A Natural History of Cumberland Island, Georgia PDF Download

Author: Carol Ruckdeschel
Publisher: Mercer University Press
ISBN: 9780881467109
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 512

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Book Description
Having lived on Cumberland Island for more than forty years, Carol Ruckdeschels goal has been to document present conditions of the islands flora and fauna, establishing a baseline from which to assess future changes. Since the late 1960s, she has witnessed many changes and trends that are often overlooked by those carrying out short-term observations. This compilation of data, along with historic information, presents the most comprehensive picture of the islands flora, fauna, geology, and ecology to date. This volume will satisfy a general interest in the ecology of Cumberland and other Georgia barrier islands. New information on individual species is presented, contributing to its value as a reference for the Southeast.

Author: Mary R. Bullard
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 9780820327419
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 492

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Book Description
Cumberland Island is a national treasure. The largest of the Sea Islands along the Georgia coast, it is a history-filled place of astounding natural beauty. With a thoroughness unmatched by any previous account, Cumberland Island: A History chronicles five centuries of change to the landscape and its people from the days of the first Native Americans through the late-twentieth-century struggles between developers and conservationists. Author Mary Bullard, widely regarded as the person most knowledgeable about Cumberland Island, is a descendant of the Carnegie family, Cumberland's last owners before it was acquired by the federal government in 1972 and designated a National Seashore. Bullard's discussion of the Carnegie era on Cumberland is notable for its intimate glimpse into how the family's feelings toward the island bore upon Cumberland's destiny. Bullard draws on more than twenty years of research and travels about the island to describe how water, wind, and the cycles of nature continue to shape it and also how humans have imprinted themselves on the face of Cumberland across time--from the Timuca, Guale, and Mocamo Indians to the subsequent appearances of Spanish, French, African, British, and American inhabitants. The result is an engaging narrative in which discussions about tidal marshes, sea turtles, and wild horses are mixed with accounts of how the island functioned as a center for indigo, rice, cotton, fishing, and timber. Even frequent visitors and former residents will learn something new from Bullard's account of Cumberland Island.

Author: Mary Ricketson Bullard
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 9780820317380
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
Robert Stafford of Cumberland Island offers a rare glimpse into the life and times of a nineteenth-century planter on one of Georgia's Sea Islands. Born poor, Robert Stafford (1790-1877) became the leading planter on his native Cumberland Island. Specializing in the highly valued long staple variety of cotton, he claimed among his assets more than 8,000 acres and 350 slaves. Mary R. Bullard recounts Stafford's life in the context of how events from the Federalist period to the Civil War to Reconstruction affected Sea Island planters. As she discusses Stafford's associations with other planters, his business dealings (which included banking and railroad investments), and the day-to-day operation of his plantation, Bullard also imparts a wealth of information about cotton farming methods, plantation life and material culture, and the geography and natural history of Cumberland Island. Stafford's career was fairly typical for his time and place; his personal life was not. He never married, but fathered six children by Elizabeth Bernardey, a mulatto slave nurse. Bullard's discussion of Stafford's decision to move his family to Groton, Connecticut--and freedom--before the Civil War illuminates the complex interplay between southern notions of personal honor, the staunch independent-mindedness of Sea Island planters, and the practice and theory of racial separation. In her afterword to the Brown Thrasher edition, Bullard presents recently uncovered information about a second extralegal family of Robert Stafford as well as additional information about Elizabeth Bernardey's children and the trust funds Stafford provided for them.

Author: Will Harlan
Publisher: Open Road + Grove/Atlantic
ISBN: 0802192629
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description
The inspiring biography of the adventuresome naturalist Carol Ruckdeschel and her crusade to save her island home from environmental disaster. In a “moving homage . . . that artfully articulates the ferocities of nature and humanity,” biographer Will Harlan captures the larger-than-life story of biologist, naturalist, and ecological activist Carol Ruckdeschel, known to many as the wildest woman in America. She wrestles alligators, eats roadkill, rides horses bareback, and lives in a ramshackle cabin that she built by hand in an island wilderness. A combination of Henry David Thoreau and Jane Goodall, Carol is a self-taught scientist who has become a tireless defender of sea turtles on Cumberland Island, a national park off the coast of Georgia (Kirkus Reviews). Cumberland, the country’s largest and most biologically diverse barrier island, is celebrated for its windswept dunes and feral horses. Steel magnate Thomas Carnegie once owned much of the island, and in recent years, Carnegie heirs and the National Park Service have clashed with Carol over the island’s future. What happens when a dirt-poor naturalist with only a high school diploma becomes an outspoken advocate on a celebrated but divisive island? Untamed is the story of an American original who fights for what she believes in, no matter the cost, “an environmental classic that belongs on the shelf alongside Carson, Leopold, Muir, and Thoreau” (Thomas Rain Crowe, author of Zoro’s Field: My Life in the Appalachian Woods). “Vivid. . . . Ms. Ruckdeschel’s biography, and the way this wandering soul came to settle for so many decades on Cumberland Island, is big enough on its own, but Mr. Harlan hints at bigger questions.” —The Wall Street Journal “Wild country produces wild people, who sometimes are just what’s needed to keep that wild cycle going. This is a memorable portrait.” —Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature “Deliciously engrossing. . . . Readers are in for a wild ride.” —The Citizen-Times

Author:
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 9780820324975
Category : Photography
Languages : en
Pages : 124

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Book Description
Moving through seasons punctuated by the comings and goings of such animals as the migratory birds that pass through in autumn and spring and the loggerhead turtles that nest in summer, more than one hundred photographs reveal the subtle but important effect of cyclical change on the ecosystems of Cumberland Island--the largest and most beloved of Georgia's barrier islands.

