Purcell's Cove -- 1959

Sunset over Blackpoint Drive in Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge. Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1963 as an overlay of NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center. Consisting of 140,000 acres, the Refuge provides a wide variety of habitats: coastal dunes, saltwater estuaries and marshes, freshwater impoundments, scrub, pine flatwoods, and hardwood hammocks provide habitat for more than 1,500 species of plants and animals.

Sunset at Blockpoint Drive on Merritt Island National Wildlife Sanctuary in East Central Florida. The refuge traces its beginnings to the development of the nation’s Space Program. In 1962, NASA acquired 140,000 acres of land, water, and marshes adjacent to Cape Canaveral to establish the John F. Kennedy Space Center. NASA built a launch complex and other space-related facilities, but development of most of the area was not necessary. In 1963. the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service signed an agreement to establish the refuge and in 1975 a second agreement established Canaveral National Seashore. Today, the Department of Interior manages most of the unused portions of the Kennedy Space Center as a National Wildlife Refuge and National Seashore.

Winter Sunset over Blackpoint Drive in the Merritt Island Wildlife Sanctuary, East Central Florida bordering on the Cape Canaveral NASA facility. About 12,000 years ago, the first people reached Florida after crossing the Siberian land bridge and migrating across North America. At that time, the Florida peninsula would have been about twice as large as it is today with sea levels 20 to 30 feet below the present location. Archeological evidence shows that Paleo-Indian's would have shared Florida with large animals such as mastodon, giant armadillo, camel, bison, and mammoths. However, it is likely they consumed mostly plants, nuts, mammals such as rabbit, raccoon, opossum, squirrel, and deer along with fish and marine life. Thus the hunting and fishing as a means of subsistence in Florida began with the first inhabitants. From this time forward, history of the Space Coast – both cultural and natural - has been rich and diverse.

They may move slowly, but Great Blue Herons (Ardea herodias) can strike like lightning to grab a fish or snap up a gopher. In flight, look for this widespread heron’s tucked-in neck and long legs trailing out behind. Though great blue herons hunt alone, they typically nest in colonies. They prefer tall trees, but sometimes nest in low shrubs. Females produce two to seven eggs, which both parents protect and incubate. Chicks can survive on their own by about two months of age.

Small Island and mirgratory ducks bedding down for the evening on Blackpoint Drive at the Merritt Island Wildlife Sanctuary Florida. At sundown I spotted this little island in a shady pond which included several little similar islands, but these various ducks all seemed to prefer the one island. My 84 year old mother commented from my truck that it must be a meeting place. I thought the image looked rather pretty with the evening light, especially when viewed in a larger size.

The Great Blue Heron is replaced in the Old World by the very similar Grey Heron, which differs in being somewhat smaller (90–98 cm), with a pale gray neck and legs, lacking the browner colors that Great Blue Heron has there. It forms a superspecies with this and also with the Cocoi Heron from South America, which differs in having more extensive black on the head, and a white breast and neck.

The Double-crested Cormorant (Phalacrocorax auritus) is a member of the cormorant family of seabirds. It occurs along inland waterways as well as in coastal areas, and is widely distributed across North America, from the Aleutian Islands in Alaska down to Florida and Mexico. Adult Double-crested Cormorants are black or dark brown and have an orange-yellow patch of skin at the base of their bills. In breeding plumage, adults have two whitish tufts behind their eyes, hence the description "double-crested."

The Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) is a large wading bird in the heron family Ardeidae, common near the shores of open water and in wetlands over most of North and Central America as well as the Caribbean and the Galápagos Islands. Whether poised at a river bend or cruising the coastline with slow, deep wingbeats, the Great Blue Heron is a majestic sight. This stately heron with its subtle blue-gray plumage often stands motionless as it scans for prey or wades belly deep with long, deliberate steps.

Wetlands of Blackpoint Drive in Florida

A Coot and some Teal swimmng around at Viera Wetlands in Eastern Central Florida

Sandhill Crane Portrait from Viera Wetlands in Eastern Central Florida (Grus canadensis)

The Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis) is a species of large crane of North America and extreme northeastern Siberia. The common name of this bird references habitat like that at the Platte River, on the edge of Nebraska's Sandhills in the American Midwest.