Florida Cranes & South Carolina Gators

Florida's resident population of sandhill cranes provides photographic opportunities year around.  I photographed this sandhill with a dragonfly in its beak at Viera Wetlands during our recent trip south.  While this is a good enough photograph it is a situation where I missed to very best shot.

A pair of sandhill's with their colt were feeding in the wetlands.  The bird pictured in the preceding photo captured the dragonfly and began waking rapidly passing behind a tree.  Just as it cleared the tree and before I was able to regain camera focus it dropped its head passing the dragonfly to the colt.

So while I came away with some nice images of the sandhills, the best image exist only in my memory.  That is wildlife photography, sometimes it just happens like that. 

On the way south we overnighted at Hardeeville South Carolina because of its proximity to the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge.  After securing a room and dining at the Crippled Crab, (if you are traveling though this area at dinner time stop!  The food is fantastic and prices very reasonable) we spent the evening motoring through the four mile wildlife drive.

Bird life was reasonably plentiful with a number of alligator sightings.  I again returned to the refuge in the morning for a few more photos before jumping back on I95.  While definitely a place I would like to spend more time the most memorable parts of SNWR was the gators and mosquitoes!  The mosquitoes must have outnumber the gators better than a million to one as a swarm met me immediately each time I set foot outside of the car.