Aravis was excited to hunt for fiddler crabs
They have one odd looking giant claw. We talked about how it almost looks unnatural since we expect most things in nature to have symmetry.
Then we were off, down the mangrove path.
We took our time, stopping to watch and observe for long periods of time. We saw fish, crabs and birds and these two spent a lot of time trying to see whose spit could make the furthest ripples in the water.
In the fork of these two pneumatophores (yes, I had to google that to remember the word) is a mangrove tree crab. Who knew crabs climbed trees?
I wondered out loud what these knobby things coming out of the water were and Dominick, who's so much smarter than me, answered, "It's them mom. It's how they grow"
Of course, he was right. Here are a bunch of shoots.
The mangrove habitat is very important to Florida's ecosystem, in part, because it serves as a nursery to many different species of wildlife. When we were done with the trail, we stopped at their small museum to learn more about everything we had seen. One of the coolest things we learned was this. About a year ago my husband found a twig with some leaves on it on the hood of our van. He noticed what looked like salt on the underside of the leaves. We all looked at it, remarked how cool it was and wondered how the salt got there. So, we brought it home, put it in a baggie and taped it to the wall with some of our other finds. While in the museum, we read that because the mangroves are in such a salty environment, the way they deal with the salt is to secrete it out of their leaves. When we got home we checked our leaves and sure enough, they're black mangrove leaves!
After that, we headed to a nearby park for a snack.......
and some playtime.
Xury loves being big enough to enjoy the playground.
It was a perfect day!
If you want to learn more about Mangroves, here is a great site for kids.
http://www.globio.org/glossopedia/article.aspx?art_id=39
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