William Bartram
Image Gallery 2
As you travel, enjoy these images in museums throughout the United States
Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis pratensis). the Florida subspecies here performing its mating dance, William Bartram called by the Creek name "Wattoola." Because sandhill cranes lay only two eggs in grassy mounds in undisturbed marshes, Paynes Prairie Preserve is an important nesting site in Florida.
The Black Vulture (Coragyps atratus) is a species that William Bartram introduced to science. He described this important scavenger as a gentle bird.
The Green Heron (Butorides virescens), drawn by William Bartram with the aquatic plant, thalia, demonstrates his skills as a bird artist.
This little landscape drawn in watercolor shows the biodiversity that Bartram admired in Florida: a seed pod of the American lotus, an immature water snake, a large land snail (white-lipped globe) hummingbird, dragonfly, pickerel weed (with flower spike), arrowleaf and water lettuce.
Coachwhip (Coluber flagellum) was Bartram's favorite species snake, "as innocent as a worm" and almost tame.
American alligators (Alligator mississipiensis), two bull 'gators in this pen-and-ink drawing by William Bartram snort like Chinese dragons. No section of Bartram's book of Travels was better read or more often quoted than his descriptions of alligators.