The full name of the park is Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park. A mouthful, I know. The park is less than 1.5 miles from our RV site, and we liked it a lot. On one side there’s a paved birding trail that’s 1.4 miles out and back. I did the walk a couple days prior. On the other side is a great assembly of wildlife including several species of birds, manatees, and a bear, bobcat and panther. Many of the animals were rescued and cannot be returned to the wild. They did such a nice job of providing habitats for the animals.
We watched as park volunteers fed pelicans fish and tossed heads of romaine lettuce to the herbivore manatees.
There’s also a pond that is well-populated with several species of fish. There’s an underwater fish observatory. I think the fish were as curious about us as we were about them because many of them stuck close to the glass. We mostly saw Common Snooks and Gray Snappers. The Homosassa Spring feeds in to the pond, which becomes the headwater for the Homosassa River. The spring’s temperature, 74F, is comfortable for the manatees. 68F and below can be deadly for them. Fun fact: a group of manatees is an “aggregation”.
In the afternoon we went back to the Withlacoochee Trail for another bike ride. On the way back we bought more oranges and grapefruits, which we are really enjoying.
No comments:
Post a Comment