Today I went down to a state park that I have intended to go to for a long time. It’s the Charlotte Harbor Preserve .  The preserve has several locations on both sides of the Harbor but the locations I went to was on Burnt Store Road just south of the Charlotte Harbor Environmental Center.   It has a hiking trail called the Old Datsun Trail after an abandoned truck that used to be there. The truck was removed some time ago.  There is a small parking lot at 12001 Burnt Store Road.  The trail is a closed loop which returns to the parking lot.  In general, it is a firm grass path through pine flatwoods and oak and pine hammocks.  It is a location on the Great Florida Birding Trail.  Here are a couple of shots from along the trail.

I was there in the heat of the day and most things were settled down.  There is clear evidence of feral pigs in the area with plenty of rooting along the trail.  I didn’t see any but did find this to be a excellent location for wildflowers.  These are a couple I found along the way.

The Yellow one on the left is a Seaside Primrose-Willow – Ludwigia maritima but I don’t know what the other is.  The Seaside Primrose is another of those Florida wildflowers which produces one bloom after another on the same stalk.  In this image, you can see a seed forming below the bloom (notice the ant?) and above it, more buds preparing to open when the bloom is fertilized.

The scenics here were shot with the Nikon P7100 and the flowers with a 105mm f2.8 VR Micro-Nikkor on a D90 body.