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Originally Posted by vettech2112
I wondered if you'd see him or if perhaps the carcas I spoke of, considering how large it was, was still around. I could have just sat and observed him work the rest of the day but I was worried I was disturbing him, even though he was quite friendly and gave no indication I was.
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We didn't spend very much time with Philippe, for the same reason you mention. That, and it was later in the day and he needed to head back to observe the female gator's nest for the evening. He apparently uses a wood canoe in some manner, as he inquired about the Guadalupe River's suitability for his wooden canoe and the video he showed us of the female gator with her fresh kill included a brief tripod shot of him approaching his canoe. He has a healthy respect and a large appreciation for the reptiles, so I'm not entirely sure the canoe isn't just a prop for the video he's working on.
We didn't observe any carcasses, but there's so many deer and racoons that I'm sure the gators are feeding well. Even the tiny (under 2 feet) gator we observed by one of the docks caught a sizable fish while we watched.
The mild weather both played in our favor -- more pleasant hiking and photography conditions -- and conspired against us -- keeping the gators in water and away from the trails. The day we had the worst horse fly issues, we'd gone straight from checking in to the hotel to the park and neglected to wear ANY (!) repellent. It still wasn't as painful and unnerving as one visit we made to Anahuac NWR in the past -- the one where I mentioned the insects are smart and attack the windows of your vehicle, just knowing there's warm human flesh inside for the taking!
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Originally Posted by vettech2112
I think I had so much success because I go mid-week. As I work weekend overnights, I tend to go on Tues or Weds. I'm betting these animals know the pattern well enough that they hide more on the weekends and it probably takes until late Monday for them to show themselves. It seems that I'm frequently getting comments about how many animals I get to see and how few others do. Either the above theory is correct or I've got a "gift" of some kind.  |
I think it's probably equal parts both reasons.
Some people just do better at mixing among wildlife -- it has a lot to do with patience, body language, noise and even color of clothing. I've lost more shots than I care to count because I absolutely couldn't contain a sneeze for another moment...
Our visit on Friday was definitely more productive than the return visit on Saturday. More people in the park on Saturday meant the wildlife was more spread out and less apt to be within "killer" photographic range (even with our 300mm zooms).
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Originally Posted by vettech2112
As far as the spiders, again, they must know the pattern because I saw many many webs (and their owners) along the trails at about the 5-6' level. However, maybe there are lots more spiders there than I've noticed because I have a habit of keeping my eyes fairly low rather than looking high in the trees.
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I tend to look high, a habit I've acquired as I try to take more good bird photographs (Justin's staple, but something I didn't get into until I had a lens that made it more worthwhile). That said, I have a sneaking suspicion that children and other hikers might have "taken out" some of the lower-hanging webs, particularly when we returned on Saturday. <sigh> I saw a neat thing as one spider worked methodically to remove a dead leaf that had become trapped near the center of its web -- without much effort, it disengaged the leaf from the web and wove some replacement strands for reinforcement. I'm in awe of the beauty of some of their webs...
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Originally Posted by vettech2112
I've been wanting to do the George Observatory tour for ages! My friend in Boerne is studying Cosmology and I've always been an astronomy geek. One thing I was amazed about SA was how much less light pollution there is than Houston.
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We paid the $5/person ($10 total) for rights to view through both the main (32" primary) scope as well as the East and West dome scopes. They could use some process improvements because we had to ask twice before we knew if it was our time to view, but the experience itself was terrific -- even the volunteers were awesome (and have some amazing scopes to view through). We observed the Ring Nebula (M57), which was "just" a blurry ring in the scope until the volunteer swapped eyepieces so we could see the stars around the nebula and appreciate that the nebula was in fact a very different phenomena. Through the larger, official scopes, we viewed the Hercules Globular Cluster (
M13) -- very impressive.
I was impressed with the dark sky out there. It's no Big Bend, certainly, but it was quite easy to note the Milky Way and we spotted several satellites cruising overhead during our time outside. I cannot see the Milky Way from my backyard in NE San Antonio, nor my parent's backyard in NW San Antonio -- too much heavy orange city glow. But out by Canyon Lake (in the "old" days and further into the Hill Country, it's still quite visible. My favorite night sky view in awhile is out in Leakey, Texas.
Anyone been to the McDonald Observatory in West Texas? That's on our agenda at some point.
Trip report probably won't be posted until end of week due to some business stuff that's popped up on our radar. I wish I'd taken more photographs of the Brazos Bend facilities, but I got fixated on wildlife watching and birding. We did get some awesome duck and goose photos out at Bayfront Park in Hoston, near the hotel we stayed at. I would have loved to have had time to return there for another visit, particularly to photograph some of the canoeists and kayakers.