Every Feathered Creature

Excerpt from The Last Remaining Indian in the Okefenokee Swamp, by Tommy Hartley:

“It soon became very noisy in the swamp that morning. It seemed to me that every feathered creature in the whole swamp was trying to make a sound or squawk all at once. Whooping  Cranes were so numerous that they would block the sunrise from view for minutes at a time when they would rise up and go off searching for food.
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“I said Whooping Cranes, but I should have said Cranes, for there were many Sandhill Cranes, White Ibis, Blue Ibis, Blue and White Herons, and so many more that it all would be impossible to describe them all. I always enjoyed the birds in the Okefenokee Swamp.”

In my search for anything Okefenokee, I came across The Last Remaining Indian in the Okefenokee Swamp by Tommy Hartley (LAH Publishing Company, 2003). Hartley writes in the inside cover, “Both of my parents were raised as swampers in the late 1800’s… We were swampers and spoke swamper and now I enjoy speaking and writing swamper.” Hartley passes down entertaining swamp stories that were told to him by his mother. It appears the book may be out of print, but I recommend it for reading, especially if you enjoy southern culture and history.

iNaturalist observation: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/35966621