My boyfriend and I went back to the great swamp on April 23, 2008, to see what we could see. Again, we heard lots of mysterious bird calls and saw awesome turtles and frogs. I also got a shot of a little bird I’ve never seen before. It was hanging out by the board walk near where the snapping turtle was from our previous visit. The bird hung around, though he didn’t let us get to close, and he flew under the boardwalk often. It looked like a little batman – dark cap and back, white face and chest. I thought maybe he was a swallow, swift, or martin, but his wings didn’t seem long enough. Oh well, I’m hoping that the friendly people here will help me ID it, since I haven’t been able to make a positive ID with my birding book (Smithsonian). I’ve posted two blurry pictures for ID… I gotta start bringing a tripod with me. We saw a Mallard and some Canada Geese too. When the light had just about faded, we left and went back home. There, I got to see another first – a tick crawling on my boyfriend’s arm! Ewww! At least it wasn’t attached, but the weird thing is that we weren’t near any grass or bushes – we stayed on the boardwalk over marshy areas. I guess it could have climbed up into the bird blind… but at any rate – it’s time to invest in some Off! spray.
