Florida Books

This is a very helpful and well written guide to introducing Florida nature to young children.

General Topics include:
-Florida's symbols
-Keeping a nature journal
-Florida's special places (everglades, salt marshes etc.)
-Flora and Fauna (plants, birds, insects, reptiles, exotics etc.)
-Florida's skies
-your part in Florida's future (careers, spaceship earth crew etc.)

Within each section you will find interesting facts and useful information (complete with clear illustrations), websites you can visit for more info, projects to do with children pertaining to that subject/section, and review of vocabulary words from that section.

Floridians will appreciate the opportunity to learn more about the nature around us that we often overlook, while Florida homeschoolers will be excited to have an extensive field trip lesson plan right at their fingertips!

This book is a find! I highly recommend it.

My family really enjoyed this book because we learned more about what we see every day here in Florida. Since I am not a Florida native, I often had a hard time helping my young naturalists identify the plants and "creatures" they saw on our outings. This book has really helped! It covers a wide spectrum of topics: from weather patterns to Florida habitats to Florida endangered species. It also covered each (Florida) geographic region separately, and provided some interesting history too. I highly recommend this book!

Highly recommended book for Floridians, it's helpful and easy to understand even if you don't have a green thumb.

Get source of information, clearly laid out with lots of photos.
Well worth having as a reference source for Florida gardening.

May 2, 2008
I'm grateful for this true story of a courageous man who shows us all how one person can make a difference, if we only will wake up to our opportunities. Initially I checked out The Zombie Curse: A Doctor's 25-year Journey into the Heart of the AIDS Epidemic in Haiti from our local library as I was preparing to go on a five-day humanitarian trip to Haiti with some students and a professor to install a water purification system at an orphanage. I liked this true story of Dr. Arthur M. Fournier's work with Haitians so much that I bought six copies, one for each of us who went to Haiti, to inspire us to perhaps one day return to our Haitian friends and do more that we have already done to help them improve their quality of life.
Yes, there is much need in places like Haiti. As we choose to start someplace as Americans who care about helping others, especially children, to get their basic life needs met, we will find that we are awakened from the Zombie Curse that has afflicted too many of us up to now. I've been asleep for the most part, too. By small things are great things brought to pass. If we can but throw back into the nourishing sea but one star fish ... it will matter to at least that one, and to those who come after that one!
Part one of the book, The Curse Descends, covers Dr. Fournier's work in Florida with Haitians back when AIDS was just being recognized. Part two, Secrets Revealed, goes into depth about the work Dr. Fournier has done in Haiti itself over the past 25¬+ years. His compassionate willingness to get involved and to open doors for hard-working Haitians who have vision for their country, and his ongoing mentoring of medical students who want to learn and help, makes this book a must-read if you, too, feel you want to understand how you can make a difference in one corner of this vineyard we call planet earth.
Jackie Ransom, Missouri

The Zombie Curse: A Doctor's Twenty-Five-Year Journey Into The Heart Of The Aids Epidemic In Haiti by Arthur M. Fournier (Physician at the Jackson Memorial Hospital and Professor of Family Medicine and Internal Medicine and Vice-Chairman of Family Medicine and Associate Dean for Community Health in Miami, Florida) is the remarkable story of Dr. Fournier's passionate struggle to understanding the terrifying truths of the AIDS virus. Having first been introduced to an AIDS patient in 1979, Fournier determined to take action in helping to discover the cure for this lethal epidemic as it swiftly unfolded throughout the United States and the world. The Zombie Curse reveals the devastation experienced by the Haitian people as the prescriptions offered had little or no effect on the patients, and the broadening tragedy became increasingly pervasive through Haitian society. Very strongly recommended for all non-specialist general readers seeking a greater understanding of the early years of the AIDS outbreak, The Zombie Curse is an outstanding account of the terrible first years of AIDS epidemic and a first-hand account of the often empty pursuit of helping the Haitian victims AIDS.

The book may be small in size, but it is filled with a lot of information. Easy reading, lovely photos. Gave one to another new orchid enthusiast friend. Great reference book. I highly recommend it to all orchid lovers.

This book has very useful information and is well researched. It is divided into chapters such as Beaches, Museums, Scenic Drives, etc. Southwest Florida is a huge area and a location index or a better map should have been included, but the information alone is worth 5 stars.

