Snakes Alive!

We seldom see snakes on our walks around Gainesville, although at widely spaced intervals in the past those we have seen have included potentially dangerous cottonmouths and coral snakes--not always welcome sightings close to home.

On our walk today we were fortunate to see two different kinds of snakes of the non-venomous variety.

This one, a black racer Coluber constrictor priapus, is quite common. We see them occasionally in the yard, although they usually flee quickly when you approach them. We had one chance to photograph this one before he slithered off in great haste.

This one, also common, is either the bluestripe garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis similis, or the eastern garter snake, Thamnophis sirtalis sirtalis. The bluestripe occurs in Florida's Big Bend region, and ours in Gainesville are probably a blend of the more common and Big Bend varieties. Unlike the racer, this snake seemed willing to pose all day for us, and we got several good photos.

Interestingly, a close relative of the garter snake, the wide-ranging ribbon snake (Thamnophis sauritus) also has a bluestripe variety, Thamnophis sauritus nitae, that like its relative is limited to the Big Bend area. What is it about being blue that seems to work for these snakes?

Fall and Spring in Florida

Two images of the same tree, a red maple in our yard in Cedar Key on January 24, 2012. The upper shows its fall colors and the lower its spring flowers. Winter is short in Florida!

Wanakena

Packbasket Adventures Lodge in Wanakena, NY

Yesterday we received an e-mail message from Rick and Angie Kovacs announcing that they are about to lose the Packbasket Lodge in Wanakena to foreclosure. We've stayed there, enjoyed their hospitality, and we hope some way will be found for it to keep operating. Perhaps someone with deep pockets will keep it going for the sake of the community.

The failure of the enterprise raises questions about the future of Wanakena as a resort destination. Surely the public agencies that helped get start-up funding envisioned the lodge as the core of a revitalized community. However, one lodging doesn't a vacation community make, and to our knowledge there has been no movement toward developing other visitor-friendly amenities, let alone lodging options.

The evolution of Wanakena has taken it first from a company town developed for logging, to a resort enjoying a brief heyday, to a bedroom community providing needed housing for the nearby iron mine and paper mill, to a quiet backwater. Perhaps its best and highest future is to remain a quiet backwater.

White Pelicans

This is part of a large flock that flew over us this morning in Cedar Key while we were on our daily walk. These huge birds winter by the hundreds in Suwannee Sound.

Close Relatives

The plant in the photo above is groundsel bush Baccharis halimifolia, and the one below is saltwater false willow Baccharis angustifolia. These close relatives have similar seeds with silvery threads that help with wind dispersal. They both are able to grow in wet places, but the false willow grows only in wetlands and is apparently more tolerant of salinity. What is interesting about the plants in the accompanying photos is that they are growing side by side on the edge of a salt marsh near Cedar Key, with their leaves actually touching.

A Hydric Hammock

This photo was made yesterday in the Lower Suwannee National Wildlife Refuge, as a group of us were about to paddle Sanders Creek from the Dixie Mainline bridge to the Gulf of Mexico. It shows what I am calling a hydric hammock. The uplands on both sides of Sanders Creek consist of swamp, with baldcypresses and hardwoods. Slightly lower in elevation, the creek bottoms support marsh punctuated by cabbage palms. The water in the creek is tidal and brackish. At this point, about four miles from the Gulf, smooth cordgrass, black needlerush, and sawgrass are found in close proximity. Respectively the three species are characteristic of salt marsh, brackish marsh, and fresh marsh, and they are separated here by slight differences in elevation. Blue crabs were abundant in the clear water of the creek.

Making a Living in the Adirondacks

Lisa Bramen has an interesting article in the December 2011 issue of Adirondack Life magazine. Titled "Live Here, Work Here," it explores the employment options for someone who wants to live in the Adirondacks. The options (find one of the rare jobs, telecommute, start a business, commute to a nearby population center) remind me of a section on options for economic development in the Clifton-Fine community I explored in Gem of the Adirondacks.

The telecommute option I proposed in 2005 was unrealistic because the region had very poor electronic communications. Fortunately this is now being remedied by a new fiberoptic link that should make high speed internet service possible. Also an additional cell phone tower is planned that will offer service to much of the area.

The same issue of Adirondack Life carried the bad news that of 14 post offices in the Adirondacks proposed for closure, four of them serve the hard-luck Clifton-Fine community. The post offices are Fine, Cranberry Lake, Newton Falls, and Wanakena. Presumably the post office in Star Lake would serve the entire community. As the article noted, having a post office is important not only for mail delivery, but is also important in promoting cohesion in small communities.