The green fly orchid, is the only north Florida epiphyte which grows on trees.   There are several small stands in Womack Creek and also in Deep Creek in Tate’s Hell, but we have never seen it bloom.   This year, noticing dried bloom stems, we  GPS’ed the locations and checked on it every time we paddled these two areas.  Last week we saw the bud stems and today, not on those bud stems which we had flagged, but on another stand, we saw these miniature orchids, not even 1/2 inches from tip to tip of the petals.   But orchids, they were, and it made our day.

Another memorable sight:  a banded sphinx moth, which alighted on Ed’s arm when we were trying to determine whether the rushes were sedges, rushes or grasses.  It stayed there for the duration of the photo shoot and would have remained there  had we not flung it into the air to fly away. 

And on a warm day, one can always see a snake or two, and alligators (4) and zillions of turtles.

And damsel flies, dragon flies, other insects, including yellow flies — it’s busy on that creek when the weather starts warming up.

Not to mention the flowers.   Roses in bloom right now, Dahoon hollies; soon muscadines, large stands of swamp titi and Southern arrowwood.  The clematis crispa vines are thriving and this summer one should see a lot of these bell shaped flowers.

Swamp titi — just a few in bloom, soon huge stands throughout the creek.

Swamp rose – fragrant.

Clematis crispa — on vines.

Muscadine blossoms, just starting to bloom. Lots of blooms this year, if pollinated, lots of little muscadines in late September.

Stands of Cowcreek spider lily and false dragon head.

And the fish were jumping!