March 25, 2018 - Reptiles and a Crab

We’ve been to Florida in the winter for many years, so I already have enough Alligator photos. But when John Murphy and I were birding at St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge, I spotted this little gator and decided it was too cute to pass up. The leaves on the ground give some perspective on its size and I’m guessing it wasn’t more than a couple of feet long. It doesn’t appear to have been in many big battles yet because its skin is in such perfect shape.

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Later we came across this really big Alligator and, of course, I had to take a photo of it as well, breaking my vow to not add to my gator photo collection.

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Here’s a close-up that shows its large claws.

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One morning Diana and I were walking on the beach at St. George Island and we found this Hermit Crab in a Welk shell. Hermit Crabs don’t grow a shell, they borrow an empty one of the right size that they find on the beach. When they grow too large for that shell, they abandon it and find another one that fits.

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Here’s the back side of the shell showing all the barnacles covering its surface. The shell was 6 to 7 inches long.

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On a later trip to St. Marks with Diana, I photographed this Florida Red-bellied Turtle.

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