Florida: The South, the Keys and the Dry Tortugas

Day 1: The trip begins at 6 p.m. this evening in the lobby of our hotel near Southwest Florida International Airport, Fort Myers.

Day 2: We’ll leave early for Port Charlotte and the Babcock-Webb Wildlife Management area, a large tract of Slash Pine and marsh whose inhabitants include the celebrated pinewoods trio of Red-cockaded Woodpecker, Brown-headed Nuthatch, and Bachman’s Sparrow. Sandhill Cranes nest in the area, and roadside ditches sometimes hold King Rail. Here too will be singing Eastern Towhees, Brown Thrashers, Eastern Bluebirds and Eastern Meadowlarks, none of which are common further to the south.  Just a bit north, on the outskirts of Punta Gorda, several clusters of the curious and social Florida Scrub-Jays have prospered for years and we’re almost certain to find them. It’s hard to know exactly how much time it will take to find and fully absorb these four North American endemics. If we accomplish our goals with dispatch, we may travel further north to the managed wetlands called the Sarasota Celery Fields, where we should encounter our first Limpkin among the many wading birds, and to Fort Desoto, where given the right weather thick woods and fruiting mulberry trees can be filled with migrating songbirds.  Nearby the fort we can look for Nanday Parakeets, which reach their peak density around the cities of Tampa and Saint Petersburg.  Night in Fort Myers.

Day 3: We’ll start the day visiting a nearby freshwater marsh a few miles inland that typically supports a healthy population of Limpkin and good numbers of Snail Kites that typically forage along the irrigation canals.  Afterwards we’ll likely stop in near the coast to look at a colony of Burrowing Owls and then, if the tide conditions favor us, will stop at Bunche Beach; a well-known wader area that supports a nice array of shorebirds and herons at low tide.  Later we’ll drive across the peninsula, stopping at the Big Cypress Preserve, a delightful sanctuary with an elevated winding boardwalk through stands of tall Bald Cypress to a sawgrass marsh. The huge Cypress trees lend a somewhat primeval feel, and although the preserve is an experience as much as a birding spot, we hope to find Pileated Woodpecker, and a collection of warblers perhaps including Yellow-throated and Northern Parula on territory.  After lunch, we’ll drive south and east across the northern Everglades to Florida City and the gateway to Everglades National Park. If time allows, we’ll visit the neighborhood around the Kendall Baptist Hospital to look for Red-whiskered Bulbul, Spot-breasted Oriole and Egyptian Geese and Muscovy Duck.  Night in Florida City.

Day 4: On day four we will visit the Everglades National Park, spending the morning on the main park road into Flamingo, stopping along the way for "Cape Sable" Seaside Sparrows. At Flamingo, we’ll scan mudflats for shorebirds and terns, possibly including Marbled Godwit and Gull-billed Tern along with the local “Great White” Herons.  among many others. Eco Pond, a few hundred feet from the end of the road, has a small island favored by roosting waterbirds often including Roseate Spoonbill and White Ibis, and the pond itself often has a surprise or two.  For the past several years small numbers of Shiny Cowbirds have frequented the parking lot area, and with luck we’ll have excellent views of this scarce invader from the Caribbean.  With real luck we may also encounter an American Crocodile or West Indian Manatee lurking around Florida Bay.

We’ll return to Florida City midday, then make the incredibly scenic, if slow, 120-mile drive to Key West, making a few stops along the way before arriving in the late afternoon. We’ll eat dinner early, then venture out again at dusk to look for and listen to Antillean Nighthawk. Night in Key West.

Day 5: We’ll sail at 8:00 am for the Tortugas aboard the Yankee Freedom III. Our route will take us swiftly and directly to the Tortugas, where we’ll arrive in the late morning. We’ll have about four hours to watch the great Sooty Tern and Brown Noddy spectacle, to look for Black Noddy, Bridled Tern, and other rarities, and to thoroughly search Fort Jefferson for migrants that can include thrushes, buntings, orioles, and up to 20 species of warblers. The Tortugas inevitably produce surprises: Cave Swallows around the battlements of the fort, perhaps a Chuck-will’s-widow inside the old powder magazine, or a Short-eared Owl perched in one of the trees on the parade ground.  For those interested it is possible to borrow snorkel gear from the ferry and take a dip into the rich waters around the fort during our stay on the island. 