The book covers the public life of Jeb Bush in a great way. But Bush's efforts to help inmates is not very well known. I am not a Florida resident, which makes this extraordinary. I learned of a serious problem at a Florida prison from a inmate. The prison guards ignored the problem as did the warden, even after being told about it. So in desperation I emailed Bush's office and asked if the governor would help motivate the warden to fix the problem. To my absolute amazement the problem was solved within 24 hours. The warden even apologized to the inmates involved. Jeb Bush could have ignored the problem, but he took the time to fix it, without publicity. I wish the book would have included his personal acts of kindness.

Two days ago we returned from a trip to Florida that we planned around animal encounters and nature experiences for our 9 year old daughter. This book was an invaluable resource in planning our trip. We went to four state parks in Florida's excellent network (as we discovered, it's the only state to twice win the national gold medal for the best state park system). The book had accurate, up-to-date information that helped us get the most out of our visit to Caladesi Island where we saw armadillos cross our hiking trail. On the last day of our trip, we checked out of our motel in Clearwater Beach and visited Hillsborough River State Park northeast of Tampa, following the driving directions in the book. Our one-hour canoe trip along the river was a magical experience, gliding through the primeval greenery of a cypress forest where we saw many turtles and an alligator. In spite of the mind-numbing overdevelopment of the state, nature is still alive and well, and this book is the best guide for anyone who would go looking for the wonders of outdoor Florida.

This whole series is a great intro into hiking the "real" Florida I own all 3, South, North and Central -- is Panhandle coming soon?

Sandra is a real hiker with a great eye for detail. She also works with the Florida Trail Association and highlights several FT trails in each of her FL hiking books. She seems to have hiked every trail in Florida. This book contains a good sample of all types of hikes / backpacking trails from short nature trails to the 30+ miles in Myakka River State Park. I use these books as a good way to find new trails.

52 Great Florida Golf Getaways by Florida golfing expert Ed Schmidt Jr. is a handy, "user friendly" guide to some of Florida's most vibrant, well-run, and enjoyable golf courses. Yet the golf courses selected are particularly special in that each one of them has access to numerous other recreational opportunities nearby - boutiques, water parks, museums, kids' activities, sailing, tennis, fishing, and more - for the non-golfers in the family. Straightforward descriptions, contact information, and black-and-white photographs form the heart of this solid reference which is especially recommended for mixed golfer and non-golfer families in the Florida area. If you are golfer and taking a trip to Florida, begin your itinerary planning with a thorough browsing through Ed Schmidt's 52 Great Florida Golf Getaways!

THE EVERGLADES......SAVE WHAT IS LEFT......GET INVOLVED!

EARLY EVERGLADES
Canoeing the Miami River on a Sunday morning, 1896: "The Sun was just rising, and a pleasant, cool breeze ruffled the surface of the river. Brewer with his pole in the stern, and myself with the Canadian paddle in the bow, made rapid headway against the current, which was getting stronger and stronger. The river winds in beautiful curves, the trees growing to the water's edge, and were it not for the occasional cocoanut-tree or cabbage-palm, you would almost believe you were in the wild streams of the Maine woods. Very soon we saw large white objects ahead, which proved to be balls of foam hurrying down with the current. With a quick turn to the left, after about three miles of paddling, we struck the South Fork, the water becoming swifter and swifter, and the cotton-like balls larger and more numerous. We were on the falls, and how the water did run! I could hear Brewer panting behind me, but I never turned my head or gave any signal that we were conquered, but started in on my old-time stroke, inch by inch crawling up that water, digging the rocks. After about three-quarters of an hour of the hardest paddling I think I have ever done, the water slowed up a little, and we could get some speed on the canoe. The trees opened up more, the stream becoming narrower and narrower, until we came to an opening where everything was clear ahead.

This was the edge of the Everglades, and the place for which the Indians make when bound to the coast by way of the Miami River. The stream here loses itself among the lily pads and before you lies a sea of apparently pathless grass. On closer observation shallow watercourses are seen running through the grass, cutting in all directions, spreading out like the lines on the human hands, and whichever one you take you regret that you did not choose the other."

The previous passage is Hugh Willoughby's account of his outing, one hundred years ago, on the Miami River, accompanied by his wife, son and wilderness-man and friend Ed Brewer. One year later he and Brewer would embark on their major Everglades excursion. In his book Across the Everglades, A Canoe Journey of Exploration, Hugh Willoughby has left us a fascinating and informative account of the early, undeveloped Everglades.

In this book you will find out how clean Everglades waters were. He and Brewer drank profusely of the waters. They just dipped a glass into it and guzzled the water. You can't do that today.

Get involved to save what is left of the Everglades now!

Reading this book will give you an idea of what the glades were like back when Miami was a village of 2000 people!