WHICH FLORIDA GATOR DO YOU LIKE BEST?

I hope that you can see the Alligator or 'gators in these photographic images.

 Unfortunately, my poor little Kodak CX7430 was way over stressed in getting these pictures.

 I apologize for the poor quality of these pictures.  I would have liked to get closer, but did not feel like playing in the water with them for some strange reason. The danger probably would not have been too great, because these were only about four foot long American Alligators.

 Also, they didn't appear to be hungry as evidenced by what I think was an immature blue heron and turtle right next to them. If you follow college sports you might want to check these gators.

MOOSE PETERSON'S SEAPLANE VIDEO

If you love vintage aircraft and flying, you will love this video clip from Moose Peterson's Blog: http://www.moosepeterson.com/blog/?p=19212. I know I was awestruck by it. I highly recommend it. Of course nearly everything I have seen on http://www.moosepeterson.com/blog/ has impressed me. Maybe one of these days I will become as good as he is. 

APPLE SNAIL PICTURES AND FACTS?

While I was cleaning out the pump sump on my wife's fish pond I found these two snails in the sump basket. I decided to do just a little bit of research on them because I thought that they were interesting and pretty. 

They are inhabitants of tropical and subtropical freshwater. The family name is Ampullariidae (sometimes shortened to Pilidae). There are several genera, such as  Asolene, Felipponea, Marisa, and Pomacea. These are the New World genera for South America, Central America, the West Indies and the Southern U.S.A.

The genera Afropomus, Lanistes and Saulea are commonly found in Africa and the genus Pila is native in both Africa and Asia. 

Apple snails are popular aquarium-pets due to their attractive appearance and size, sometimes reaching a size of  15 cm or approximately a 6 inch diameter in the case of the Pomacea maculata (which is not pictured here).

I sincerely hope that you have enjoyed these pictures. 

CLOSEUP OF A MOSQUITO

I took this close up photo of an unknown (to me) type of Mosquito on the side of a public dock at the Lake Shipp Park in Winter Haven, Fl. Seeing this mosquito to take a picture of was not a surprise because they are frequently found near water. 

Female mosquitoes are typically larger than males and have fine threadlike antennae with only a few hairs on them. Males typically have bushy antennae. Surprisingly, only the female sucks blood. I think that the one above is a male mosquito.

The camera used was a Kodak EasyShare CX7430 set to Closeup, Daylight, ISO 200 (I think), Color, Center Spot, Center Zone and Autoflash.

ARACHNID SUPPORT SYSTEM

I hope that you enjoy these pictures of an arachnid support system installed on a local dock. These images were taken mid morning on a foggy Friday, the Fourth of February, 2011. You will probably notice the water droplets on the webs constructed under the dock. I have absolutely no idea which type of Spider is responsible for these spiderwebs. 

SCIURIDAE SCIURUS CAROLINENSIS

I was feeling rather squirrelly one day and decided to go to a local park and photograph some squirrels. I believe that these squirrels are Eastern Gray Squirrels. The diet of the gray squirrel is composed of acorns, hickory nuts, walnuts, beechnuts, maple (buds, bark, and samaras), yellow poplar blossoms, American Hornbeam Seeds, apples, fungi, black cherry, flowering dogwood, grapes, sedges, grasses, American Holley, insects (adult and larvae), baby birds, bird eggs and amphibians. They have even been reported to eat each other. 

There many sub-species of the family SCIURIDAE including but not limited to Fox Squirrels, flying squirrels, and Red Squirrels.