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I admit it. It was an innocent mistake, your Honor. I plead guilty of feeding the wildlife. It’s just my spoiled indoor cats refused to eat the little crunchies of kibble left in the bottom of the bowl. It was no more than a tablespoon worth, but I tossed it onto the ground. I’m sorry. I realized my error when upon return to the scene of my transgression, a giant raccoon was scratching the ground where I had thrown the kibble. This Northern Raccoon (Procyon lotor) looked pretty healthy. Its fur was bushy and there were no obvious scratches. I stood in the shadows of the garage and watched from a safe distance as I didn't want the critter to take offense and come after me. It turned its head toward me. With brown eyes with black fur surrounding its eyes, the raccoon looked like a burglar caught in the act of stealing, in broad daylight no less.  A group of raccoons on the edge of the woods. This black and white photo is vey much how a raccoon would perceive the world since their vision is rendered in greyscale. Urban wildlife is not rare, it’s only difficult to see. Animals stay hidden during the day in nearby natural habitat or in quiet crevices around the home, then come out at night to forage. That’s why we call them night critters. Proof of their work can be seen in the morning as shown by overturned garbage cans and contents strewn across the driveway. My yard is a pretty happy, nutritious place for critters to live. There are lots of native plants and fruit trees, a pond with frogs, crawly insects, small lizards, snakes and nesting birds that all reside there.  This baby raccoon was seen high in a tree, it’s fur was still wet from days of tropical rains.  The base of a hollowed out tree provides a suitable place for a raccoon den. It is best to let wildlife forage naturally, but the crafty raccoon has adapted to begging for food in urban areas. Perhaps this raccoon’s well-nourished state is courtesy of the resort’s kitchen dumpster. My suspicion was confirmed as a result of research conducted at Crocodile Lake National Wildlife Refuge, to see how human activities relating to unsecured trash and feral cat feeding stations, influence the movements of raccoons and possums. They trapped local possums and raccoons, fit them with radio collars and released them in the area where they were captured. Researchers found out a number of these animals with collars would go up to Ocean Reef and eat each night.  Nimble paws and a keen sense of touch helps the raccoon find its food. The raccoon’s scientific name is Procyon lotor, when translated means “washing bear.” When a raccoon wets its paws, the water stimulates the nerve endings and heightens their sense of touch. Researchers had a serendipitous discovery when in September 2022, a GPS collar attached to a possum gave off a mortality signal, which is emitted when an animal goes several hours without moving when it should be active. The signal began moving, and it continued to stop and then move again over the period of a few days. The researchers discovered that a Burmese python was responsible, as it ate the possum and the radio collar was now inside the snake. They changed the focus of the collared raccoon and possum research toward tracking python.  This collared raccoon was known as “Fighter” - he was covered with scars and a truly wild raccoon who never went into people-occupied areas, such as neighborhoods or the waste transfer station. There aren’t many raccoons like him anywhere in the world. Photo by: Mike Cove Since 1995 when the Burmese python arrived in the Everglades, there has been a decline of 85% to 100% of the population of medium sized furry animals such as raccoons and rabbits due to the python. When the python swam 25 miles south to their new hunting grounds in North Key Largo, small furry creatures such as the Key Largo woodrat began disappearing. Camera traps placed inside woodrat nests provided evidence when a python preying on a woodrat was caught on video. Raccoons have few natural enemies other than man, and automobiles kill more raccoon than anything. Luckily for the raccoon urban food resources do allow these mesopredators - medium sized carnivorous animals such as raccoon and possum - to occur at much higher densities than the natural environment supports, which could indirectly help them sustain some of the python pressure compared to that in the Everglades.  An x-ray image of a python taken by researchers in Key Largo shows a GPS collar that had been fitted on a local opossum. Photo by: Kelly Crandall Animal survival success depends on how well they adapt to life with humans. The greatest concern with raccoons is the diseases and parasites they carry. Canine distemper and rabies will kill raccoons, and raccoon diseases can affect unvaccinated pets. The risk of rabies is small. The Monroe County Health Department, whose records go back to 2012, reports there have been no cases of rabies in Monroe County.   Seeing a raccoon out during the day does not mean it is rabid or dangerous. If it is quiet, and few people or dogs are around, it may come out to forage for food. According to the April/May 1988 editions of The Ocean Reef News:
“The fourth case of rabies in two months occurred in Key Largo March 4th, 1988. Two confirmed cases determine whether an epidemic rating is issued. Rabies, or neurotropic rhabdo virus, has been documented in raccoons at mile markers 101, 99 and two cases at mile marker 94, Key Largo. In each case raccoons approached humans during daytime hours acting erratically. Soon after, the animals were found dead and diagnosed in post-mortem as having rabies.” “Monroe County health professionals warn county residents to avoid all wild or unvaccinated animals and this, unfortunately includes squirrels. While many residents possess great affection toward squirrels and their antics, the very treat you present to a squirrel may act as an invitation to less desirable animals.
