10/20/10 Blancard Park

     When ever I go to Blanchard Park I know I can collect exotic plants and litter until I'm too tired to continue. Today I pulled out 250 Cesar Weeds, 17 Chinese Tallow Trees and 3 Cuban Anole lizards. I began hacking away at several Tallow Trees with my survival knife. I brought one down and an working on a few other large ones.
     It will be easier for me to come back and cut off the new tree growth until the tree dies, then it would be for me to have to deal with the hundreds of thousands of seeds the resulting baby trees.
     I don't know why fisher men and women come to enjoy fishing in this park and then turn around and litter it. I got tangled in the fishing line ball pictured above. I do usually pick up litter while I'm collecting exotic plants and fishing line is especially dangerous to many kinds of animals. You can see in the picture above I pulled up a trot line. A trot line is a line you tie to a tree and you leave the line with a baited hook to come back for later. This is illegal and irresponsible fishing. Many turtles, alligators and birds die trying to eat the bait and getting caught on the line.
     I also noticed two big Armoured Cat Fish laying in the water near the bank. These exotic over grown sucker fish have spikes in their fins that block any native animal from eating them. I will find a way to get them.

A long day doing good 10/24/10

     I went to "Back To Nature" animal hospital to get some pictures. I got some good Owl pictures, killed a Cuban Anole then started home. I stopped to photo a deer that was hit by a car and then ended up in trail leading into the woods. I am an explorer at heart and find an odd trail or river bend hard to resist. Well not long after I started down the trail I got into a Chinese Tallow Tree pulling war. I ended up taking out 17 Chinese Tallow Trees and 5 Cesar Weeds. I got some good flower pictures too.
     Then it was off to Lake Mills Park to take on two large Chinese Tallow trees I could not pull out by hand on a past trip. As I was driving up to the park a Gopher Tortoise was crossing the road. I nice man on a bicycle stopped and helped it across. I sat there in the road with my hazard lights on protecting him as he protected the tortoise. Later I dove into the woods of Lake Mills. My pullerbear was the perfect tree pulling tool. I ripped out those two big Tallow Trees and then I was off on another mission.
     I went back home and taught a Hapkido class for some friends. It is because of my Hapkido that I am comfortable being so deep in the woods exploring by myself.
     I went on to UCF and went on a Cuban Anole (Anolis sagrei) hunt. I killed 47 of them and saw two Green Anoles. In years past I could find a hundred or more in a day. When I began this project three years ago all the Cuban Anoles were huge and the Greens were small, weak and struggling. Now I rarely see a large Cuban and I've seen many Greens reaching maturity and even old age.

10/17/10 Mystical Experience

     If you look back to 10/3/10 you will see the baby Musk Turtle I found out in a Cypress Swamp. I released it back into the Econ River a week ago. The river is two acres away from my house, with thick Cypress Swamp in between.
    Well... a week later I'm coming back from the Eco-Action river clean up and I see this strange seed on the ground in front of my front porch. I pick it up and it's not a seed, it's my baby Turtle! How and more importantly why, did this tiny spec of a Turtle make such a dangerous out of the water trip to come back to my front door?! I'm still amazed by this. I rushed the dry baby into the house and into some room temperature water. Now it is living with me again, in a fish tank in my living room.
     I wonder how long it had been waiting there. How did it get past all the predators on the way back to the house? Why would it leave a clean, food rich river to come back to live with me? Did it take all week to make the trip?
     If I didn't see it with my own eyes (and camera) I wouldn't have believed it.

10/17/10 "Bridge Out" on the Big Econ River

     I met with Eco-Action to do a river clean up here this afternoon. I got a collection of beer bottles along with 204 Cesar Weeds (and many to come back for), 14 Chinese Tallow Trees (with many of these to come back for too) and 10 Air Potato Vine potatoes.

