Blue Springs

Manatee

As I posted yesterday, had a spectacular, perfect...well...almost perfect paddle at Blue Springs this past Saturday July 16th. It was not the location I had in mind when decided where to go but time constrains made us go there. Wifey had more than 300 pics to review. After she deleted the bad ones and the ones she did not like the number did not come down of 320 pics. Then it was up to me to decide what to post. Was not easy to decide but had to do it. No way I can post 320 pics here. It will be safe to assume we were very pleased and happy we went to Blue Springs. Stay with us and you will see why.

Thursby House

Put In / Take Out: We use the facilities of Blue Spring State Park in Orange City. The entrance fee per vehicle is $6.00 up to 8 occupants. It is not too bad, if you arrive early. The put in it is not too far from the parking spots but it involves some kayak dragging/carting/carrying. I did park for a few minutes in the Service Vehicle area, dropped the kayak, and then drove our minivan to one of the parking spots. The put in area is a small beach, if you can call it like that, near the canoe/kayak rental concessionary. There you will start paddling in the waters of the St. Johns River, where the Blue Spring Run empties a few meters to the North.

Blue Spring Run

Manatees in the Blue Spring Run

The Blue Spring Run is short. No motor boats are allowed to pass a designated area after the St. Johns but canoes and kayaks can. Even better than that; kayaks and canoes can paddle all the way to the Blue Spring but it has to be before 11AM or after 5PM. The run it is an extremely popular swimming and tubing area and it also is a Manatee Sanctuary. From November 15th to March 15th no one is allowed to swim, tube, or paddle in the waters of the run since it becomes the winter residence to hundreds of manatees. I saw it last winter and it is impressing. Today , against my best wishes, we decided to kayak the run because my wife wanted to do it and we had some time before 11AM. I am really glad we did as she wanted, because what we saw in the run. As soon as we entered spotted a manatee on the North side of the run. It was very active and splashing a lot. It was then when we realized that it was not A manatee but manatee-S doing whatever manatees do to preserve the species. We gave them plenty of room and wifey did shoot pics from the distance until a couple in a canoe decided they wanted to be really close to the action. That seemed to spooked the big mammals, or maybe they just finished their business and left. We paddled up the run to the border of the swimming area and turned around since it was almost 11AM. On our way to the St. Johns stopped to take a pic of a little gator in a log and a tricolored heron.

Tri-Colored Heron

Manatee comes to say hello

As we were busy with the heron people on the boardwalk started yelling "Manatee...manatee". Effectively, a manatee was coming down the run following a couple of kayaks. We saw it and moved to the side of the run at the other side of the boardwalk where I grabbed a twig coming out of the water and waited for the manatee to come. We have learned that if you go after them, 8 out of 10 times the manatee will swim away. If you stay still or just float around, 8 out of 10 times it will come to you. It did not take too long before the manatee came to take a look, which made my wife very happy since she did shoot pics of the marine mammal at will. It was sad to see the ugly scars on the manatee's back though. But it was playful and even when I let the twig go stayed with us for several minutes. The manatee had a tracking device on the tail and also had L1 written. We thought it was a code to identify it but came home to find out that L1 means the manatee has a skin virus. There was no floating device attached to the tracking belt and we were not able to read what was written on it.

Blue Spring Run manatee

Osprey

Cannot remember how much time we spent in the run. After more people arrived to see the manatee we left and headed north on the St' Johns River. There is a small island west of another put in / take out area at the end of French Avenue. The waters around that island are usually rich in wildlife. We have seen manatees there on previous trips. We had our manatee dose and were looking for something different. Wifey was hoping for a red shouldered hawk or an eagle but she was more than happy of taking pics of an osprey, a Pileated Woodpecker, a Little Blue Heron, a Cardinal, an Anhinga, a Great Egret, and a Great Blue Heron that were in the area. One thing that was a concern to us was the heat. We made a stop and floated in the area while applying sun screen to ourselves, again, and grabbed more water bottles from the cooler.

Cardinal

Belted Kingfisher

After circling the island we headed South up river. The wind in our back made it felt like we were going down river and it was a welcome help. We were close to the west bank of the St' Johns when I saw something in the distance. It flew to a tree in the distance and did not, or maybe did not see it, come out. It was the elusive Belted Kingfisher. When I heard the distinctive sound the Kingfishers knew that what I saw was not my imagination. Did not see again and kept paddling to another area, South of the State Park put in, that also is a good place to see birds and gators. But close to the South entrance of that area we saw it again and, because it was in the East bank, we crossed the St. Johns looking for pic chance. The problem was that a couple in a canoe was in front of us and it was making the Kingfisher fly farther and farther from. At one point they stopped and that was our break. We tried not too approach it too fast but it kept flying away when we were close, as it usually does. Anyways we tried and wifey was able to shoot some pics of the Belted Kingfisher.

