coryi4ever's Favorites

We landed on Storøya, an island in the Svalbard archipelago east of Nordaustlandet, separated from Nordaustlandet by the Storøysundet strait. Our plan was to hike about 3 kilometers around the tip to catch a glimpse of male walruses resting on shore.

Our hike was cut short about a third of the way (about 700 meters). Kirby spotted a white shape moving quickly in the distance. A young, lean, and hungry four-year-old polar bear was walking briskly along the shoreline. Federico, who was scouting 500 meters ahead, saw him too. Julien communicated to the group that we had to retreat as a pack and return to the Zodiac in an orderly fashion—no stopping, no turning back. When we were 100 meters from the Zodiac, we were asked to speed up and board immediately. We all followed orders and were back on board in no time.

We then rode our boat toward the tip of the island, and there he was, assessing two giant walruses. The bear walked along the shore, perhaps hoping to catch a tern, but the birds were mobbing him for being too close to their nests. He stopped at the edge of the water and looked at us intently, sniffing the air from afar and watching us some more, clearly seeing us as an opportunity. This bear is very hungry and desperate. I so hope he will make it through the summer, the toughest time for a young polar bear to survive.

JC Log: 18/07/2024 80.1361 27.9882 Storøya Polar Bear 0 0 0 1(subadult) 2(condition) 0 NA 0 alive 1 land

Found this nerodia down in some cypress knees eating what I thought was a red salamander, pulled him up on the shore, and apparently he was in the process of killing a large adult waterdog, unfortunately. He never stopped eating, and when I came back after letting him go he had repositioned and was swallowing the salamander.

On the edge of Blue Hole, FL Caverns SP. Found this nerodia down in some cypress knees eating what I thought was a red salamander, pulled him up on the shore, and apparently he was in the process of killing a large adult waterdog, unfortunately. Would've been the best find of the trip; still super cool. Not sure of the taxonomy with waterdogs here.

For whatever reason I've always looked at these beams and thought that they looked perfect for tricolors, but up until now there's only been a glass lizard and frogs. I hadn't found anything to photograph today so I went out to find the glass lizard and found this gem actually tucked up in a crack in the beam. It rained yesterday, but given that the lowest temperature today was 75 and it was 80 when I flipped this dude I'm still pretty surprised.

Lifer! And first tricolor! I knew I could get one this year but I thought for sure it would be cruising in Big Cypress or Flamingo not flipped in my yard. It was absolutely unreal flipping my board and finally after two years seeing this thing. Nice aberrant head band too. Subadult (13"). Last two pics are a habitat shot and a pic of it drinking after the photo session, which I thought was kinda cool. Twitched and mock-struck kinda like a kingsnake which I did not know they did, and it actually bit once which I have never heard of a scarlet doing.

Second-ever scarletsnake just days after the first! Flipped the next board over. Super stoked that flipping in my yard is finally panning out. Small adult (14-ish inches) and not much longer than the first but heavier set, and that combined with the very short tail make me think it's a female and probably breeding age even tho it's small.

Lifer! Legit like the fourth snake of the year, I haven't gotten out at all this month. I haven't even seen a racer at my house before this guy lol! While I'm photographing some lunatic walks by and starts ranting (with plenty of obscenities and cussing thrown in because why not) about respecting nature and that she's gonna report me. I was making sure to keep the encounter legal, so she had no grounds for anything. She was pretty sus, fun experience. I don't recall now if it was exactly at the moment or a bit before, but I was just telling my brother that I didn't expect much quality because of how late it was, but we should still be able to find some racers. Nope! One and only snake, and pretty much the only herp asides from a gator or two and as many anoles. It was stretched out on the grass and I knew what I had to be looking at. Writhed a bit and then posed for a few minutes. It was insane. Pretty cool out like 68 or seventy-even and cloudy, with decent humidity for the dry season and light rain just a few minutes before. Looking back it was probably pretty good weather for muds. It was pretty awesome especially considering I was only expecting a few starved racers. I don’t usually fave my own observations but I’m pretty stoked about this one.

In ambush at the junction of a seep and Kelley Branch. Intergrade lol. I wasn't sure I bought cottons this far east being intermediates, but now that I've seen one it obviously has a darker and differently proportioned face than pure conanti.

Probably the best find of the trip! Only the seventh recorded on iNat in the state. Sitting in an overhanging plant over Kelley Branch. When I first found this place last December I thought that if there was somewhere I would find a queensnake in FL it would be here; glad I was right.

My first from the state, and the largest and most vibrant I've seen. I've had lots of false alarms over the years, thinking I cruised one only to find it was grass or something, but this time it was unmistakable and neon, probably bc of the yellow stripe. 3rd thru 5th pics are in situ.

This bear was from the Seminole Forest area close to our neighborhood. He stopped in my yard to eat berries from a tree he was under. He stayed for about an hour and was very relaxed even while I took pictures of him.

I am always scanning for wildlife as I drive, in case something tries to cross the road for instance, and this bear easily caught my peripheral vision attention about 20 meters off the edge of PA State Route 22, north of Johnstown, about two hours from home. I pulled over immediately and walked back a little, to see if it was still there. I stayed about fifty meters away from it and took pictures. It seemed to want to cross the road, but turned back a couple times.

It seemed to catch scent of me, and then clearly looked right at me, sitting back on its haunches.

I have some experience with the Fish and Game Commission inspecting bear carcasses harvested by hunters, weighing and extracting a tooth for analysis etc., but this bear was noticeably bigger than any I have seen before. I would guess roughly in the 400 pound (180 kilogram) range. It was a bit scary actually to be looked at by such a huge animal. I did not see any cubs. That, along with its tremendous size suggests that this was a big male. It did not seem disturbed. It turned away from me calmly, and walked around a little for a couple minutes. It then went farther away, at one point standing up to get one more look at me (he was towering standing up), before actually laying down for ten minutes. He then got up slowly and walked away north into the woods.

Another couple that stopped when they saw me with my camera said they had been seeing a bear with two cubs in the neighborhood lately, but that this one was much bigger.

Wow. This was, for me, a very rare encounter with a literally awesome creature.

Mother and cub. The cub ran up the tree when it saw me and the mother stayed at the base of the tree watching the cub and me for a minute. Then she ran off in the opposite direction and the cub quickly climbed down and ran after her.

Write up from Flickr when we initially found the animal:

We were driving west on alligator alley this morning with our friend Randy when I caught a quick glance of a roadkill in the middle of the road. I instantly thought it might have been an everglades mink (highly endangered). We kept driving and about 2 miles later we saw an animal running across the highway. We got a really good look at it and I am sure it was a live everglades mink (my second live mink, first was in Fakahatchee).

Randy turned around so we could go check out the roadkill I had seen a few miles back. It turned out to be an everglades mink also! I called Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park biologist Mike Owen to tell him . Mike said we would submit it to the University of Florida under his permit to collect roadkill.

According to Mike there are about 15 mink which have been collected over the past 80 years or so and send to the University.