Tag: Florida environment
-
OUR URBAN OASIS
A Place of Calm in the Middle of Chaos We live on the southeast side of Tallahassee, but when we drive a mile from our home to a city park, it’s hard to believe we’re so close to an urban area with a population of 200,000. We call it Piney Z after the name of…
-
NEVER IGNORE A “LITTLE OLD LADY IN TENNIS SHOES”
By P.C. Zick – @pczick.bsky.social “I’m just a little old lady in tennis shoes.” So said Margaret Hames when other more glowing titles followed her name. Environmentalist, conservationist, defender of wetlands, scrubs, and hammocks, and savior of public places in Brevard County, Florida, are more accurate descriptions of this “force of nature,” her daughter, Pat Baxter,…
-
THE HUMAN HEIRS OF MARJORIE KINNAN RAWLINGS
By P.C. Zick – @pczick.bsky.social Last week, I wrote about the inspiration of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings on my life and career. Here is the essay “Human Heirs” that I wrote for the Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Essay Contest in 2001 as I left my decades-long teaching career to venture into freelance writing. The essay won first…
-
TRAILS IN THE SAND CELEBRATES #FREE
To start off Earth Day 2025 week, I’m offering my Florida Fiction novel, Trails in the Sand, for free downloads April 21-25. What does this novel have to do with Earth Day? Everything. Book Blurb: When environmental writer Caroline Carlisle sets off to report on endangered sea turtles during the Deepwater BP oil spill in…
-
WILD FOR FLORIDA WILDLIFE
“Why aren’t there any mosquitoes when I visit Florida?” I was once asked. “Where do you go in Florida?” I asked. “To Disney World, Sea World – all those theme parks around Orlando.” I wondered how to reply without bursting this man’s image of “natural” Florida that exists within the gates of “unnatural” worlds made…
-
SOPCHOPPY – SMALL TOWN BIG IN NATURE
The Worm Gruntin’ Festival first drew my eye to the small town of Sopchoppy, Florida, located between Tallahassee and the Gulf of Mexico. I had no idea what it was, but it sounded weirdly fun. Worm Gruntin’ is an ancient technique to get earthworms up from the ground. A wooden stake—a “stob”—is pounded into the…
-
FOR THE LOVE OF SEA TURTLES
I’ve long had a love affair with sea turtles. It might have started when I learned the amazing life history of this species. It only grew after my experience first as a volunteer member of a sea turtle patrol on Matanzas Beach, Florida, twenty years ago. Then fifteen years ago, I was a part of…
-
ICHETUCKNEE SPRINGS – A HISTORY AND CULTURE OF A FLORIDA SPRING – #FREE
A Project of the Heart Please download my new book, Ichetucknee Springs – A History and Culture of a Florida Spring. It’s #Free to download in any format that works for you. Click on the cover or here. Ichetucknee Springs – A History and Culture of a Florida Spring – my latest project offers a…
-
Tortoise Stew on Kindle
By Patricia Zick @PCZick As promised, I’ve now released Tortoise Stew on Kindle (by P.C. Zick). It’s a real deal at .99 cents. It was originally published in paperback in 2006 under my former name (Patricia Camburn Behnke). The new e-book version has been updated and edited. Here’s a review of the book from 2006.…
P.C. ZICK 