Paul Holmes and I spent about three hours on Thursday morning birding the Babcock/Webb WMA.  We saw several deer and one large pig that crossed the road in front of our car.  Birds seen included Bluebirds, Sandhill Crane, Great-crested Flycatcher, Shrike, several Brown Thrashers, Eastern Towhee, and Downy and Red-bellied Woodpeckers.   In certain areas, we also noted quite a number of dragonflies and small skippers.

As a followup to Thursday's trip, I visited the Babcock/Webb on Saturday morning for a couple of hours concentrating on photographing dragonflies seen near the east end of Seaboard Grade.  I found numerous Halloween Pennants, Eastern Pondhawks, a few Golden Skimmers and Eastern Amberwings.  I also saw some birds along the way, such as Brown Thrashers, Bluebirds, Green Herons, and three Red-cockaded Woodpeckers.

Paul Holmes and I went out to the Ding Darling NWR on Sanibel this morning, arriving there at 8:00.  Rather than an honor system, there is now a gate with a manned shack to collect the $5 fee (unless you have a Golden Age Passport).  The primary purpose of our visit was to look for two uncommon birds, the Mangrove Cuckoo and the Black-whiskered Vireo.  Unfortunately, we were unsuccessful.  We even walked the cross trail and took the Indigo Trail to the end.  We also traveled the Scenic Drive twice.  Birds seen included Spoonbills, Egrets (Great, Reddish, Snowy), Herons (Green, Great Blue, Little Blue, Tricolored, Yellow-crowned Night), and several Gray Kingbirds.  We saw 22 species in the NWR.

On the way home, we made a quick stop at Bunche Beach (11:30 am).  The tide was out exposing much of the mud flats.  There must have been at least a thousand or more wading birds and shorebirds as far as the eye could see.  Shorebirds observed included Dowitchers, Plovers, Sandpipers, and Willets.  Many of the birds were in their alternate plumage.  We didn’t have a scope with us and didn’t have appropriate footwear for going out on the flats, plus it was getting hot.  So we didn’t spend much time trying to identify the various species present.