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 At Robbies Marina, in Islamorada visitors buy pails of fish to feed the resident tarpon. Some may think it odd that I live in the Keys, the fishing capital of the world and I don't fish. It’s not that I don't like the water. I love photographing its varying shades of blue and aqua. I came to the Keys in the mid-1980’s in a round-about way. I actually left my hometown of Ft. Lauderdale in 1979 aboard a yacht, and spent nearly five years, logging more than 47,000 miles by sea, including seven trans-Atlantics, as crew aboard the schooner “America.” Upon my return home, I had tamed my adventurous spirit, and satisfied a lifetime of “been-there-done-that’s” and also noticed the Ft. Lauderdale of my youth had vanished, as high-rise buildings were popping up in the once small town.  Though fishing for the “Silver King” was generally a sport reserved for men, that didn’t dissuade Shultz Heitman with her 185 lb tarpon catch circa 1900 (Credit: Archives State of Florida) Imagine what it would have cost to have chartered a yacht, and spent years living in exotic destinations? Yet we live in one of those special places called the Keys, where tourism and fishing have been the backbone of the economy for decades. Here we have hot weather, warm water, and skilled fishing guides for those willing to spend a lot of money to fulfill an item on their “bucket” list, to experience the rush of stalking and hooking a tarpon. The “Silver King” tarpon was the first major game fish sought in Florida waters.  This photo of hooking a tarpon was started out as a challenge and a dream, that actually came true. A pioneer in the sport of fishing, Stu Apte, age 94 still lives in Tavernier with his wife Jeanine. After serving from 1955-1958 as a Navy fighter pilot during the Korean War, he became a pilot for Pan Am. most importantly because their routes included the places he wanted to fish. Stu holds many records for fish, but his largest record on fly was for tarpon, a record he achieved twice on one day (May 28, 1982) fishing in Homosassa Springs; he broke the record in the morning with a 162-3/4 lb. tarpon, only to break his own record in the afternoon with one that weighed 164 lb. on 12 lb. tippet.  “The requisites to success in tarpon-fishing are a favorable locality, hot weather, warm water, infinite patience, plenty of endurance, coolness, skill, a good guide, carefully selected tackle, and a knowledge of how to use it. —“Tarpon Days,” Harper’s Weekly, June 26, 1897 When he wasn’t fishing, Stu was photographing and writing, or guiding other anglers to world records. In 1962 his angler Kay Brodney landed a 137.6 lb. tarpon on a 12-pound tippet, at Coupon Bight, Big Pine Key, fishing alongside a half dozen others, with baseball great Ted Williams, among the boats present. “It was fantastic to have her tie into that fish in front of all of those people,” Stu recalls. Now known as Coupon Bight Aquatic Preserve, it is a 5,400-acre protected area located south of Big Pine Key in the Lower Keys. An environmentalist in a time before sustainable fishing was even invented, Isaac Walton (1593 to 1683) in “The Compleat Angler” wrote: “The Earth is a solid, settled Element; an element most universally beneficial both to man and beast: to men who have their several recreations upon it; as Horseraces, Hunting, sweet smells, pleasant walks: the Earth feeds man, and all those several beasts that both feed him, and afford him recreation.”  In 1962 Kay Brodney record 137.6 lb. tarpon on a 12-pound tippet in the Florida Keys with legendary fishing guide Stu Apte. That quote was my inspiration: Can we still in the 21’st century have a battle with a powerful beast within sight of the trappings of mankind? I wanted a photo of a jumping tarpon on an anglers line with a traffic filled US-1 in the background for the America 24/7 (Day in a life of America) book project. I arranged for two guides, one as my photo “chase” boat and the second with long-time fishing guide Capt. Ron Wagner and two British anglers Pip and Ashley. My heart sunk when Capt. Ron said they’d been out all week and hadn’t hooked a tarpon. Undeterred, we approached the Channel 5 area where Capt. Ron put a small crab on the hook, cast it and within moments a tarpon grabbed it, jumped high into the air and the battle had began.  Following the fish through the concrete arch of the former Florida East Coast Railway Extension. I have heard stories of anglers while fishing at Channel 5 Bridge, would hook a tarpon, it would head through the bridge to the ocean and turn around and go back again. You have to follow the fish, and in heavy current it is easy for them to breathe, they have more oxygen and it gives the fish more stamina to fight harder. On this day this tarpon headed that way, in heavy current toward the bridge. The experienced Capt. Ron maneuvered the fish, line, and the boat through the concrete arches of the Channel 5 bridge and through to the ocean side.  Closer to the boat, the tarpon lept out of the water in front of me.  Landing a tarpon in view of US1. My camera captured many different views, but always in mind was the shot I wanted… a tarpon battle with a background of US1. As the sun got lower and the fish more tired, the angler Ashley brought it closer to the boat and it leapt out of the water in front of me. The shot made the book.
