Down to Ponce de Leon, Mile 845 ish
Posted by Bryan on Tuesday, December 3, 2013 Under: ICW Travels
December 1st and 2nd.
We spent yesterday on a Kayak tour of the marsh with a guide that told us all about the area.
We learned that
1. Dolphins have hair when they are born (all mammals do). Although it is just whiskers.
2. Cannon ball jellyfish have muscles and can swim slowly, not just drift.
They can also put out their stinking stuff like a squid.
3. Black mangrove plants will collect all the salt that gets into their system and concentrate it to one sacrificial leaf to get the salt out of their system.
4. Pelicans were almost extinct (we now see them EVERYWHERE)
5. The range of the Mangroves(red, Black, and White) are moving north and changing the landscape
6. A swamp vs Marsh??? A swamp has a tree dominated landscape, the marsh is grass dominated. The rest is the same.
Today we traveled to a nice quite anchorage near Ponce De Leon.
Travelling through Florida, we have noticed a trend in some of the fancier houses. Huge bug netting is set up around the deck, porch, back yard, patio, etc... Perhaps not all is perfect in paradise? (hard to see in the foggy picture, the black stuff on the roof is not a solar panel, but the top of a large bug net.)
We arrived early enough to go and explore a big sand bar and beach. We found a few surprises as always. Birds are always fun to annoy.
We walked around on the beaches after a large tide the night before with a new moon. The big currents created some neat sand to walk on and carved a big cliff in the sand.
Check out our Map. There is a spot marked to zoom in on that shows amazing water/sand formations in this area created by the tides and currents. Very cool!!
it created strange Mars like topography. So we had an astronomy lesson about water on Mars.
Devon found a man o war jelly fish. So strange to hold. Like a balloon. And a sea sponge, which could be squeezed and refilled with water. (although in the picture it just looks like a rock)
on a sad note we found a dead sea turtle. No obvious signs of why it died. It was tagged and we sent a report to the Florida Marine Biology department with the ID number.
We spent yesterday on a Kayak tour of the marsh with a guide that told us all about the area.
We learned that
1. Dolphins have hair when they are born (all mammals do). Although it is just whiskers.
2. Cannon ball jellyfish have muscles and can swim slowly, not just drift.
They can also put out their stinking stuff like a squid.
3. Black mangrove plants will collect all the salt that gets into their system and concentrate it to one sacrificial leaf to get the salt out of their system.
4. Pelicans were almost extinct (we now see them EVERYWHERE)
5. The range of the Mangroves(red, Black, and White) are moving north and changing the landscape
6. A swamp vs Marsh??? A swamp has a tree dominated landscape, the marsh is grass dominated. The rest is the same.
6
Today we traveled to a nice quite anchorage near Ponce De Leon.
Travelling through Florida, we have noticed a trend in some of the fancier houses. Huge bug netting is set up around the deck, porch, back yard, patio, etc... Perhaps not all is perfect in paradise? (hard to see in the foggy picture, the black stuff on the roof is not a solar panel, but the top of a large bug net.)
We walked around on the beaches after a large tide the night before with a new moon. The big currents created some neat sand to walk on and carved a big cliff in the sand.
Check out our Map. There is a spot marked to zoom in on that shows amazing water/sand formations in this area created by the tides and currents. Very cool!!
it created strange Mars like topography. So we had an astronomy lesson about water on Mars.
Devon found a man o war jelly fish. So strange to hold. Like a balloon. And a sea sponge, which could be squeezed and refilled with water. (although in the picture it just looks like a rock)
on a sad note we found a dead sea turtle. No obvious signs of why it died. It was tagged and we sent a report to the Florida Marine Biology department with the ID number.
In : ICW Travels
