Spirit of the Swamp Airboat Tours

Many people ask us what types of wildlife they should expect to see on an airboat ride… here are just some of Florida’s birds you may see:  bald eagle, great white egret, snowy egret, cattle egret, blue heron, limpkin, ibis, glossy  ibis, wood stork, snail kite, hawks, red shoulder blackbird, gallinule, wild turkey, sandhill crane, roseate spoonbill, osprey, crested caracara, coot and mud hens, plover, gulls, pelicans, cormorant, owls, kingfisher, ducks, and anhinga.  Wow, that’s a lot of birds and I’m sure I missed some!

We also see alligators, turtles, deer, raccoon, armadillo, otters, bobcat, coyote, possums, wild hogs, swamp cattle, foxes, snakes and many more!

Like I said, if you love nature, this is the airboat ride for you!

The beautiful and elusive Crested Caracara has been spotted on our recent airboat tours!  This feisty bird is on the “Threatened” list, which means it is on the way to becoming endangered. 

The Crested Caracara is a raptor, but it’s unusual in that it will spend a lot of it’s time on the ground, as you can see from these photographs taken this week by Lorie.  There are times that a pair of caracaras will even work together as a team – and we saw this in action as well… the pair of caracaras were fighting an American Bald Eagle for a fish on the bank.  And it looked to us like the pair was winning the battle!  Every day is different on our airboat rides and we enjoy being surprised over and over again by incredible Florida wildlife.

Here are the Caracara pictures I took yesterday.    I did get some other great shots and will send you a few under separate cover.

Thanks again for a great adventure.  My dad had a blast and was showing off the video last night.  Lorie Slawsky, Lake Mary, Florida

Thanks for sharing your photos with us Lorie!

Bird watching trips, photo safaris and more… we customize trips for our passengers all the time.  Chances are if you can dream it up, we can do it (within reason of course!)  In fact, you probably won’t be the first person to ask!  Take a look at our photo gallery page to see some of the incredible wildlife photography taken from our airboat: http://www.spiritoftheswamp.com/gallery.html

Yes, we do photo safaris and bird watching trips!  One of our previous passengers is even selling his incredible photos.  So please go ahead and ask us to customize a trip for you – bachelor / bachelorette parties, nighttime trips, frog gigging, romantic picnics, corporate events, VIP tours, sunset airboat rides, etc.  Personal service is what we do best!