High Drama

On our morning walk yesterday, we witnessed something that proved once again that Nature is messy and often violent: a bald eagle being chased by an osprey, whose nest was nearby. We weren't sure what bad thing the eagle had done, but I suspect the osprey had caught a fish for breakfast, and the eagle flew by and tried to steal it.

Although I'm not aware that eagles eat the eggs of other birds, it's possible that's what caused the osprey to rise up out of its nest and take pursuit. But it's not really nesting season yet, and ospreys are just now returning to the nests they had last year - to check them out and, if need be, add a few sticks here and there.

Last year, I was driving along a busy highway near here when traffic came to a stop in both directions, and some people got out of their cars to look. It seems that a bald eagle had swooped down and was making a meal of juicy road kill.

Stealing other birds' food and eating what cars have run over are not what you think of when describing our national bird. Benjamin Franklin once wrote in a letter he was sorry the bald eagle with its low moral character had been chosen as the national bird of the United States of America. He personally favored the wild turkey.

A Terrible Tragedy

My thoughts and prayers are with all the people who lost so much in Hurricane Sandy. Stay strong. Better days are coming.

Learning as I go

Gardening in the tropics has its surprises. After a sago palm I planted several years ago succumbed to a disease that has killed virtually all of that variety in south Florida, I found what I thought would be the perfect replacement. It was a foot tall then, and feathery. I thought it would remain small. It had one trunk.

Given our rain and sun however, my choice of pigmy date palm was not a perfect one for the spot outside our bathroom window. Today, the tree is at least seven feet tall with multiple trunks. Worse than that, sharp needles three inches long grow from the otherwise feathery fronds.  My husband, Ed, says the tree is a menace when he wants to turn on the garden hose or wash the window.

So today, I asked our tree man to cut the thing down. He was reluctant. He said he could remove all but one trunk, so at least there would be something pretty in the space, and the faucet and window would be accessible. Other trunks, in a few months, would start growing from the stump, he admitted, but they wouldn't become a problem for several years. At that point, we would have other decisions to make. Sounds good to me.

Well, we've started!

 A New Adventure

We started living at least part of the year in the tropics in 1992, but my love for it goes back to the time my grandparents retired to St. Petersburg, FL. I had never seen a palm tree before, or a hibiscus growing anywhere but in a pot on a summer patio up north. That is, until our family visited Grandpa and Grandma each Christmas.

Frankly, I was hooked then, but years passed by before we - my husband and I - made our own pilgrimage south.

With this, I jump into the blogosphere where I intend to write about my passion for living in the tropics. We started with vacations in the Caribbean - just why I'll tell you later - and even bought a house there. A volcano caused that to change. Now, we live in southwest Florida with our own palm trees and hibiscus.

I won't concentrate on just the tropics, though. Sometimes, I may write about the other loves of my life - the island of Montserrat in the Caribbean, creating art quilts, writing, travel, photograph and gardening zone 10 and 11.

I hope you'll visit often and comment about what you read.