Adult American Oystercatcher on the beach of Egmont Key, Pinellas County, FloridaAdult American Oystercatcher on the beach of Egmont Key – Nikon D200, handheld, f6.3, 1/2000, ISO 250, Nikkor 80-400mm at 400mm, natural light

Today’s post is about an American Oystercatcher image taken in 2009 at Egmont Key in Pinellas County, Florida and the story behind it.

I was taking the Florida Master Naturalist Class at the time and instead of taking a boat over to Egmont Key from Ruskin which was about an hours drive for me I decided to drive to Fort De Soto County Park which was less than a 45 minute drive.

I planned on spending an hour or so photographing birds on the north beach with a friend who was also in the class and then take the first ferry from Fort De Soto to Egmont Key where the plan was to meet up with the rest of our classmates. The first ferry got us onto the key before the boat with our classmates was scheduled to arrive so we explored a part of the island and photographed birds, animals and scenery.

I was wearing a brand new pair of Mountain Hardware pants that I had ordered two weeks prior that were great for wearing in and out of the water. I already had three pair and knew that those pants dried very quickly, were light weight and had sun protection built into the fabric.

While photographing the American Oystercatcher in the photo above I knelt down on the sand to get a low angle perspective and was happy to have the waves of the Gulf in the background.

A few minutes later I felt something wet running down my left leg under my pants and when I looked at my left foot I could see that it was bloody. I sat down and rolled up my pant leg and discovered a 3/4 inch cut in the soft part of my knee and when I looked my pants there was a similar sized cut right at knee level. I don’t feel pain as easily as many people do so I wasn’t even aware I had cut myself until the blood was running down my leg.

My brand new pants were ruined. The bleeding took a while to stop after I immersed my knee in the salty water and then freshwater from my bottle to rinse the wound out.

My day wasn’t going that great but I had wonderful photos of the oystercatcher.

There is more to the story but that can wait for another time.

Life is good.

Mia

I’ve shared this photo once before here on my blog and thought I’d mention that.

To view more of my American Oystercatcher photos please click here.