Palm Beach County FL has many areas to kayak and one of our favorites is Loxahatchee Slough in Palm Beach Gardens. The 4 mile trail (out-n-back) is never crowded and you feel as though you are in the Everglades. We often bring a lunch or snack and paddle out past PGA, through the cypress trees and into the slough. There is a small portage about .75 miles in but is it easily traversed. There is no current and it is an easy paddle. The county has recently cleared the trail, which was getting overgrown by spikerush. Below are some of our favorite pictures from our last outing.
Wildlife sightings: Snail Kite (male, female and juvenile), raccoon, gar, limpkin, dragonflies and damselflies (eastern pond hawk, halloween pennant, ramburs forktail), lubber grasshopper, apple snail eggs (native and non-native). Plant sightings: American White Water Lily, Lemon bacopa, String lily, Eastern purple bladderwort, pickerelweed, cypress tree
Can you tell which apple snail eggs are the native ones and which is the non-native? The native apple snail egg are the white ones in the lower left and the non-native eggs are the pink ones in the upper right. There are many many more non-native eggs than native. The native snail is also smaller in size only 2-3 inches. For more information click here.
Note: All photos and videos unless otherwise stated are property of Wayne and Margaret Shoemake. If you would like to use any of them please click the contact page and email us.