    I pulled on a Air Potato vine and the potatoes came raining down on me. There are many Chinese Tallows here that I need my Pullerbear for and one giant one I need an axe or chain saw for. A tree has fallen across the river and allowed me to get to a bunch of Chinese Tallows that I hadn't noticed before.
    You can see lots of environmental information on the Eco-Action.net website.

10/16/10 Lake Mills Park

     The last time I was in Lake Mills Park, Cesar Weed was everywhere. I came back today ready to go to war. But I'm very happy to report someone else got to them! So rather than hundreds and hundreds I collected 102 Cesar Weeds and none of those were large. I took out 2 Chinese Tallow Trees that I was able to pull out by hand. There are two more I need to come back for, with my Pullerbear tool. I collected some litter also, mostly beer bottles which is typical. People throw beer bottles into the bushes so they don't get caught drinking.
     The stream that feeds this lake is clogged with Water Hayacinth, I'll come back for those too.

10/14/10 On patrol in my preserve

 Today I realeased the Red Rat Snake there with a full stomach today. I saved it off of a road, kept it for a pet for a couple days, fed it some mice, then put it back.
10/14/10
    Cesar Weed Patrol
    I also found 18 small Cesar Weeds. In my woods Cesar Weeds are rare. In many public parks they are the dominant species. I also killed one Cuban Anole that wasn't as fast as I was.
   

Feeding Exotics to Natives

     This is a Garden Orb Spider. It lives beside my grassy driveway. I tried to feed it an exotic Cuban Anole today. But the spider was afraid of the lizard at first and stayed at the top of its web. Later it returned to the center of its web as you see in the picture, but it still just ignored the lizard lunch. Later it dropped the lizard to the ground and went on to hunt bugs.
    

Exotic Plant and Amimal Removal: University of Central Florida

 10/14/10   

     5 less Sagrei

     Today I got 5 other Cuban Anoles. They are more exposed there and easier to catch than at my home.

10/10/10    
     26 less Sagrei
     On my way in to work, I hunted for Cuban Anoles (Anolis sagrei). I got 26 of them. One Cuban Anole was closing in on a Green Anole (Anolis carolinesis) from behind. The Cuban is gone and the Green is still there.
     The top picture is of a Green Anole. The below picture is the now deceased Cuban Anole.
I also pulled out 2 Cesar Weeds I saw in a ditch.

Exotic Plant and Animal Removal: Mead Gardens

10/8/10

     On my way to do some sign langauage practice I stopped in one of my favorite parks. Mead Gardens is in Winter Park Florida. There are some Green Anoles left there, so I often stop by to kill as many Cuban Anoles as I can. Today I caught 8 Cuban Anoles. I also took out 100 Cesar Weeds, 2 Ear Trees and one Chinese Tallow Tree.

     I met a nice lady named Kimberly who told me the park was spraying to kill Cesar Weeds, but oviously it was not working. She also showed me two giantic Ear Trees, the biggest I have ever seen.

Exotic Plant & Animal Removal: Big Econlockhatchee River

     While out the other day collecting Water Haycinth plants (Eichhornia crassipes) from the Big Econlockhatchee River, I collected 86 Water Haycinth plants, all that my canoe could carry and 7 Cesar Weeds (Urena lobata). I also caught a tiny baby Musk Turtle. I use the Hyacinths for fertilizer, I burn the Cesar Weeds.

     When I catch an animal I often keep it for a pet for a few days. I take it around with me to teach people about wildlife. I take photos too. I know how to care for animals so I try to do this with as little stress as possible to the animal. I often release them with a full stomach of their favorite foods too. If I let someone hold a turtle, I keep my hands right below thiers in case they drop it. If I'm showing off a snake, I genlty hold the snake's head away from the person just in case something upsets the snake. I bring in toads and hold it in my hands to show people, toads do not give people warts.

     People are facinated by even the most common animals. Letting them pet a toad for example builds their appreciation for toads. If I bring in a spider or snake I never joke with people if they are afraid of it. I try to point out some attractive feature. "Look this Wandering Spider is rootbeer brown in color." In psychology it is a principle that the more people know about anything, the more they like it.

