Our first day in Dunnellon

Our first day visiting our friends Tom and Kathi in Dunellon, Florida found us walking around the neighborhood looking at birds including White Ibises (AKA “long-billed lawn chickens”) before we headed out to the Goethe State Forest.

We stopped at a small roadside slough where Tom had previously found an American Bittern and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was still there.

Close to the bittern Susan spotted the yellow flowers of a bladderwort (Utricularia inflata), a carnivorous water plant.

We found quite a few Brown-headed Nuthatches while searching for Red-cockaded Woodpeckers (which we found, but somehow I didn’t photograph).

Along one stretch of sunny damp road we found quite a few butterflies, including this common buckeye.

Another common butterfly was Phaeon crescent.

More tomorrow when we go to look for sparrows and shorebirds.