Mead Botanical Garden, FL. 7/7/25

     Monday was our last full day in Orlando.  My wife and daughter again headed out early to park hop Disney World.  I used the day for more wildlife viewing.  I chose to head over to Mead Botanical Gardens, about a 45-minute drive from our resort.  The locale is an eBird hotspot for Orange County, but I was not expecting a large bird checklist.  It was another hot day in central Florida, and I didn’t arrive there until mid-morning.  This place, unlike Lake Apopka Wildlife Drive, is only for walking but has some areas that one can get cover from the sun.

I spent close to three hours walking the grounds before a typical mid-summer Florida rain shower ended my day there.  I was actually finishing up when the rain started anyway.  I did not find any new birds for my life, year or Florida lists.  I only tallied 20 bird species for the day, but that was okay with me.  The gardens are an interesting place to walk around, and I was looking for other creatures besides birds.  I did find a couple new butterflies and a new dragonfly on the day.  I found my first gold rim, or polydamas swallowtail, plus a monk skipper and three-spotted skipper.  The new dragonfly was actually a damselfly, a blue-ringed dancer.

Left, blue-ringed dancer.  Right, gold rim, or polydamas swallowtail.  © S. Weiss

The gardens also have a sectioned off, but approachable, area for its resident gopher tortoises.  The tortoises are a protected keystone species in Florida and other southeastern states.  They excavate deep, long burrows in the ground where they spend much of their time.  These burrows, in turn, provide shelter to hundreds of other animal species.

Gopher tortoise.  © S. Weiss

Gopher tortoises are associated with longleaf pines, sharing the same ecosystem.  The pines grow in dry, sandy soil in sunny areas.  The pines have lost well over 90% of their original range, thus accordingly affecting the tortoise population.

I originally planned to hit another hotspot on my way back to the resort, but I was hot, tired and soaked, mostly from sweat rather than rain.  I was tapping out for the day and wanted to avoid the afternoon traffic on Route 4.  I couldn’t avoid the traffic and another torrential rain shower going through downtown Orlando, but I made it back okay and spent the rest of my afternoon poolside.

Left, zebra longwing.  Right, dilemma orchid bee.  © S. Weiss

The shiny metallic green color of the bee caught my eye, and its name made it even more interesting.  The male bee does not collect pollen, but instead it collects the fragrance oils of the flowers, specifically orchids.  It stores the scents in a pouch on its hind legs.  It later uses the scents to attract females.

Dutchman's pipe.  © S. Weiss

This tall growing vine resembles a carnivorous plant, such as a nepenthes.  The hanging bulb looks like a pitcher on a nepenthes that captures insects for food.  The Dutchman’s pipe is not carnivorous, and the bulb is actually part of its pipe-shaped flower.  The flower gives off an odor similar to rotting meat to attract insects.  Instead of being dissolved and digested as in a nepenthes plant, insects become temporarily trapped.  In their struggle to free themselves, the insects are dusted with pollen to carry to the next plant.

The Mead Botanical Gardens is a nice place to visit, and like many parks in Florida, is free to the public.