![junkit bird junkit bird](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/rCoArfgPxck/maxresdefault.jpg)
The SW Florida IPTs (herons, egrets, gulls, terns, shorebirds, Osprey, & both pelicans.
Junkit bird registration#
Registration includes a complimentary homemade crawfish etouffe dinner hosts: Wes and Patti Ardoin. With cloudy weather the days will be long. Sunny afternoons will be tough at this Lake Martin but mornings will be spectacular. Also: Cattle Egret, Green and Little Blue Heron, both night-herons, sunrise scenics, nutria, alligators with young, and lots of flowers. 500 and 600mm lenses with 1.4 and 2X TCs are mandatory (rentals are available). Good flight photography opportunities are expected on both IPTs). They will be courting, building nests, copulating, and fighting. Barring a natural disaster spoonbill chicks are expected on the 2nd IPT only. The first IPT will feature spoonbills in mind-boggling breeding plumage (unlike anything I've ever seen here in Florida). The Lake Martin, Louisiana Roseate Spoonbill IPTs (Roseate Spoonbill-and Great Egret-rookery in budding cypress swamp courtship & nest building. Enjoy the images, and do consider joining me when I return to Nome in mid-June 2006. We had lots of shorebirds, many jaegers, some wonderful passerines, lots of Arctic terns, and a gyr nest. Dozens of Aleutian Terns nested on short-grass tundra within a few miles of town and we enjoyed several amazing photographic opportunities with nesting ravens. On several evenings we were photographing in bright sun after midnight! As it turned out, it was a very good year for the tundra-nesting birds, at least for the early birds. It had been an early, warm and dry spring before we got there and the weather pretty much held for the 10 day trip. We were astounded on our first morning to find several Western Sandpipers with chicks. On my previous Nome IPT, I did not even find a Western Sandpiper until about June 19, and those birds were still on eggs. Patti Ardoin helped me with the cooking (the restaurants in Nome stink!) and added her Louisiana touch to the menu. (Early in the trip the songbirds simply jumped all over the speaker, but the frenzy of activity and success tapered off dramatically after that. Brian did a great job with the birds songs on his MP3 player. I was joined by Wes and Patti Ardoin, Matt Haggadorn, John McRae, and Brian Zwiebel. Blessed by glorious weather, the Nome IPT was a huge success.