How I Spent My Christmas Vacation

The AMB schedule has been intense, and it will be intense again soon, but there is a heavenly break in December of four entire weeks.  Four weeks!  Life is good.  I love the learning and the speakers and the field trips and all, but what a joy to have four entire weeks to myself!

So, of course, because I'm looking for a break from all of this, I head to Florida to spend Christmas week with my friend Melissa.  I may have mentioned that Melissa was responsible for getting me interested in the birding nonsense as well as the photography nonsense.  It was a similar trip two years ago that led me to where I am now, and that might best be described as bird-obsessed.  Yes, two years ago, I was a complete neophyte and was taken in by the big and beautiful wading birds.  They are, as we all know, the entry drug of birding.

This year, Melissa has prepared an itinerary so intense that - by the end of the week - I'll be praying to get home just so I can get some sleep.  And have a meal that isn't shoveled down between birding locations.

And mind you, that's not a complaint;  not by any stretch of the imagination.  Because, friends, Melissa led me to 11 new life birds:

Short-billed Dowitcher (sandwiched between two Willets)

Muscovy Duck

Monk Parakeet

Nanday Parakeet

Common Eider

Wilson's Plovers

Snowy Plover

Swamp Sparrow

Black-and-white Warbler

Blue-headed Vireo

Dunlin

.....and countless year birds..........

Wood Stork

Florida Scrub-Jay

Royal Terns (the guy in the back is the youngster, relentlessly begging the parent for food.

Sandwich Tern

Limpkin

Roseate Spoonbill

Little Blue Heron (juvie)

........as well as fabulous photo ops of other birds..........

Pileated Woodpecker

Boat-tailed Grackle

Red-shouldered Hawk

Common Gallinule

Osprey (with lunch)

Burrowing Owls

Northern Cardinal (female)

Tufted Titmouse

Bald Eagle

Anhinga

Of course, there were a few on my target list that were "guarantees" that we didn't see:  Piping Plovers and Red Knots and the much-heralded and much-reported Bar-tailed Godwit that's been hanging around Fred Howard Park for many weeks now.  But who has time to bemoan the missed birds?  After all, that just gives me something to go back for. 

Plus, I can't be worried about the ones that got away, not when it's my turn to plan an itinerary for when Melissa comes to see me next summer, and I get to share all the mountain and western birds with her.  Oh wow, where to start?  Well there are Black-capped Chickadees, and Mountain Chickadees, and Clark's Nutcrackers, and Steller's Jays, and both Western and Mountain Bluebirds, and .................