1) Appearing robins. Every January, robins descend on North Florida on their way south, or north, or somewhere. When they show up, they flash their orange breasts all over town. These omnivores crawl over seemingly every bit of foliage and ground looking for grubs, berries, insects, and anything else they can get their beaks on.
I love robins and we never see them any other time of year, so it's always a bit thrilling when they suddenly show up en masse, all over my yard and even sometimes at work. They were here for a few days last week, but now they're gone to other climes.
2) Disappearing cranes. Last weekend I went to see the sandhill cranes on Payne's Prairie, but most of them were gone. There were still a few hundred around but it was nowhere near the number that were here just a week or two ago.
3) Appearing gators. On the prairie walk, we also saw a bunch of large gators sunning themselves in and near Alachua Sink. They've been hiding out in the mud for weeks because we got a pretty Canadian cold snap. We must have seen twenty or thirty gators basking in the sun that day. Some were fairly close to the trail.
4) Appearing blooms. Yesterday I went for a long solo bike ride on the Hawthorne Trail, and noticed that the native chickasaw plum trees are starting to bloom.
Just short while to wait for boiled peanuts and sleeping in the living room. And the next installment of the cockroach war. God forbid.
