"Whether you spell it as Okefinokee like Wright (1931) or Okefenokee like The New Georgia Guide (1996), the big swamp nestled in the southeastern corner of Georgia and northern edge of Florida with its distinctive flora, fauna, and natural history is the largest swamp in North America."--from the Foreword The Okefenokee Swamp, named a National Wildlife Refuge by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1937, is the country's largest intact wetland. Its continued protection is essential to native amphibian populations. Albert Hazen Wright's survey of the life histories of the frogs found in the Okefenokee at the beginning of the twentieth century is a classic of natural history, long out of print. Wright's "Acknowledgments to Residents" provide a fascinating portrait of the human context of his research. Wright goes on to outline the status of explorations of the region and offers an extensive general discussion of the Okefenokee and its frogs, including habitats, range, coloration, measurements, vocalization, mating, structural differences, ovulation, life periods, tadpoles, growth rates, food, and predators. The book's species accounts give clear and extensive details about the species found in Georgia, still applicable today to frogs throughout the East Coast of the United States. A new foreword by J. Whitfield Gibbons highlights appreciation for Wright's work in the context of amphibian studies today and puts into perspective the value of the Okefenokee Swamp as a nature preserve and as a refuge for native amphibian fauna now in serious decline. It updates common and scientific names and notes the current status of all taxa. Gibbons provides a history of the Cornell Expeditions and mentions the importance and later influence of some of the students who took part.

The preeminent naturalists Albert Hazen Wright and Anna Allen Wright spent years assembling the wealth of material on frogs and toads appearing in this widely used handbook, the third edition of which was originally published in 1949. With abundant black-and-white photographs, colorful descriptions, journal notes from the field, and excerpts from the literature, their personalized natural history emphasizes amphibians observed in the wild. In a foreword to the 1995 paperback edition, Roy McDiarmid, a foremost specialist on frogs and toads, brings the book into historical perspective and supplies information to bring it up to date. Accounts of more than 100 species and subspecies cover such topics as common and scientific names, range, habitat, size, and general appearance, as well as color, structure, voice, and breeding. Separate keys are given for secondary sexual characteristics, eggs, tadpoles, families, and species. Generous quotations from the Wrights' field journals give the reader a sense of the problems and satisfactions of their work.

During the 1930s in the United States, the Works Progress Administration developed the Federal Writers’ Project to support writers and artists while making a national effort to document the country’s shared history and culture. The American Guide series consists of individual guides to each of the states. Little-known authors—many of whom would later become celebrated literary figures—were commissioned to write these important books. John Steinbeck, Saul Bellow, Zora Neale Hurston, and Ralph Ellison are among the more than 6,000 writers, editors, historians, and researchers who documented this celebration of local histories. Photographs, drawings, driving tours, detailed descriptions of towns, and rich cultural details exhibit each state’s unique flavor. The WPA Guide to Georgia describes the rich historical and cultural background of America’s Peach State. With varied and interesting photos, the guide gives readers a real taste as to what sweet southern living was like in the 1940’s, all the way from the top of the Blue Ridge Mountains down to the roaring Mississippi River valley.

Consisting of more than six thousand species, amphibians are more diverse than mammals and are found on every continent save Antarctica. Despite the abundance and diversity of these animals, many aspects of the biology of amphibians remain unstudied or misunderstood. The Ecology and Behavior of Amphibians aims to fill this gap in the literature on this remarkable taxon. It is a celebration of the diversity of amphibian life and the ecological and behavioral adaptations that have made it a successful component of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Synthesizing seventy years of research on amphibian biology, Kentwood D. Wells addresses all major areas of inquiry, including phylogeny, classification, and morphology; aspects of physiological ecology such as water and temperature relations, respiration, metabolism, and energetics; movements and orientation; communication and social behavior; reproduction and parental care; ecology and behavior of amphibian larvae and ecological aspects of metamorphosis; ecological impact of predation on amphibian populations and antipredator defenses; and aspects of amphibian community ecology. With an eye towards modern concerns, The Ecology and Behavior of Amphibians concludes with a chapter devoted to amphibian conservation. An unprecedented scholarly contribution to amphibian biology, this book is eagerly anticipated among specialists.

compiled and written by workers of the Writer®s program of the Work Projects Administration in the state of Georgia ; sponsored by the Georgia Board of Education.