One of the things that I admire about Boca is that, despite its many faults, it does have some semblance of a commitment to environmental practices. For instance, it isn’t supposed to groom the beach above high tide during turtle nesting season. So the beach gets a little ugly, but it keeps those gigantic machines off the turtle nests. Well, apparently no one told the operator of the giant beach groomer that we saw a few weeks back, chugging south along the beach well above the tide line. You can see how neat the beach above high tide looks in [...]
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This morning’s stroll was a complicated affair. A flat tire on the main buggy meant the first part of the ride had to be in the backup wheels, while Dad went into the shop to fix the flat. You learn a lot of things in the shop: how things work, what a “jack” is, what a “pump” is. One other thing you learn, or at least you try to: patience! Take a look and see how Eric does! The most exciting thing about Sunday’s trip to Gumbo Limbo Nature Center (other than giving Eric his first excursion in his new backpack) was the tree snail in the parking spot next to ours: After yesterday’s debacle, I decided not to bother checking the radar. It was clear out, so we went for our stroll. And a good time was had by all. The white-winged dove presided over Phase 1 of Operation Walk in the Park, just long enough for me to get a picture, even without my zoom telephoto: It was a dry winter here in subtropical Florida, with quite a bit less rain than normal since November. The temperatures haven’t been too unbearable, but the weekend before Easter brought a taste of summer: mid-80s, humid, and plenty of sun. That weekend also happened to be one of the few that I had time to get my hands a little bit dirty in the garden. So, there I was, weeding the cocoplum/palm/oak islands in the front yard. And then, when I couldn’t take it any longer and moved over to a shady corner of the house, I discovered an Eastern [...] They have them there for you already! #gallery-1 { Anisomorpha buprestoides Anisomorpha buprestoides Remember the Thorn Birds, by Colleen McCullough? Australian novel that got turned into a miniseries here in the States? I don’t. I wasn’t allowed to stay up late enough to watch it when it came out, and now I don’t really care too much to track it down and find out whether I’ve missed something or not. And why bother? I have all the drama I need right here in my backyard in Boca. Of course, you have to look a bit more closely; this is not the wide-open sweep of the Outback (even though it is, technically, out back). Summer is the rainy season in Florida. This summer we have high hopes of a wet season, after a couple of years of drought. The winter was unusually wet, at least in the coastal regions, leaving our local wellfields quite full, although Lake Okeechobee, the region’s backup water supply, has been quite low for some time (scroll down for a graph showing just how long it’s been below the benchmark 10 feet). |
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