10 ET HE? AUD UB OUNP eB bee ae 
many American egrets, turkey and black vultures, boat-tailed grackles, 
crows, ground doves and a bald eagle. Near the first ranger station a cat- 
walk extends into a marsh pool to an observation point. There an 11-foot 
alligator sunned himself; wood and white ibises passed overhead, also great 
blue herons, black-crowned night herons, Louisiana and little blue herons. 
In the pool, the coots were paired and apparently defending territory. There 
were pied-billed grebes, Florida gallinules, and purple galiinules. 
Other birds seen around the station were: cormorants, pelicans, Florida 
red-shouldered hawk, sparrow hawk, anhingas, osprey, ring’ neck ducks, 
Florida ducks, pintails, scaups, laughing gulls, crow, loggerhead shrike, 
meadow lark, redwing blackbird, tree swallow, kingfisher, mockingbird, 
goldfinch, and myrtle warbler. After lunch, we drove down a little dirt 
road leading to a fisherman’s resort near Paradise key in Florida Bay. On 
the way we saw many trees killed by the hurricane. Out on the barely sub- 
merged flats were great white herons, reddish egrets, great blue herons, 
skimmers, black-bellied plover and innumerable smaller shore birds, thought 
to be largely turnstones. Laughing and ring-billed gulls flew near us, and 
some Caspian terns. Myrtle warblers feeding on the dock came up to our 
feet. Returning, we followed a wild cat who trotted calmly ahead of us for 
a quarter of a mile, and finally jumped over a narrow place in one of the 
ditches that bordered the road. We were told that panthers were also in 
the park. Again, on the way out, three wood ibises were in the road to say 
good-by to us. 
We returned slowly north through the center of Florida, visiting Miami 
Beach, the north shore of Lake Okeechobee, and Highlands State Park, a 
fascinating swampy woods of native trees and shrubs, alligators and frogs, 
probably representing a bit of primeval Florida. We went through the 
orange country, visiting Bok Tower, and the next day to Gainesville, where 
we spent an enjoyable time with Pierce Brodkorb at the University. On 
March 6 we arrived at Waukulla Springs, an ornithologists’ paradise. We 
spent two days there, one of which was largely devoted to a visit to St. 
Mark’s refuge, on the gulf. On the road were three black vultures eating 
an oppossum. I wondered why these birds don’t seem to have enough in- 
telligence to drag their meal off the road to avoid the traffic. On this and 
a previous trip I saw a number of dead vultures, both black and turkey, 
which had been hit by autos. The superintendent, Mr. Paul T. Kreager, 
greeted us cordially and immediately got out the service truck to drive us 
over the dikes that serve both as roads and as retaining walls to control 
the water distribution into ponds. Shore birds were abundant: Hudsonian 
curlew, yellow legs, turnstones covering the roof of a boat house completely 
with their numbers; willets, killdeer, little blue herons, great blue herons, 
Louisiana herons, and egrets. Of the ducks, we saw scaups, blue-winged 
teal, canvasbacks, redheads, black mallards, pintails, shovelers, 80 green- 
winged teal, and Canada geese. Also 8 bald eagles, 4 adults at the nests 
and one young; osprey, several vultures; pelicans, a loon, and cormorants. 
Our smaller land bird list consisted of flicker, blue jay, purple martins, 
loggerhead, shrikes, red-winged blackbird, meadow larks, mockingbird, 
Carolina wren, and savannah sparrow. We also saw our largest alligator 
of the trip, 14 feet of monster. £051 Bast’7end Place) Ghisee 
