?  If you look really hard, you might see some blossoms to the left and right of the orange.    

                                       We also saw this beautiful tree covered with big yellow blossoms like this.....but they had no scent.

That day was very very hot, and I thought I would see lots of alligators out of the water, sunning themselves on the banks, but I never saw even one!  I think this furry little fellow was hot, though, and we saw him laid out flat on his belly on a shady part of the sidewalk.  At first, I thought he was injured, and stopped to check on him after I rode past.  But he just got up and ran away, so I guess he was okay.

     
I was lucky to see this woodpecker in the woods, but it was hard to get a good picture.  He kept going behind the tree!  I looked in my bird book, and decided he is a Red-bellied Woodpecker.  It looks like some pretty hard stuff he was pecking at!

  #7  Why do you think I refer to this immature Little Blue Heron as an "opportunist"?  Look up the word in the dictionary, and see if you can come up with an answer.

 
A lot of the time that we bike in Celebration, we bike beside waterways, and there are flowers that grow along the edges.  This is one of those, as are the next 2 pictures.

           

That's it for this time.  We went to Gatorland one day, and I took a LOT of pictures, but that's one whole blog in itself.  I believe next Monday, you will be on March Break, so I will have a blog for the day you get back to school.  
UNTIL THEN..........