Introducing Jeff

Hello to everyone. I've been an Everglades nut since I was a kid many, many years ago. I am out on the water in kayak or canoe whenever I get a chance (not often enough), and I've done my share of slogging around the Big Cypress on foot and mountain biking swampy trails in clouds of mosquitos. I've seen panthers and crocodiles, but my main love is the snakes of this wild, beautiful area. I also spend a lot of time photographing Everglades-region wildlife, and I am currently trying to photographically document all the native "Odes," or Dragonflies, of the area.

I regularly lead field trips in the Everglades for Tropical Audubon Society (Miami chapter of National Audubon), and I participate in at least three Christmas bird counts each year.

I wrote A Visitor's Guide to the Everglades, in print since 1986, and my father and I produced the first two plastic identification guides to Everglades and Florida Keys birds. Even though these guides have been superceded by several others (including the excellent new ones by my friend, Larry Manfredi), I was recently pleased to see that the Rangers in ENP still use the one with my dad's paintings when talking to school kids about the Everglades.

Have also written or illustrated quite a few magazine articles about the Everglades in such magazines as Sea Frontiers, Boca Raton, and Undersea Journal (PADI). What I am really proud of, though, is taking the only photograph ever made (as far as I know) of a Northern Wheatear in a Dade County Slash Pine, which was later published in American Birds. This guy took a wrong turn at Greenland during migration and ended up in Everglades National Park.

I hope to see some of you in the swamp, and I am looking forward to participating in the various forums on this site.

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