GEOGRAPHY OF CENTRAL FLORIDA 



107 



Only about 65% of the trees are evergreen, the lowest figure 

 of any region in this latitude in Florida. Ericaceous shrubs arc 

 rather scarce, as in other calcareous regions, and leguminous plants 

 fairly well represented, especially among the weeds. Not much use 

 seems to be made of the native vegetation, except the pines for 

 lumber and turpentine, almost any of the trees for fuel, and the 

 Spanish moss for mattresses. In the early days the forest was 

 simply an encumbrance on the land, that the farmers had to get 

 rid of with much labor. At present it is customary in this and 

 other hammock regions in Florida to let cabbage palmettos grow in 

 orange groves and other cultivated ground wherever they will (see 

 fig. 14). Some of these may be remnants of the original forest, 

 but probably most of them have been planted by birds, and arc 

 left because they indicate hammock land and are ornamental and 

 do not take much light and nourishment away from the crops. 



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Fig. 14. Cabbage palmettos in cultivated field on hillside about 2 miles 

 south of Ocala. March 8, 1914. 



Population. As this region covers only a small part of Marion 

 County, and contains a city of considerable size, it is not possible 

 to get any accurate information about the rural population from 

 census reports ; but in number of inhabitants per square mile and 



