Mike Walker

My blogs

Blogs I follow

About me

Gender Male
Location Gainesville, Florida, United States
Introduction This blog is an effort to research, document, and share the natural history, folk history, and associated culture of rural Florida with an emphasis on north-central Florida. The way of life here has changed markedly in the past twenty or so years, to say nothing of the last fifty, and a lot of things like Cracker vernacular architecture, folkways, rural occupations like turpentining, are being lost. This blog is an effort to retain at least some of that history while also exploring how we live today in Florida. Don't think of it as a trip back in time only, because there will be an ample focus on contemporary life, too. I have written for a variety of popular and academic publications on natural history, biology, and rural history and have lived much of my life here in north-central Florida. In addition, I am an avid photographer.
Interests Nature, Floridian history, Southern history, history of agriculture, architectural history, historiography, skateboarding, languages, surfing, snowboarding, aviation, computer languages, medicine, veterinary allopathy, photography, cartograph, geography, military history, soccer, basketball, oceanography, piano, pipe organs, clavichords, early music, Celtic music, Denmark, Faroe Islands.
Favorite Movies Cat's Eye, Silkwood, Final Destination, The Black Hole, Clue, Thunderball, The Living Daylights.
Favorite Music Saint Etienne, Deerhunter, Neko Case, Kathy Mattea, ETBG, Mercury Rev, Spiritualized, Nanci Griffith, Bright Eyes, The High Llamas, My Morning Jacket, Reba, Karen Wheaton, Jamiroquai, Atlas Sound, The Olivia Tremor Control, Elf Power, Twila Paris.
Favorite Books The Other Florida, Ecosystems of Florida, The Dream of the Red Chamber, Wuthering Heights, Some Kind of Paradise, Disunion!, One Continous Fight, The Tangled Field, Mendering Bodies-Saving Souls, The Shield of Achilles, The Downing Street Years, Frontier Medicine.