. Where to find birds and enjoy natural history in Florida. Birds. of grazing animals—deer and Seminole stock. In summer Pickerel Weed (Pontederid) occurs as purple seas of flowers in solid expanses of many acres' extent. Cattails and the lavender-flowered Water Hyacinths are conspicuous in the prairie vegetation, and in many scattered ponds the great round leaves and huge, long-stemmed, yellow blossoms of the American Lotus form aquatic gardens of rare beauty. This big, wet savanna, rich in insects, fish, frogs, reptiles, and small mammals, provides an important feeding ground for thousands o
. Where to find birds and enjoy natural history in Florida. Birds. of grazing animals—deer and Seminole stock. In summer Pickerel Weed (Pontederid) occurs as purple seas of flowers in solid expanses of many acres' extent. Cattails and the lavender-flowered Water Hyacinths are conspicuous in the prairie vegetation, and in many scattered ponds the great round leaves and huge, long-stemmed, yellow blossoms of the American Lotus form aquatic gardens of rare beauty. This big, wet savanna, rich in insects, fish, frogs, reptiles, and small mammals, provides an important feeding ground for thousands of aquatic birds, including resident and migratory ducks, rails, coots, gallinules, and the hosts of showy, long-legged wading birds. It is also the home of small bands of the magnificent Sandhill Crane. The Prairie, like other shallow lakes of the area, has had a varied history. It was once an Indian pasture. In Civil War days corn was grown on it. Twenty years later a steamboat was making regular runs from Rocky Point to Bivin's Arm. In 1961, the owners, Camp Ranch, Inc., in cooperation with the Gainesville Garden Club and the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission designated a strip on either side of the right-of-way of U. S. Highway 441 as a wildlife sanctuary. The remainder of the prairie is closed to hunting, fishing and visiting. LAKE TUSCAWILLA (or Cuscowilla) — A two- square mile marsh, at times becoming a shallow lake, a mile south of Micanopy. The Cuscowilla Indians, visited by Bartram, had their town on the shore of the lake. In 1959, the owners of the lands adjacent to Tuscawilla co-' operated with the Florida Audubon Society in making it a wildhfe sanctuary. It is an important feeding ground for a colony of Wood Ibises. American, Snowy, and Cattle Egrets are usually to be seen feeding among the grazing Black Angus cattle on the broad pastures around the lake, MICANOPY WOOD IBIS ROOKERY—This is located in cypress swamp in the lower reaches of the River S
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Keywords: ., bookcollectionbiodiversity, bookleafnumber18, booksubjectbirds
