timber and that therefore, by inference, this whole country was 

 once a continuous forest. The other regards the grassfields as 

 indigenous, and believes that they were maintained and the tree 

 growth controlled by naturally induced fires. It is interesting to 

 note that the lower reaches (i.e., coastward to east and south) 

 are more typically parklands, with the trees isolated and an 

 almost continuous carpet of grasses beneath, while as one 

 approaches the fall line and the deciduous woodlands of the 

 Appalachian piedmont, the trees become more closely packed 

 and segregated and the grass forms wandering belts or lakelike 

 pockets. This succession is typical of all parkland belts: isolated 



The great Okejenokee Swamp in southern Georgia swarms 

 with life dependent on vast quantities of fish; these in turn 

 live mostly on insects and their larvae. 



trees in grass on the prairie side and copses of massed trees amid 

 grassfields on the woodland side. 



This somewhat monotonous scenery stretches all the way 

 from the Tar to the Apalachicola— Chattahoochee rivers and back 

 to the fall line. To the seaward side it gives way to dunes and 

 marshes on both the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, but where it abuts 

 onto the base of the Floridian peninsula it runs into a singular 

 phenomenon. This is a dual interlocked river system, with bogs 

 and swamps, that actually renders that peninsula an island, since 

 one can travel by water from the Atlantic to the Gulf via the 

 St. Marys River to the Okefenokee "Swamp," and from this down 

 the Suwannee River to the Gulf. 



splendid "guinea pig" for such investigation as well as a mar- 

 velous place. It is now a reserve, combining a large federal 

 preserve and an area administered by a remarkable private 

 citizens' organization known as the Okefenokee Association, Inc., 

 which leases its area from the state of Georgia and calls it 

 Swamp Park. The total area of this vast bog, for such it is, is 

 between 650 and 700 square miles. 



It is a most exceptional bog in that it looks like and is to a 

 large extent covered by a very fair forest. In this it may be 

 classified with similar areas in equatorial regions rather than 

 with typical bogs of the temperate, sub-Arctic, and Arctic 

 regions. A bog (as opposed to a swamp) may be said at the risk 

 of oversimplification to be an area that collects water, rather 

 than one that is simply flooded by an overflow from elsewhere. 

 Northern bogs are usually composed mostly of masses of moss 

 with either tundra or muskeg-type plants that hold water and 

 sometimes cause this to pond around its edges, notably on the 

 upward grades. This water is held above the general water table 

 in apparent defiance of gravity and hydrostatic principles by 

 processes that we cannot describe in detail here; such bogs may, 

 moreover, actually creep slowly uphill. Bogs of the tropical type 

 have in common the fact that they also are, so to speak, domes 

 of water. The Okefenokee is just this. 



In order to understand this place you should visit it in winter 

 when the cypresses are leafless. Only then is it possible to see 

 that it is not really a very tall forest but rather a sort of open 

 wood, growing for the most part in water (often through water, 

 as explained below) but elsewhere in saturated soil. Besides the 

 dominant cypresses, its timber consists of the rather scruffy- 

 looking Loblolly or Black Pine and the clean-looking Short-leafed 

 Pine, with a sprinkling of other larger trees. Beneath these grow 

 catspaw briars with flaming red berries, red and white bay — the 

 bark of the former was once used for tanning — and a delightful 

 bush with little pink clusters of blooms called locally and cheer- 

 fully the hurray or fatta bush which, though smelling sweet and 

 giving nectar, is strictly shunned by all bees. There is also the 

 pretty red-leafed bush called the Virginia willow, and the climb- 

 ing heath vine and a spiny smilax or bamboo vine that reaches 

 fifty feet or more. This forms a fairly dense mass under the 

 trees, but the area is divided up into flooded forest, open "prai- 

 ries" that are either flooded or saturated, and islands of shrubby 

 growth dotted about in the latter. In the depths of the main 

 swampy area the trees reach a respectable height, and in summer 

 the place has an eerie enchantment that is unique. Everywhere 

 there is a patchwork carpet of scrub palmetto. 



The name "Okefenokee" is said to be a Seminole word mean- 

 ing "the Place of Trembling Earth." Though I am a bit suspicious 

 of "native names," there is little doubt about the accuracy of the 

 term since, though the earth here does not actually tremble, it 

 does wobble or bounce up and down. And here we come to a 

 really bizarre note. 



Persons born and raised in this country who call themselves 

 "swampers" and who have come to love and, comparatively 

 recently, to protect their country, tell of sudden tremendous 

 noises like prolonged gunfire that often can be heard in this 

 great bog at night. Nobody has ever been present at the point 

 of origin of one of these outbursts, and outsiders have failed to 

 explain their cause, though several suggestions have been made. 



THE WOBBLING BOG 



Before we go any further into this, we must investigate the 

 difference between a swamp and a bog. The Okefenokee is a 



The Southern "Cypress" is a deciduous conifer. Taxodium 

 distichum, but is not a cypress in the popular sense. It 

 prefers swamps and its roots send pillars, called knees, 

 upward out of the water. 



