The book Swamp Angels: A Family of Limpkins started with the photographs. I live in North Florida on a lake next to a huge woods. The lake is filled with weeds and wildlife: turtles, fish, alligators, frogs, snakes, mud puppies. Some times there are eagles, ospreys, anhingas, beavers, otters, deers, raccoons, turkeys, foxes, armadillos, wild hogs. For about 5 years I took many rolls of film with my first good camera, a Canon A 2e with a Canon telephoto lens. It took gorgeous photos. I am an inexperienced amateur, and often the light was dim, or I wiggled the camera, or the canoe rocked, or the critters came right at me and the telephoto would not focus. I did see wonderful things following wildlife around the lake but many photos were not sharp. Most of the pictures were taken with Fuji 600 film and look great on a well printed page. Very warm colors.
So my dear friend Carolyn Aidman was looking at the photos about the limpkin family, placed in chronological order. She said that it would make a good children's book. I said fine, but only if she would be my partner. Many years pass. Voila. We both have done some writing and editing but this was very hard in every way. We both have always loved nature, and I was a biology major for a while, but neither of us has a deep knowledge of science. We got great help from limpkin expert Dana Bryan PHD, who lives in my town of Tallahassee. He reviewed the manuscript for scientific accuracy and also added more interesting facts about limpkins.
It is a wonderful world.
William Martin
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