On the way back to Key West we’ll look for Masked Boobies and also check the buoys for loafing Brown Boobies or Roseate Terns.  The trip to and from the fort crosses a deepwater channel where we might also see Northern Gannet (making for a three Sulid day), and with some luck jaegers or even an Sargasso Shearwater. We’ll return to Key West in the late afternoon arriving around 5:00 pm for a great seafood dinner by the harbor. Night in Key West.

Day 6: Among the principal landbird attractions of the Lower Keys, White-crowned Pigeon and Black-whiskered Vireo are widespread and conspicuous. Mangrove Cuckoo, however, is neither, and we’ll spend the morning checking several locations looking for this handsome bird. In some years we’ve had good views of cuckoos within just 15 minutes of exiting our vehicles; in others it requires a lot of patience. We’ll continue up the Keys, stopping at shorebird roosts or migrant traps along the way. As the tour winds down, we’ll search for any rarities that might be present in the area or end the day watching parrots fly to roost in Miami. Night in Miami.

Day 7: This will be a flexible day. We’ll look for species that we might have missed and will have time to track down any reported rarities in the greater Miami area.  We generally stop in at one of the excellent wetland parks near Loxahatchee, to enjoy the full array of breeding herons, anhingas and Wood Storks that tamely breed along the boardwalks.  Seeing these birds in their full breeding dress is an amazing experience, and with some careful scrutiny we might pick out a nesting pair of Least Bitterns or Purple Gallinules amongst the throngs.  We’ll almost certainly use some of the day to track down remaining “countable” exotics like Gray-headed Swamphen, Scaly-breasted Munia, and Mitred and Yellow-chevroned Parakeets, and also visit one or more of the excellent migrant traps along the coast for a last look at assorted warblers, vireos, thrushes or cuckoos that might be resting after their journey across the Caribbean. Night in Miami.

Day 8: The tour concludes this morning in Miami.

2026 Narrative - First Departure

Brief Summary

The first of our two Florida tours this spring was full of memorable sightings and showed how much Florida has to offer the birdwatcher and naturalist. From resident southeastern specialties like Red-cockaded Woodpecker and the state's endemic Florida Scrub-Jay, to abundant migrants such as Cape May Warbler returning from their winter haunts in the Caribbean, to the real south Florida specialties like Black-whiskered Vireo and Mangrove Cuckoo, we really packed in the sightings in our six days of birding. We also searched for and found many of the established exotics, such as Mitred Parakeet and Spot-breasted Oriole, and took advantage of rare bird alerts and a network of observers to see an exciting Bahama Mockingbird. But the overall highlight of the tour was the day trip to the Dry Tortugas National Park, a world unto itself. The teeming Sooty Tern and Brown Noddy breeding colony was a spectacle, we managed to find a few scarce Bridled Terns, and the bird of the trip was a mega-rare Cuban Pewee that was there for its ninth day, one of the most confiding birds of the whole tour. The American Alligator, West Indian Manatee, dragonflies, and butterflies, and other critters rounded out a fantastic natural history experience.

Detailed Summary

Finding the Red-cockaded Woodpecker at our first stop was not a slam dunk. There were plenty of marked trees showing we were in the right area, but we had racked up a few good sightings already before we finally heard the distinctive call and then saw a single bird foraging actively overhead. A pair of Sandhill Cranes flew by, and Brown-headed Nuthatch and Great-crested Flycatcher were additional birds we noted before concentrating on finding our next target, Bachman's Sparrow. This proved even more difficult than the woodpecker, but we finally found a singing bird that sat for prolonged views through the spotting scopes. We then made short work of Florida Scrub-Jay, finding a pair feeding a very recent fledgling. We followed up on a report of a migrant-filled park including Swainson's Warbler from the day before, but by today most of the migrants had already cleared out. The Celery Fields was next on our route, and it provided many new species, including our only Gray-headed Swamphen and Roseate Spoonbill. A single Nanday Parakeet fed at the feeders there, but as we left, several more flew in. There were precious few migrants at Fort De Soto Park, and the long-staying anis eluded us, but Cape May Warbler and many gliding Magnificent Frigatebirds were the highlights. During the drive back south, we noted several elegant Swallow-tailed Kites hunting over the forests.

