Table of Contents
Introduction: Ghosts, Skeeters, and Rye Savannah, GeorgiaMuir spent a half-dozen hungry and desperate, yet historically important, nights in the city’s famed Bonaventure Cemetery. A latter-day visit to the land of the dead underscores the South’s peril, and its promise. Chapter 1: Who Is John Muir? Atlanta, GeorgiaA brief biography of the botanist, inventor, rambler, writer, cofounder of the Sierra Club, father of the national park system, and conscience of the environmental movement. Chapter 2: A New South Reckoning Louisville, KentuckyMuir crosses the Ohio River and into history. The land of bourbon, horses, and highways epitomizes the South’s sprawling environmental problems. Chapter 3: The South’s Incredible Biodiversity Is Threatened and Endangered Cave City, KentuckyMammoth Cave National Park, and the Green River, are filled with natural wonders. Some species are disappearing. Some are already gone. And some are making a comeback. Chapter 4 A Celebration of Muir Turns Toxic Kingston, TennesseeThe annual Muir Fest is overshadowed by the nation’s worst coal ash disaster and the South’s checkered legacy of cheap energy. Chapter 5: “The Mountains are Calling”and They’re Not Happy Coker Creek, TennesseeThe saga of the southern Appalachians as they succumb to the very forces that make them popular with deadly consequences. Chapter 6: More Rain, More Heat, and More Trouble Boone, North CarolinaA warming world forces trees, trout, and rare flowers higher up into the mountains. Climate change hits the hills in unpredictable and alarming ways. Chapter 7: Water Wars Suches, GeorgiaGeorgia, Alabama, and Florida have been fighting for a generation over the Chattahoochee River. Farmers, oystermen, kayakers, and sturgeon are threatened by the loss of this increasingly precious natural resource. Chapter 8: The Deeper the River, the Greater the Pain Augusta, GeorgiaGlobalization demands a deeper Savannah River and compounds the environmental damage done previously by dams, developers, cities, farmers, and factories. Chapter 9: A Coastal Playground Is Disappearing Tybee Island, GeorgiaRising seas. Ghost forests. Sunny-day flooding. Salty tap water. Bigger hurricanes. There’s not enough money to save the coast from a warming world. Chapter 10: Where Hogs Rule and Turtles Tremble Ossabaw Island, GeorgiaInvasive specieswild boar, Burmese pythons, tegu lizards, lionfish, northern snakeheads, melaleuca trees, laurel wiltmarch relentlessly across the South. A marksman aims to save at least one endangered species. Chapter 11: Take My Water, Please High Springs, FloridaThe aquifer running from Savannah to Miami is under siege from overuse, pollution, and saltwater intrusion. Yet Florida all but gives away billions of gallons a year to private profiteers. Chapter 12: The End of the Road Cedar Key, FloridaDevelopment imperils one of Florida’s last wild places. Science, though, offers hope for the future. Acknowledgments Further Readings About the Author