Limpkin

Gator on the St. Johns River

The plan was to take one of the canals that connect the St. John with a river named Dead River. Dead River is West of what is called Hontoon Island, which is a State Park too. Once we paddled from Blue Spring State Park around Hontoon Island and back to the St. John thru one of the canals but wifey did not like that trip too much. Saturday we just wanted to paddle the canal from the St. Johns and then come back. We found and explored the first canal, which is the more to the South, but it was blocked so we headed to the other body of water that connects the St. Johns with Dead River; Snake Creek.

Butterfly

Snake Creek...and a green mat

On my opening statement of this post said that this was an almost perfect paddling. Here is the explanation. I have been looking forward to paddle Snake Creek. The first time I missed the entrance from Dead River. The second time tried from the St. Johns but there was a downed tree so had to turn back. This time it looked promising until found a green mat of leafs covering the waters of Snake Creek. At the beginning it was a thin cover but after maybe twenty minutes it became thick. I did read somewhere that there is a rule of thumb for these kind of situations: If you cannot see the end of the blockage, turn around. Well, the end was not anywhere to be seen and we kept going until it became really thick and it was like trying to paddle on sand. It was at that point when told my wife we really had to turn around. Looking at the map we were maybe half way(best case scenario) but truth is, I did not know how was it the rest of the way. When we looked forward and only saw green several meters ahead thought it was better to return. At least we knew how far we were from entrance of the creek. But one good thing about this mini adventure in Snake Creek is that we saw several Black Crowned Night Herons. They were skittish but we were able to get some pics at the end.

Black Crowned Night Heron

Anhinga (female)

After the miss-adventure on Snake Creek we decided it was time go back. At that time we had been in the water for nearly 4 hours. Wifey still does not like to be paddling for so long but even when she was tough and did not say a word, I knew it was enough. She just asked me for another paddling into the run and then we could leave. Thought she deserved that, after we went thru at the creek she could have asked whatever she wanted to ask. Did not stay at the run for too long; we were tired and hungry. When we beached the yak at the State Park the tour boat was coming back to the dock. With the yak on the top on the mini van went to the boardwalk to take a stride to the spring. We stopped at one of the observing platforms to look for manatees on the run but there were none. As wifey moved to another spot to take pics of the many gars and mullets on the run someone besides me spotted a deer at the North bank of the run. I hoped that my wife saw it too and for her to be able to get some pics, which she did.

Deer on the Blue Spring Run bank

Wow...Sorry folks. This is taking too long and I realize not too many of you are visiting because my narrative skills. But before we finish this it is time for...

Did You Know That?

Tri-Colored Heron

Tri-Colored Heron was formerly known as the Louisiana Heron. It is one of the most abundant herons in the Deep South and is the only dark heron with a white belly. The Tri-Colored Heron's diet consist mostly of fish and the oldest one on record was 17 years and 8 months old. It ranges extends along the Atlantic coast from New Jersey southward Mexico, the Caribbean, and South America. It spends the winters over most of this range. When the Tri-Colored Heron senses danger nearby in the reeds or in high grasses, it may try to conceal itself by standing erect with its bill pointed toward the sky in order to blend in with its surroundings. When stalking small fished in shallows, it crouches with it's legs bent alsmot double or runs rapidly, wings partially raised, sometimes stretching one foot far forward and vibrating rapidly along bottom to flush prey.

Pileated Woodpecker

Here is what you probably came to see...the rest of the pics of what we saw today.

Let us start with herons...

Great Blue Heron

Green Heron

Green Heron

Black Crowned Night Herons

Tri-Colored Herons

Little Blue Herons

Egrets...

Snowy Egret

Great Egret

On the water...

Manatee

Gator

Gator

Gator

Turtle

Turtle

Gar

Mullets

Manatee

Turtle

In the air...

Osprey

Snowy Egret

Great Egret

Belted Kingfisher

Belted Kingfisher

Immature Little Blue Heron

Black Crowned Night Heron

Swallow-Tailed Kite

Swallow-Tailed Kite

Great Blue Heron

Flora...

On the ground too...

Gator stalks a deer at Blue Spring Run

Blue Spring deer

Squirrel

Peek-a-boo!!!!!

And finally...grooming...

Osprey

Little Blue Heron

Great Egret

Green Heron

Sorry for such a long post folks. Think I over did it but..cannot promise it will not happen again though.

Here is the link for more pics of this and past trips to Blue Springs State Park

Thanks for reading and hope you come back to the next Views From Our Kayak

Blue Spring