Florida really does have excellent State Parks and on our quest to visit and enjoy as many of them as feasible, we took a long day trip last week to Kissimmee Prairie Preserve in Okeechobee County. The Park's guide tells us that this Preserve protects the largest remaining expanse of Florida dry prairie, an ecosystem found only in south and central Florida.
On arrival at the Park headquarters, we were greeted by this lovely Eastern Meadowlark. I don't remember having seen this bird, although we do see it's Western cousin occasionally in our travels.
We saw the bird, we got the picture — and we heard the concert! It sang it's heart out for us. What a nice welcome.
This ecosystem has huge flat open views of grasses and saw palmetto — and big sky! The grass is kept mostly at knee-high by frequent growing-season fires (now sometimes planned burns) and by the rainy wet season (summer). This provides the best habitat for plants and wildlife. Native species include white-tail deer and way more birds than I was able to get photos of. The preserve is home to the Florida Grasshopper Sparrow, which is highly endangered. We saw a lot of flitting little brown birds, but without an expert guide I have no idea which ones they were. Beautiful butterflies too.
There are over a hundred miles of trails in this remote park. On the one we walked, we met nobody else at all except one volunteer who was off- loading boards to finish a trail bridge over a spot that floods in the rainy season. The quiet was one of the best parts of the walk.
The remote location and the flat prairie terrain make Kissimmee Prairie a perfect place for star-gazing. (This information is sadly not known from personal experience, since the 150 miles we drove to get there precluded any chance of staying until after dark. And our camper van is waiting for us in Oregon.) It would be fun to say we'd camped in the Red Light District! And (seriously) great to observe the sky without any light pollution. And of course to have more time to walk those trails and learn more about the birds.
So Kissimmee Prairie Preserve definitely belongs on our 'hope we get to visit again' list. But also on our 'so grateful we were able to get there this time and we loved it' list. As we drove toward home, we continued to enjoy the very different scenery and ecosystem. And even some wildlife, like this turkey vulture. Black vultures are quite common around here, but we hardly ever see these red-headed ones.
image from WRMI website
Outside the small town of Okeechobee we stopped to look at a huge installation of antennas and radio receivers with one just small sign identifying the area as WRMI (website here.) We looked it up and learned that this station is a large short-wave radio station broadcasting and relaying signals to Cuba (which was its primary focus originally) and many other countries in Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean. I wish I'd thought to snap our own picture … the one above is from the station's website. It was quite impressive to see this array of antennas almost literally in the middle of nowhere. (And we talked about how interesting it is these days to have an encyclopedia in our pocket all the time. Back in the day, this would have been information we'd have forgotten to look up by the time we were able to do so.)
The sun began to set as we got closer to home and the first photo-op stop we found was next to an orange grove with blossoms still on the trees. A feast for the senses — the perfume of the blossoms and the color of the nearly ripe oranges echoing the sunset.
The end of another beautiful day.
LINKING this week to the following sharing opportunities. Thank you to all of the hosts.
NATURE NOTES; ALL SEASONS; THROUGH MY LENS; MOSAIC MONDAY; OUR WORLD on Tuesday; TRAVEL PHOTO SOUVENIRS; SAY CHEESE; WILD BIRD Wednesday; MY CORNER OF THE WORLD; SIGNS SIGNS; THANKFUL THURSDAY; SKYWATCH FRIDAY; FRIDAY BLISS; SATURDAY CRITTERS; and RATHER B' BIRDING
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