Manatee Watch and Walk Along C-54 Canal

Had an awesome walk today with HFC David and, fresh off her stage run in Beauty and the Beast, the divine Ms. H. We began with the last manatee watch of the season. We only saw 2. Not sure if due to weather or to the die off. I'm hoping it can be attributed to the weather. After the manatee watch, we took a walk along the C-54 canal. It was a nice walk, weather was great. If you didn't GOYB, here is what you missed today (as always, click to enlarge):

I thought this stick looked like a lizard or alligator head or something. 

Heather found a piece of cardboard and decided to do a little red-neck sledding.
Here she is at the top of the berm.

Here she is 1/2 way down the berm.

And click here to see a video of her in live action!

In addition to manatees dying this year, we have lost may brown pelicans as well.
This is the first dead pelican we found today. 

This is the last sand hill scrub in Brevard county. A beautiful area.

This was a eagle who watched us from the other side of the canal.

This was bones from something.

Apparently some kind of fish. The bone on the far right was serrated. 

This was the second dead brown pelican we found.

In happier news, we found tons of gopher tortoise burrows. This is a
prickly pear, one of the tortoise's favorite noms.

Me and Heather looking diligently over our manatee watch paperwork.

An awesome end to an awesome day.

Be sure to watch our schedule and see what else we have coming up. It's a big world out there that you can't experience from your couch! Join us for the Treasure Coast Birding Festival next weekend where I'll be speaking Friday night and leading a trip with David on Saturday morning. Visit the festival web site for details.