Author: Patricia Barefoot
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
ISBN: 9780738516509
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 132

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Book Description
Rich in history, wildlife, and beautiful coastal landscapes, Georgia's Cumberland Island attracts many an island tourist and nature lover. The island's well-preserved marshes, tidal creeks, and dune fields provide this hidden oasis with a rare natural charm. The area is also home to a wide variety of animal species, including loggerhead turtles, bob cats, manatees, and alligators, just to name a few. Though Cumberland is best known for being the nation's largest wilderness island, its history-dating back to the 16th century-also includes a period of use as a mission by the Franciscans. Among its historic sites are the magnificent ruins of Dungeness, the house built by the Carnegie family during the latter part of the 19th century, as well as the romantic Greyfield Inn. This pictorial history of Cumberland Island illustrates the people, places, and events that have shaped the area's cultural and natural history. The island's rare solitude and beauty, which have resulted from conservation and preservation efforts in the area, are captured in this carefully detailed book for all lovers of nature and history to enjoy. Though the island permits only very limited human traffic, these images allow the reader to appreciate the Cumberland landscape-laced with wild animals, pirate coves, English forts, and an African-American "settlement"-from afar.

Author: Anouk Masson Krantz
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781864708851
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Photography, Nature In Wild Horses of Cumberland Island, photographer Anouk Masson Krantz has captured the dramatic scenery and majestic horses as they have never been seen before. Her images show the remarkable animals in their naturally diverse ecosystems.

Author: Anthony J. Martin
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253006023
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 715

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Book Description
Have you ever wondered what left behind those prints and tracks on the seashore, or what made those marks or dug those holes in the dunes? Life Traces of the Georgia Coast is an up-close look at these traces of life and the animals and plants that made them. It tells about how the tracemakers lived and how they interacted with their environments. This is a book about ichnology (the study of such traces) and a wonderful way to learn about the behavior of organisms, living and long extinct. Life Traces presents an overview of the traces left by modern animals and plants in this biologically rich region; shows how life traces relate to the environments, natural history, and behaviors of their tracemakers; and applies that knowledge toward a better understanding of the fossilized traces that ancient life left in the geologic record. Augmented by illustrations of traces made by both ancient and modern organisms, the book shows how ancient trace fossils directly relate to modern traces and tracemakers, among them, insects, grasses, crabs, shorebirds, alligators, and sea turtles. The result is an aesthetically appealing and scientifically grounded book that will serve as source both for scientists and for anyone interested in the natural history of the Georgia coast.

Author: Charles Seabrook
Publisher: John F. Blair, Publisher
ISBN: 9780895872678
Category : Cumberland Island (Ga.)
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
In Cumberland Island, Charles Seabrook uses his talent as an award-winning environmental writer to describe the island's natural bounty and to tell its long and intriguing history. Today, the island serves as a lightning rod for controversy. Although the island is currently under the purview of the National Park Service, some descendants still reside on the island. The dispute over the sale of land by cash-strapped landowners to commercial developers creates as much heated debate as the discussion of how the Park Service should balance the management of a wilderness area with the privileges accorded the residents. Included in these two debates are the questions of whether the island's signature wild-horse herd should be dispersed because of the environmental damage it wreaks and whether the historic mansions that still pepper the island be allowed to crumble to ruin for the sake of wilderness preservation.

Author: Rita Welty Bourke
Publisher: Histria Books
ISBN: 1592112714
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
Lucy Carnegie, wife of industrialist Thomas Carnegie, dreamed of creating on Cumberland Island a home where her children would be safe from the smoke and soot-filled skies over Pittsburgh. Protected by the waters of the Cumberland Sound, the estate she built encompassed nearly the entire island. It was a perfect world, until the outside world intruded. Stone by stone it all came tumbling down. Wild horses now crop the grass around the burnt-out mansion. Rattlesnakes nest among the ruins. A century later, another family comes to Cumberland to walk among the horses and to accept what gifts the island has to offer: solitude, unspoiled wilderness, and wildlife free to roam undisturbed. Returning year after year, Rhamy and her parents explore the island and swim in the ocean. They picnic on the beach where servants once served champagne, shrimp cocktails, and crab cakes to the Carnegie family and their guests. They gaze at the chimneys surrounding Stafford house, all that remain of slave quarters that once housed plantation field hands. They mourn for Zabette, daughter of a plantation owner and his black servant, sold to a man who fathered her six children, then abandoned her. Always, everywhere on the island, the horses graze nearby, unaware of efforts by environmentalists to remove them from the island where they have lived for centuries. Traveling to the north end of the island, the family sits for a quiet moment in the church where JFK Jr. married Carolyn Bessette. Across the pasture is the shack where naturalist Carol Ruckdeschel has lived for fifty years and the porch where her lover lay dead, shot through the heart. In the campgrounds, on the beach, at the Dungeness dock, wild horses graze. For now, they are safe.