FWF member fee: $45
Non-member fee: $55
Trip length: ~3 hours
Difficulty: Easy to moderate (prior kayaking experience is preferred but not required)

Made famous by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings in her 1942 novel, Cross Creek is a charming little thread of water connecting two of North Florida’s most beautiful and storied lakes, Orange and Lochloosa. The slow-flowing creek meanders lazily under a nearly complete canopy of oak, maple and moss-draped cypress. On the downstream end, Orange Lake is a vast, open expanse, famous for its “floating islands.” On the north end, Lochloosa Lake offers a fantastic shoreline of unbroken forest of cypress and granddaddy oaks, maples, ashes and others, with the only houses seen (after leaving the Creek) being in the far distance. The creek and lakes provide habitat for many birds, including bald eagles, osprey, egrets, herons, cormorants and anhingas, as well as alligators, snakes and turtles. This is an easy paddle on slow, tannin-stained waters. The open waters of the lakes can get choppy in wind, but you will never be very far from the protected channel of the creek.

Lars Andersen is a full-time river guide for Adventure Outpost, the outfitter and guide service he and his wife, Patsy, own in High Springs. Each week he leads three to four tours on some of the 60-plus North Florida waterways. Lars is an instructor for the Florida Master Naturalist Program. He is also an author. His work includes North Florida Adventure: A Journey Through History, Paynes Prairie: A History and Guide, Suwannee River Wilderness Trail Paddling Guide and Paddlers Guide to the Gilchrist Blueway. He is currently working on a book about the rivers of North Florida. In 2016, Lars was presented the “Unsung Hero” award from the Florida Defenders of the Environment.SOLD 

FWF member fee: $15
Non-member fee: $25
Trip length: ~2 hours
Difficulty: Easy

Join Dr. Jaret Daniels, the Director of the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity at the Florida Museum of Natural History, for a behind-the-scenes tour of the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity, home to the 6,400-square-foot living Butterfly Rainforest, an adjacent 4,600-square-foot exhibit gallery featuring information about butterflies and rainforests worldwide, as well as more than 31,000 square feet of research laboratories and collection space.

The Butterfly Rainforest is a can’t-miss living exhibit. Take a tour of this unique and ever-changing living ecosystem, which features hundreds of free-flying butterflies and birds and showcases turtles, fish, bromeliads, orchids and hundreds of other vibrant flowering plants. View a variety of tropical butterflies up close as they feed on trays of fresh cut fruit. The lush landscape is planted in tropical trees and colorful flowering plants amid waterfalls and a walking path. Be sure to bring your camera — and consider wearing a shirt with a tropical print as butterflies are attracted to bright-colored flowers!

After the tour, head upstairs for a brief presentation by Dr. Daniels on butterfly conservation efforts.

Jaret Daniels, PhD is Associate Professor of Entomology at the University of Florida and the Director of the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity at the Florida Museum of Natural History. His research focuses on insect ecology, population biology and conservation, with particular emphasis on butterflies and other native pollinators. He has authored more than 50 scientific papers, articles and books on butterflies, conservation, integrated pest management and wildlife landscaping, including Wildflowers of Florida.

FWF member fee: Included in symposium registration
Non-member fee: $10
Trip length: ~2 hours
Difficulty: Easy to moderate

Prairie Creek Conservation Cemetery (PCCC) is a 93-acre non-profit community cemetery nestled within Prairie Creek Preserve and adjacent to Paynes Prairie State Park. The cemetery collaborates with Alachua Conservation Trust (ACT) to manage, protect, and restore the land for all living things. This includes maintaining a conservation easement with Alachua County which protects the land from development in perpetuity and keeps it open to the public. Prairie Creek Conservation Cemetery is a natural and wild space where you will find a blend of flowering meadows and shaded, breezy hammocks. This field trip offers a unique opportunity to learn about the process of conservation burial and its positive environmental impact, as well as the efforts to conserve and permanently protect natural habitat through environmentally friendly burial options. The trip will begin with a 10-15 minute introduction to ACT and PCCC at the Lodge. From there, participants will either hike or carpool to the cemetery (located 1/2 mile away), where PCCC staff and board members Ivor Kincaide, David Ponoroff and Doug Hornbeck will lead participants through the different areas and talk about the work they are doing in each.

Ivor Kincaide, Land Stewardship Director  A lifelong birder and treehugger, Ivor earned a BS in zoology from the University of Florida. Most of his postgraduate life has been devoted to natural resource and wildlife management. Ivor is a State Certified Prescribed Burn Manager with a keen interest in freshwater marsh and pineland restoration. He directs land acquisition and natural resource management activities for the organization.

David Ponoroff, Assistant Director  David is a Floridian at heart, and a longtime nature lover. He graduated from UF in 2017 with a BA in political science and a BA in sustainability studies. His honors thesis addresses the capacity of conservation burial grounds to engender opportunities for participative democracy. At PCCC, David is a jack-of-all-trades, managing much of their communications, coordinating volunteers, giving tours, working with families, and much more.

Doug Hornbeck, Board Member  Doug is a Conservation Steward Award winner from ACT, and president of Flamingo Hammock Community Association. He is the chair of the cemetery’s Land Management Committee, in charge of long-term cemetery design and restoration efforts.

FWF member fee: Included in symposium registration
Non-member fee: $10
Trip length: ~2 hours
Difficulty: Moderate

The Santa Fe River Preserve protects over 900 acres along the banks of the Santa Fe River near Worthington Springs, including high bluffs and an interesting tangle of floodplain forest where the New River converges with the Santa Fe. The preserve has an interesting mix of flora which in turn support a wide diversity of wildlife. Bears frequent the river corridor, and there is a rare and endangered mussel in this watershed. This hike will follow a loop trail that meanders through beautiful upland hardwood forest and down along the Santa Fe Creek before it feeds into the river. Mature swamp chestnut oaks, spruce pines and pignut hickories tower above a beautiful floodplain forest with wood oats, Pinxter azaleas, sweetleaf and much more.

Grace Howell is a North Florida native and lifelong nature lover. She graduated from UF with a degree in Natural Resource Conservation and worked in the City of Gainesville’s Department of Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs for nine years, first as an environmental educator and then as a land manager and biologist for the city’s nature parks. She now works for the Alachua Conservation Trust (ACT) as a land management specialist, carrying out restoration and natural resource management goals on ACT’s conservation properties and teaching land stewardship skills to young professionals through the Women in the Woods internship program. Grace is a native plant enthusiast, amateur botanist, fire ecology advocate, and Certified Prescribed Burn Manager. She serves as the Land Management Partners Chair for the Florida Native Plant Society and enjoys exploring and botanizing around Florida.

FWF member fee: Included in symposium registration
Non-member fee: $10
Trip length: ~2 hours
Difficulty: Moderate

Mockernut Hill Botanical Garden (MHBG) is a 109-acre site oriented around land management training and showcasing trails through exemplary native vegetation rather than display gardens. MHBG Founder Linda Conway Duever selected this site for its extraordinary diversity of topography, vegetation types, and management challenges and opportunities. Located in the historic Shiloh community in north Marion County, the site has a wide variety of hydric-mesic forests and wetland types including a spring, sinkholes, gum swamps and baygalls, as well as red oak woods and sandhill-scrub areas undergoing ecological restoration with an active microburning program. Wildlife, including a thriving colony of reproducing gopher tortoises, is abundant. Come prepared for a wild rural environment. Briars, poison ivy, stinging nettles, cacti, ticks, mosquitoes, bees, wasps, fire ants, spiders and snakes may be present.