I took one more slog through the cypress trees tonight and had some luck with some cool clouds. This was my last evening of shooting before I start heading back north. The apartment is cleaned, the pickup is loaded and after one last morning shoot tomorrow at the Anhinga Trail I’m officially done with my Everglades shooting (for now).

I’m kind of glad to be heading home, but will miss this place. It’s been a great experience to be able to photograph what I want, how I want for a month. As always after finishing a big project, I’m not sure how well I’ve done. I expected that I would have much better work to show after so much effort. But I have learned a lot and this isn’t the last time I’m going to be out shooting. I’ve got many more adventures in the pipeline and this is just the start.

I’m not sure it this is a great photo or not, but it really captures what it feels like to be in a cypress dome. I spent about an hour wading around this dome enjoying the solitude. It was overcast when I started in, which is the best light to shoot in there, but then the sun came out soon after I shot this photo so I trudged out into the open sawgrass and shot the top photo as the sun dipped down in the west over the River of Grass.

My trick of parking down the far end of the parking lot at the Anhinga Trail failed to keep the vultures at bay. Someone took it upon themselves to spend the morning shooing the birds away from the cars near the boardwalk, but her good deed wasn’t so good for me. They all relocated down to my end of the parking lot, no damage done to the windshield or wipers though, they seemed content to rip up my roof wracks some more. I have one more morning before heading northward, can I make it without these guys damaging the car??

The vultures decided to have a convention on my pickup this morning. They’ve pretty much removed the padding on my roof wracks, which will make it easier to replace before I head home.

One vulture was good to me today though. This guy was sitting on his roost at sunrise and did a little wing flapping for me. You may recognize this tree he’s sitting on, there is an earlier shot from this same tree posted on the blog.

Here’s a shot from tonight along the park road about halfway down to Flamingo. As I walked out into the water to shoot this, I noticed the tell tale signs though the sawgrass that alligators have been here. Sure enough, I got about 5 feet into the sawgrass and there was lots of splashing about 40 feet away of a startled alligator. This guy wasn’t like the sedate alligators at the Anhinga Trail, he took off in a flash throwing up lots of water in the process. All the wild alligators not accustomed to humans are generally terrified of humans and leave the scene as soon as they hear you coming. I trusted that he was clear of the area and I was right, I never saw another sign of him, but as I stood in ankle deep water for about an hour waiting for the clouds and sunlight to cooperate with my composition I kept a close eye out. It does make the time go by faster.

Yesterday I didn’t do much shooting, I went to see Clyde and Niki Butcher over on the other side of the Everglades who I got to know when I was a newspaper photographer at the Naples Daily News. To anyone in Florida I don’t need to explain who Clyde is, but for those of you who don’t, he is the top dog when it comes to Everglades photography. He shoot large format black and white photos, mainly in Florida, but also travels all over the U.S. They are quite colorful characters and great conservationists, They filled me full of horror stories from their art show days getting me prepared for what I have in store. They now have a great gallery in the middle of the Everglades on U.S. 41. If you ever cross the Everglades you have to stop and see his work. They also have a gallery in Venice, Florida as well. Check out his web site if you want to learn more about Clyde.

On the way to see Clyde and Niki I stopped in at Shark Valley at sunrise to find out there is a locked gate that doesn’t open till 8:30 am? I’ve never heard of a National Park having banker’s hours but I parked out on the road and walked in. Being the first one there was kind of a neat experience. I was greeted by thousands of birds. It was like they were having a morning planning meeting. I walked about 2 miles out on the tram road, but the further I went the less birds I saw. So there is a lesson, at Shark Valley, for birders, the best birding is right near the parking lot.

Here’s a shot of a snowy egret from Shark Valley, I actually shot this on off the drive on the way into the parking lot as I was walking back out to my car. I had to walk in to the park from the Tamiami Trail because the park doesn’t open until 8:30.

I’ve made several attempts to make some photos walking around this beautiful cypress dome that is filled with bromiliads. On Clydes advice I tried it before sunrise, that certainly helped with the contrast, but I still have a hard time making a nice composition in these thick jungle type places like this in the Everglades. This is my best attempt. I’m certainly no Clyde Butcher, this is what he does so well.

After my pre-sunrise walk in the cypress dome I swung into the Anhinga Trail on the way back for breakfast. The vandal vultures were really at it this morning tearing out some windshield molding on this minivan. It’s so fascinating, they are absolutely infatuated with the rubber moldings and windshield wipers on cars  in the parking lot. People shoo them away and they are back at it in 5 minutes. The poor owner of this minivan is going to have to get some repair work done. I’ve been parking at the far end of the parking lot and leaving my canoe on the roof of my pickup and so far that has worked. The one day I didn’t have the canoe on the roof they tore up the padding on my roof wracks. I’ve only got a few more days, I hope they don’t attack my pickup’s windshield. If you plan to visit the Anhinga Trail I suggest parking in the far side of the lot and I’ve seen people bring bed sheets and putting them over their cars and tucking them into the doors of the car to keep them in place. That seems to work as well.

Anhingas can be seen airing out their wings during the day. They dive under water to catch fish and then spend time spreading their wings to dry off in the morning sun.

Today and last night I spent some more time in the dwarf cypress forest, these cypress trees can be centuries old but some are not much taller than I am because of the shallow soil they are growing in. In the Everglades the limestone bedrock is often only inches below the surface of the mud, which is nice because when walking there is usually a pretty firm bottom underneath the muck and you usually don’t sink much past your ankles (usually). In winter the trees loose their needles and are bare till March or April (they are really leaves, but look more like needles of a pine tree so people usually refer to them as cypress needles).

Last night I had more clouds so I had a little better light than tonight, which was completely clear. The above photo is from last night and it looked pretty good in color, tonight’s photos I thought looked better in black and white with the clear blue skies.

I’ve been playing with black and white some lately, black and white lets you play a little more with the tones. It’s nice to have some more tools at your disposal.

I love Cypress Trees, when I first moved to Florida I thought they looked like Dr. Suess trees. Everything in the Everglades is so foreign to a Midwesterner, It’s always fascinating to photograph this place.

After returning from the canoe trip, I’ve been back to the easy stuff, the Anhinga Trail. It’s an easy place to shoot and keep your feet dry, but it still makes nice photos. Tomorrow I’m planning on getting back in the water and walking around a cypress dome.

With the photo on my home page of an alligator, it’s been hard to top that one. But how could you come to the everglades without posting some photos of an alligator? Here are a few alligator shots.

Nap time for the alligators.

You can get up close and personal with the wildlife on the Anhinga Trail. The thing I love about this photo is you can see the reflection of the boardwalk in the eye.

Here is a cropped in version of the above photo, you can see the boardwalk and that is me on top taking the photo.

The eyes of the cormorants are an amazing turquoise, I believe that their eyes change color during the mating season, I’ll have to check into that for sure though.

A wood stork and a black vulture share a roost in the early morning light.