SO I guess I DO fish after all, sustainably, with my camera and lens, I RELEASE the shutter to capture a moment. There’s so many critters here in the Florida Keys, I’ve been able to write about a different variety each month. So far I’ve covered those who are feathered, furry, or scaly, from a spectrum of soft bodied insects to mammals, amphibians to birds, with some that slither, run, scurry or crawl and others that sail freely on the wind.   The male Golden Silk spider is a fraction of the size of the female. It’s been educational and enjoyable, photographing and researching each subject. Up till now… my current subject spiders creeps me out. I am not really afraid of them, but I don’t like looking at them either. There’s probably some good reason why at Halloween a lot of decorations depict spiders. Arachnophobia!!  A Cellar spider (Pholcidae sp) was attracted to the moisture in my kitchen sink. When I was five years old, sleepovers at my friend Jennifer’s house were fun, and spiders were part of the excitement. The rarely used room where we slept had pecky cypress wood covering the walls and ceiling. and brown spiders the size of silver dollars hung from webs in the dark, dusty corners. (I guess the spiders were what the monsters ate when they came out from underneath the beds.) Researchers believe we are not born with the fear of spiders, but instead are taught this behavior. Children are curious about spiders, and will capture them and watch how their tiny bodies move via their eight long legs until a parent/teacher intervenes, with the message of “be careful, they bite.“  Southern Black Widow spiders (Latrodectus mactans) are a venomous spider found throughout the Southeastern U.S. Credit: James L. Castner UF All spiders bite, however only two of them in Florida will provoke a strong reaction in humans: the Southern Black Widow spider (Latrodectus mactans) and the Brown Recluse spider (Heteropoda venatoria). According to the Florida Poison Information Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami (1-800-222-1222) if bitten by a Black Widow you will likely experience severe stomach pain, and you should go to the emergency room immediately. The Black Widow received its name from the belief the female spider would kill and consume the male after mating.  Brown Recluse showing “violin” shaped marking. by Jean Woods The Brown Recluse spider is typically found in Central and Southern Missouri… not here. The only documented case in Florida of a Brown Recluse spider bite involved a sailor who was bitten on the hand by a male Brown Recluse in the cargo hold of a naval ship in Jacksonville. The Brown Recluse spider bite causes pain, blistering and frequently necrotic lesions in humans. They are often blamed for mystery bites, wounds and bacterial infections that require treatment with antibiotics— a misdiagnosis by the public and doctors who are not trained in spider identification, nor have seen the spider inflict the bite. There are more than 250 species of spiders in Florida. Around the house, spiders are beneficial insects who consume flying insects, cockroaches and other small domestic pests. In the wild spiders spend their days hiding in leaf litter, and under debris, and emerge at night to hunt. They also spin elaborate webs in clearings to catch flying insects who cannot see the webs until they are ensnarled. Once in their web, the spider bites it’s victim and a small amount of venom is used to immobilize the insect, then dissolve it into a “smoothie” for the spider to ingest as they cannot eat solid food. A spider may bite a human if held or pinched; the bite may hurt for a while but quickly goes away and is much less severe than a bee sting.  The Mabel Orchard Orbweaver (Leucauge argyrobapta) has an orange and green, almost metallic colored body. I have a general rule when walking in the woods: always go with someone else, and let them lead the way. This is because my attention is usually behind the camera lens and I have a bad habit of walking into spider webs. The two methods people use to avoid walking into spider webs are (1) Carry a long stick to brush away webs in the path, (2) Avoid disturbing the web by walking around it. The second method respects the spider’s efforts making a web which is light, elastic and stronger than steel, and is how the spider, who may have poor eyesight, senses vibrations from their prey, as the web acts as an extension of their sensory system.  This Ghost spider (Genus Habana) was hiding among the leaves in a fruit tree. Most spiders have eight eyes and eight legs. and come in a multitude of colors and can be patterned. Some have tiny hairs on their legs that can sense electric charges around plants or the movement of air emitted from a flying insect’s wings. Not all spiders spin webs, and those that don’t, rely on their better eyesight to capture prey.
Pest control is a choice, and my preferred method is preventing a bite by wearing gloves while working where spiders may be found, and shaking out shoes that haven’t been worn recently before putting them on. You can deter spiders by turning off outside lights at night, so not to attract flying insects, a spider’s preferred food. Realize that proper identification of the spider is the first step, and if the spider is beneficial, let it be. |
CAROL ELLIS
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