This past week was spring break. Unfortunately, it appears that third-year graduate students do not qualify for spring break. :( We did, however, decide to have one family fun day. Saturday we loaded up the car and drove to Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. It is basically a wildlife preserve, dedicated to Florida native creatures.
Here are just a few of the animals we saw.A Great Horned Owl
A snake taking a drink.
A Gopher Tortise
A bald eagle
A baby alligator
A couple river otters
A bobcat
A whooping crane (in 2007 there were only 340 wild whooping cranes and 145 living in captivity)
Flamingos
And a non-native creature - Lu the hippopotamous. He's 49 years old and was an animal actor back in a number of old TV shows and movies.
A moray eel - also non-native. Some have been introduced into the wild in Florida when people dump their pets out into the ocean. These eels, not being native, are not good for the local ocean environment.
A manatee eating a salad. The park had a nice underwater viewing area.
Anwyn's favorite part of the day was "going on the boat ride." We got to ride a large pontoon boat to enter the park, and took a tram ride back at the end of our excursion. We got to see a lot of animals but missed seeing the black bears (they were sleeping, hidden behind a tree) and the panther (it was hiding in its building).
Anwyn's favorite animals are "all of the animals". Here is what she had to say about the day: ajhdhvhghggcvghvgvghvfbgvfhgfhAnduyedydy
Lily was excited to see all of the animals and birds, and called everything "ba" or "da".Don't we make a cute family of manatees?
5 comments:
Love the cute photos! Is that an eel going into water or a snake taking a drink? It looks like a fun place for kids.
Thanks! It's a snake taking a drink. I updated the post to say that. I also added more photos. It was fun for the kids (and us too)!
That looks like so much fun! I am sorry you didn't qualify for spring break. If it makes you feel better, Mike didn't either. I didn't even know Spring break already occurred.
We liked the photos! And we liked the funny costumes. Andrew and Edward.
This has been on my list of places to visit while we are here. I would LOVE to see the manatees underwater. . . they look huge!! I'm glad you were able to escape for a day and have a family fun activity.
Post a Comment