We started our morning near Fort Myers looking for Snail Kite, and we scored one almost immediately along a canal through a residential area. Our second stop resulted in Limpkins as well as another couple of Snail Kites, one with a band on its leg. We had a delightful walk out Bunche Beach where the tide was perfect for watching scores of diverse shorebirds as well as a roosting group of Black Skimmer, terns, and gulls. The throngs were flushed a couple of times, first by a Bald Eagle, then later by a passing Northern Harrier. We had our picnic lunch in a wooded area right on the highway across the peninsula, where a small group of migrants included a handsome male Black-throated Blue Warbler. Great-crested Flycatchers called loudly overhead and a Swallow-tailed Kite pair sailed over a couple times, but the star of the show here was the pair of Barred Owls that flew in, responding to a rather poor vocal imitation. We completed our drive across the peninsula, stopping at a park where Spot-breasted Oriole showed immediately upon our arrival. We then dipped on a place where there had been sightings of elusive Mangrove Cuckoos but had a male Blackpoll Warbler as a nice consolation prize.

We spent the morning in Everglades National Park, making it to the end of the road in Flamingo, where we first checked out a giant American Crocodile and then a pair of West Indian Manatees drinking a tiny spray of freshwater leaking from a pipe under the boat docks. In the campground we located a pair of Shiny Cowbirds, then walked a short trail where we found our first Black-whiskered Vireo accompanied by a White-eyed Vireo that proved to be an adept decoy. Wandering among the mangroves, we enjoyed hearing the buzzy songs of Prairie Warbler. Back in civilization, we stopped at a freeway bridge where a massive breeding colony of Cave Swallows showed well before we began the long drive out the long chain of islands known as The Keys. We made one good birding stop at Long Key where we found another very cooperative Black-whiskered Vireo as well as a very vocal group of Clapper Rails in the mangroves.

Our boat ride out to the Dry Tortugas National Park was beautiful and largely uneventful until we crossed the slightly deeper channel just before arriving at Garden Key. Here we had a close fly-by of three Common Terns, followed not long after by a lone Sargasso Shearwater. Once on the island of Garden Key we made a beeline for the campground where we found the stakeout Cuban Pewee without too much difficulty. One we found it, it was amazingly tame, and we spent some time watching it forage, sometimes at arm's length. This was the 9th day of what would turn out to be its 13th stay, quite a lucky find as the country's approximately 11th record. It was also notable that this bird was from the Cuban population, probably specifically distinct from the Bahamian population. We took in the bustling Sooty Tern and Brown Noddy colony, checking for Black Noddy at least three times to find that it never showed on its usual perches. Bridled Tern, however, did appear from the lookout on top of the rampart. Other highlights from the island included many migrant Prairie and Cape May Warblers, a cooperative Ovenbird, and a rare ridgwayi subspecies of Osprey, with a striking, white head. As we left on the Freedom Yankee III, the captain obligingly took us on a little detour to pass by East Key where we had excellent views of Masked Booby.

We took our time working our way back up the Keys, looking for Mangrove Cuckoo and Mangrove Yellow Warbler everywhere we went. A Blackpoll Warbler, a very vocal Black-whiskered Vireo, and Magnificent Frigatebirds were some of the consolation prizes, and while we never found the warbler, our last stop in the keys was the spot for Mangrove Cuckoo, where one came in very close for great photos. We finished the day looking for established exotics closer to Miami, getting photos of Julia butterflies along the way, then finding Mitred Parakeet, Red-whiskered Bulbul, and a single White-winged Parakeet coming in to roost with a large group of Yellow-chevroned Parakeets.

We began our last day with a solid attempt for the Bahama Mockingbird that had been at Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park for two days, accidentally finding White-eyed Parakeets only because we were 15 minutes too early for the opening of the gate. Alas, the mockingbird appeared to be gone, but as we were departing, we got a phone call from friend Doug Gochfeld that he and Chris Benesh had found another one a few miles north of where we were while scouting for their Field Guides tour. We dashed off there only to find that it had flown and disappeared. Nice consolation prizes were at least a couple Yellow-billed Cuckoos in the same area. We finally gave up on the mockingbird to try for Mangrove Yellow Warbler and La Sagra's Flycatcher, only to hear that the second Bahama Mockingbird had been relocated when we got to our lunch spot. The area where we didn't see the La Sagra's was full of White-eyed Vireos as well as more Mangrove Cuckoos (presumably having just arrived on migration) as well as a vocal pair of Eastern Screech-Owls. Having spent some time not finding the flycatcher, we decided to try once again for the Bahama Mockingbird, and as luck would have it, the park was still open and the bird was there when we arrived. We enjoyed the bird for not more than five minutes when a park employee drove up to let us know the park was closing and he was about to close the gate. We would turn out to be the last observers of this bird. What a great finale to a fun tour.

- Rich Hoyer, 2026

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