10/6/10

     Today took out two small Ear Trees from my front yard. I only want native Florida plants growing here. I took on a much larger third Ear Tree and for an hour whacked away with an axe, cutting large branches into small logs. It will take me several more days before I have hacked this one to the ground. The picture above is of an Ear Tree seed pod. It is from this pod it gets the name Ear Tree.

     I released the tiny Musk Turtle back into the river.

Exotic Plant & Animal Removal: Jay Blanchard Park

5/26/11
     Armoured Catfish in Blanchard Park
     I called the FWC (Florida Wildlife Commision) and asked them what the law was on catching exotic/invasive Armoured Cat Fish. They said because they are exotics then there is no bag limit or catch method limit on them. Of course what ever method I use, it must be very species specific.
     So I went with a friend to Blanchard Park to hunt the Armoured/Sailfin/Janitor/Sucker Cat Fish. My friend had a cast net and I brought a bamboo spear. After chasing about ten of them around we didn't catch a single one. They stayed just a few feet beyond our reach all afternoon. The cast net sunk to slowly and the fish just ducked under it. The spear was not accurate enough.
     After watching several Youtube.com videos, I really feel a bow and arrow fighing-rig up is the best way to catch them.
     I did collect a bucket full of Water Hyacinths, Water Lettuce, one Chinese Tallow Tree, 20 Cesar Weeds and 1 Cuban Anole. I also scraped off all the pink egg cases of the invasive Channel Apple Snail I could find.

10/10/10
     Chinese Tallow Trees
     I went to Blanchard Park today and did something I have never done. I walked over the bridge over to the north side of the Little Econlockhatchee River. I've been cleaning this park for 17 years with Eco-Action and never knew there were paths over there!
    I explored and found these paths to be a lower elevation than on the south side of the river. In Florida a few inches in elevation could mean the difference between weeks or months underwater. The plants are different and dominated by grasses and Button Bushes. I saw a few populations of Cesar weeds and pulled out 205 of them. I more importantly saw a dominance of Chinese Tallow Trees and I pulled out 72 of them. I found a lot more styrafoam here then in higher elevations.

     Since I'm walking and not in a canoe like I am at home, I'm limited to taking out only what I can carry. If I was in a canoe I could use it like a floating trash can and collect a lot more.

                            
10/7/10
     Anolis sagrei
     I stopped briefly at Blanchard Park and terminated three Cuban Anoles. Cuban Anoles (Anolis sagrei) are an exotic and invasive species of lizard. They are pushing the native Green Anole (Anolis carolinensis) into extinction. (The picture above is a young Cuban Anole.)
     Often when I am out hunting Cuban Anoles I see them fighting Green Anoles for territory. I swoop in an take the Anolis sagrei right out of the picture. Often I keep the Cuban Anoles for later and feed them to some local Soft Shell Turtles. I find this to be true justice, to feed an exotic species to native one.
     I wish the Anoli sagrei were more commonly called Caribbean Anole. To call them Cuban Anole, like Cuban Tree frogs in neither biologically correct nor culturally correct.

10/6/10
     A Good Use of Time
     Today while waiting for a dentist appointment I went to Blanchard Park and took out 200 Cesar Weeds and two Cuban Anoles.

10/4/10
     A War Begins
     I have many exotic invasive plant and animal removal sites going on at once. This blog will be about my effort to rid Central Florida of exotic and Invasive species.

     Today I went to Blanchard Park in East Orlando and ripped out 450 Cesar Weed plants, 10 small Chinese Tallow trees, two Begonia plants, one Cuban Anole lizard and some litter. There was several Chinese Tallow trees to big for me to remove. So I took out my survival knife and hacked them down to stumps.
     The picture above is of Cesar Weed (Urena lobata). Cesar weed is a category II invasive exotic plant in the state of Florida. I think it should be category I. It is very invasive and crowds out any native plants.