Trip Report – Florida | March 8-12, 2026

Highlights from the Nature Photo Retreats Workshop

This was my first big trip after injuring a lower back disc in December and I was worried about carrying the gear, the long hours, etc. – but it was fine. I had no issues with the new lighter OM System gear or the hours walking, standing and driving along the east side of Florida.

And this was a great trip. It was an immersive small-group learning experience from Nature Photo Retreats (with whom I definitely plan to go on future trips) led by three wonderful OM System Ambassadors who were all great teachers. I learned so much about my new camera gear, especially regarding ProCapture. More on that later.

Locations

Day 1 – March 8

We were all over the east coast of Florida. I flew in a day early to do the longish drive from Orlando to St. Augustine and hit the Alligator Farm early the next morning (and get a 2-day pass). The Alligator Farm has a large and loud wild bird rookery and is a fantastic place for shooing egrets, herons, spoonbills, anhingha and many other birds. This was my third time visiting.

Our workshop started the afternoon of March 8 with a long session at the Alligator Farm.

Day 2 – March 9

Today was morning at the Alligator Farm, then a drive south to Titusville. We took a detour from plans mid-afternoon and visited Cruickshank Sanctuary to look for Florida Scrub Jays, which are endemic to Florida (only found there and nowhere else). And yes – they are super-friendly and we did find some (they found us!) along with a pair of pileated woodpeckers and several raptor species.

Then we headed over to Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, my second time visiting this amazing place. Merritt Island was packed with birds. Everywhere we looked there seemed to be another feeding heron, passing spoonbill, or wood stork drifting overhead. We stayed through a beautiful sunset.

Day 3 – March 10

Our morning session at Merritt Island started with diffuse bright light from lifting fog, which made for some nice high-key photos along with more flight photos.

The afternoon session was at Orlando Wetlands, another favorite birding spot and my third visit. There we got to see baby spoonbills (‘teaspoons’) and many other species. And two very large alligators we had to carefully navigate on one of the berm trails.

Day 4 – March 11

We spent the morning at Merritt Island and I was so happy to have a few hours to practice ICM (intentional camera movement) and slow panning shots of birds in flight. I never seem to have time for this, and it was wonderful.

Merritt Island was probably my favorite spot for birds in flight and the light was so nice there.

That afternoon we had a looonnnng drive down to Boca Raton, then visited Peaceful Waters Sanctuary. This is a 30-acre human-made wetland complex with nice boardwalks and a big variety of bird species. And this is where the most amazing part of my entire trip happened…

I was so very lucky to come across a green heron hunting in a back corner of the sanctuary, and at the time I was wandering around alone (my tripmates were scattered around the park). I leaned against a tree trunk and stood there with my 150-400mm lens up, just watching.

I witnessed this bird moving at glacial speed up and down a branch for almost 20 minutes before it finally started inching its way further down toward the water, its eyes never moving from the target it had found. It finally started to stretch down until it was hanging by its feet – then it let go.

Thanks to the ProCapture info I’d had drilled into me over the previous few days, I got a few shots of the actual dive – it happened so fast! And from my vantage point I couldn’t see the heron hit the water, but I did see it successfully come up with a fish and then exit the water quickly (one of the trip leaders later told me it was an adaptive hunting method due to the number of alligators in the water, as I’d never seen a green heron hunt like this before).

I am very grateful to have had this experience.

Day 5 – March 12

The last day was filled with wonderful shooting at two more nearby human-made wetland complexes (on previous wastewater utility property), the famous-among-birders Wakodahatchee Wetlands and Green Cay Nature Center. These places are both incredible for birding and photography, I highly recommend a visit to south Florida just to see them (and I know there are more spots we didn’t have time to visit in the area).

We got to Wakodahatchee before sunrise and I was just amazed to enter it on the boardwalk between hundreds of wood stork nests – we were right in the middle of their February-to-April nesting season. So loud, and yes it smelled, but it was just incredible. Wakodahatchee had many great opportunities for close-up shots of storks, baby herons and anhinga, and many more species.

The last field experience was at Green Cay – and it was another amazing evening. After my heron experience of the previous night I was on alert for more of them, and I saw a total of 12 green herons in the few hours we were at Green Cay. I also found and watched a least bittern moving in and out of the marsh vegetation for about 15 minutes before finally getting a decent (and fleeting) photo opp.

Final Thoughts

This was a great trip and I’m planning on doing it again. I learned so much from the OM System ambassadors and from my tripmates and it was also wonderful to see so many excellent Florida birding locations from St. Augustine to Boca Raton.

After switching out every piece of Fuji gear for OM System back in October, it was great to get some serious dedicated instruction in how to take advantage of all the features of the OM-1 Mark II – primarily ProCapture but also the computational features like built-in ND filters and focus stacking. I love this camera even more after this trip.