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October 2009 Calendar Picture and Discussion
I was delighted when Nora (Sunny) agreed to accompany me on a photo expedition to Emerson Point because she has a great eye and was instrumental in finding many of the pictures you'll see on this page.
Though it's not too visible on the small homepage calendar, if you look near the center of the larger picture above, you can see the Sunshine Skyway bridge which spans Tampa Bay and connects Manatee and Pinellas counties.
This is the new cable-stay bridge that replaced the original cantilever bridge that was struck by a ship in 1980. At 7:33 on the morning of May 9, 1980, my boss (At the Kee Lawnmower plant in Samoset), who lived in St. Petersburg, was on his way to work. When the 20,000 ton freighter, Summit Venture struck one of the center bridge pilings, the entire center span fell 150 feet into Tampa Bay and his car went with it. The new bridge is a thing of beauty and a fitting memorial to the 35 lives that were lost that day.
The park, Emerson Point, where these photographs were taken is the last bit of land that separates the Manatee River from Tampa Bay.
This spit of land, at the western end of Snead Island, has always been used by the public as a park. When I was a kid, we would go there to camp and party. In the mid-70s all this was threatened when it was purchased by a private developer who started to build condominiums. When that project faltered, the county and state were quick to step in and purchase the property for permanent public use.
Of course, as soon as it was officially designated as a park, all camping and partying were prohibited. Still, we should be very thankful that this excellent piece of the natural coast was preserved.
In this very close satellite view, you can see the park and the mound where the failed condominium was under construction. Instead of demolishing the structure, the park developers just buried it by making an observation mound on the spot.
This picture of one of the park's public areas was taken from atop the observation mound. In the distance, right on the horizon, you can see a strip of land which is Egmont Key and helps to form the barrier that makes Tampa Bay a safe harbor.
The small building in the photo is a public restroom, notable for many reasons.
It is self-contained, painted to blend in, solar powered... and spotlessly CLEAN!
As we set out down the nature path along the shore, this couple was returning. Though the guy, car keys in hand, was already moving on to the next thing, I could tell his girlfriend had been taking pictures and had a few more in mind. Her camera was quite expensive and much nicer than mine.
The open beach at the start of the path is a spot where we once built huge fires and pitched tents. At the right time of day, I've seen it literally carpeted with fiddler crabs, but they sleep during the heat of the day. Across the bay the Skyway rises majestically.
This sandy path amongst the driftwood is one of the most beautiful on the west coast of Florida that are still accessible to the public.
Imagine the countless times the soil beneath this seagrape's roots had to be washed away to produce this exquisite example of living driftwood!
There are many points along the path where branches grow low overhead and one must duck.
In the continental United States, Florida is the only place where red mangroves grow. They thrive here along the coast and, because of their array of roots, they trap debris and sediment which actually build land mass.
There are two main varieties of mangrove that grow here and both share the trait that they have a root system that must be exposed to the air. Since they grow in mostly saturated soils that are generally poor in some nutrients, they get the rest of what they need from the air.
The red mangrove, pictured above, dominates at the very spot where water meets land and is marked by it's long support roots. The black mangrove, below, generally grows in a band a bit farther from the shore and gets air to its roots by growing protuberances six to eight inches long that carpet the soil and make it look like it needs a shave.
Because of their adaptation to the aquatic environment, red mangroves grow very strange seeds. Actually these seeds germinate right on the host tree and are about 10 to 14 inches long when they drop from the tree into the water. They have very sharp points on the bottom and are often sprouting slightly at the top end.
They are bottom heavy and float vertically in the water where they stay alive up to a year and can travel amazing distances. When they get into shallow water, a wave will come along and lift the vertical seed then plunge it point down into the mud where it will stick and take root.
There are extensive mangrove forests near my house. I'm afraid, when we were children, we stopped a great many from propagating as they should because we discovered that these long pointy seed-pods made excellent ammunition in our various war games. They were naturally weighted correctly with long flinging shafts and we collected them by the bushel. You haven't properly smarted until you've been struck by one of these arm-propelled-grenades flung at high speed -- YEE-OUCH!
Even though the trail is above the normal high water mark, you can see by the items deposited around the roots of this seagrape that the tide often inundates the area taking some things and leaving others.
There are many places along the trail where the dense foliage forms a literal green tunnel with a sandy bottom.
Here is a good example of how mangroves build land. While the soil around of the roots of the tree in the foreground has been washed away, causing it to topple, you can see that because of their elaborate support roots, the mangroves are growing strong even when standing in water.
The next picture is an animation of a shot I took from inside a dark close foreground with a distant subject in the light. You can see that with the camera on automatic I had to pick between either the foreground or the background in focus.
By placing the camera in manual mode, I was able to set a small enough lens aperture to bring both in focus. To reduce the tendency of the foreground to silhouette, I increased the exposure time as much as possible for a hand-held shot.
What are the chances of this living seagrape growing twin trunks set at opposite angles and both rotting out at exactly the same height? As the old saying goes, "Truth is stranger than fiction."
The young mangroves in the foreground are black mangroves which took root in the leaf litter a bit farther from shore. Red and black mangroves are called by the colors because the layer (cambium) just beneath the bark shows the color when the bark is scraped. A red mangrove in this condition actually looks like it's been wounded because of the bright red color.
When we found this nifty knothole along the path, Nora and I couldn't resist taking some interesting shots of it, as this animation shows...
When we decided to go a bit off the beaten path, we didn't get far. The undergrowth is all but impenetrable--
and most of the island is actually a salt marsh, only a tiny bit above sea level.
We also quickly came upon another reason to stick to the safer areas. Wasps love to build their nests beneath palm fronds where they are protected from sun and rain. This tends to hide them until you brush the frond out of the way then they nail you!
I was so thankful we discovered this nest without incident, so I kept my distance. Nora, of course, was fascinated and walked right up to within a couple of feet!
Because of the salt environment and sandy soil, higher areas of the island take on a more desert nature. These yucca plants are some of the many cactus species native to the state.
As you can see in the satellite photograph above, the shallow water continues for hundreds of yards from land. This cast net fisherman wandered far from shore in search of bait fish.
When we saw storm clouds gathering, we made our way back to the beach where we found these young people watching a horseshoe crab.
As the first few drops of rain fell, I snapped this final shot looking across the Manatee River where it was already raining hard on our homes.
