Wildlife in your own backyard
Categories: As Heard on the Street, Real Estate News
hiPerhaps you’d be surprised by what’s lurking (living, hunting, procreating) in your own backyard … smack dab in the middle of Florida. I’m not talking about the Everglades. I’m referring to Miami (the Gables, the Grove… major cities and bustling urban centers!) We co-habitate with a bevvy of creatures … and it never ceases to amaze me what actually lives just outside our front door… For those of us who live in Pinecrest and Palmetto Bay, half-acre and acre lots are our cherished, manicured green space… and… home to wildlife. In Coral Gables and in Pinecrest, we shared our backyard with wildlife, and on rare and cherished occasions, got a glimpse of what co-exists with us.
Barn owls graced our areca palms in the Gables, and now hunt in our Pinecrest yard… charming nocturnal creatures, with adorable faces and big bright eyes… They made themselves known to us very first evening we moved into each of those homes.
Three times now, we’ve had the privilege of seeing a pair of foxes, in our yard. Unfortunately one was hit by a car, but we keep looking for, and hoping to see, the remaining one again.
A family of raccoons rumaged though our vegetable garden, and would peak through the hedges for what seemed like weeks on end … our dogs objecting mightily to the intrusion. Opossum are greeted with the same lack of hospitality by our dogs!
Flocks of egrets, and the occasional heron, land periodically in our yard. Often we’ll hear or see a woodpecker hammering away at a telephone pole. Robins nest in the calamondin tree, or potted ficus just outside… and battle their own reflection in the tinted windows … assuming that the reflection they see is an intruder. Blue jays are in abundance … eating the peanuts we sometimes toss out for them … racing the squirrels to be first to claim them.
Nightly, just prior to dusk , dozens of parrots make themselves known … perching in the upper fronds of the majestic royal palms … chattering away for an hour or so before abruptly taking flight again.
The local (and rare) bobo bird resides in the vicinity of Royal Palm Tennis Club, in Pinecrest… Orniculturists abound, binoculars in hand… Occasionally some lucky bird-watcher spots one on the tennis club grounds. I took numerous photos of a bird I thought was the bobo … way up high in our avocado and mango trees… but it turned out to be something other than a bobo.
But without a doubt, the most unusual form of wildlife, I’ve seen so far, is the bearded dragon : a pre-historic looking creature … In the wild, they can grow to the size of a large dog. My son and I got a rare glimpse, once only, in the middle of the day, on the banks of the Red Road Canal, directly across from Pinecrest Elementary. We have looked for it for the past 7 years, each and every time we drive up SW 57th Avenue. This one was size of a large dog, with powerful arms. Scared by our approach, he dove into the canal and swam, snakelike, under water… emerging after crossing the canal, with powerful strokes … Raised in captivity (starting out at the size of a small lizard or iguana), once they are released into the wild they grow to be immense … veritable pre-historic looking dragons … “Ours” was brightly banded with red, yellow and black markings, and spiky protrusions. What we would give to see that one again !
The bearded dragon… and the fox … 
some of the more unusual co-inhabitants of our South Florida backyards! Keep an eye out … You might just glimpse some of our Florida wildlife … right in your own backyard. There are so many reasons to move to Florida ! Whatever you are looking for, South Florida is a wonderful place to live!
