More Myakka River State Park Wildlife

Wednesday December 16th 2020

Today began as a nice sunny day, but it didn’t end that way. As the morning progressed the wind started to pick up. By 2PM dark clouds were moving in from the east. It looked like the severe weather front the TV weather talkers had been warning about was going to happen. Around 4:30 the wind picked up even more and the rain started. Ten minutes later the worst was over. It was a non event in this area. North of here in the Tampa area the weather was severe. A tornado was reported in the St. Petersburg area.

The trail goes between the two trees in the foreground. It gets harder to find as you get deeper into the forest.

Before the weather got bad I got my daily alligator and bird sightings in. I took a hike along the Myakka River. The trail has only recently dried out enough to be used. There is evidence of lots of dead vegetation that floated in from the river. In some areas it is difficult to find the trail. I turned around after about a mile. The weather was starting to look threatening and I really wasn’t sure if the trail continued on along the river.

Florida Wildlife was out on the Lake making noise today.

Whenever I approached the bank of the river I always checked carefully for alligators. The last thing I wanted to do was come face to face with a surprised gator. Luckily for me all of the gators were on the bank on the other side of the river. I did manage to startle and be startled by a few birds including a big Blue Heron. It was a nice walk in the woods, but not particularly different from other areas of the park.