OT Tales of Florida

[Rusty]

IIRC it's Threeleggedturtle who's coming to Fla. in a few weeks and it got me to thinking about the history here. Florida's Black Hat Troubadour was a man named Will McLean who has now passed. This is one of his most famous songs about a swamp in the N. Fla panhandle A Place called Tate's Hell.


Oh Listen good people to this story I tell of a great swamp in Florida
A place called Tate's He!!

A hundred and forty square watery miles
with millions of skeeters and big yeller flies
and where all about the moccasins lie
with glittering death in their beady eyes.

Where bull gators beller and panthers squall
this is a place to be shunned by all.

Old Tate left Sumatra along about dark.
He had his two big dogs and a puppy named spark.
An old Long Tom shot-gun, a sharp Barlow knife
That panther would sure have the chase of his life.

A little past moon down, the dogs struck the scent.
Through bramble and Ty Ty a runnin Tate went.
For hours and hours until it was dawn
Then Tate knew that he was a long way from Home.
He blowed through his gun barrel, the dogs did not hear,
The panther had killed them, and now Tate felt fear.
The sun was not shining, the mist it was thick
Oh Lordy Tate hollered, I'm lost up the creek.

He leaned back to rest, and his eyes did not see,
The big rattler struck him above the bent knee.
The lick was so hard that a-sprawling he fell,
This was the beginning of poor old Tate's Hell.

He opened his Barlow and grabbed him some moss,
A cut he made one way, the other across.
He wrapped his leg tightly and tied it with string,
the sickness came on him his body turned green.

When Tate was discovered, these words he did tell,
My name is old Tate boys, I've just been in Hell.
These few spoken words were the last that he said,
His spirit, it left him, old Tate he was dead.

No man can dispute this legend of yore,
how Tate lived a full week and then five days more.
and somehow crawled out close to Carabelle
from the deep ghostly swamp we know as
Tate's Hell.

[Rimfire McNutjob]

I do love the colder days because the "million skeeters and yellow flies" are much supressed and the gators in our lake aren't croaking. I assume he's talkin' about the biting horse flies when he says "yellow flies".

Enjoyed it.

Tell Threeleggedturtle to bring lower ammo prices with him when he comes.

[gamekeeper]

That sure sounds like HELL to me! Thanks for posting.

[bigbore442001]

Ahh. The Florida of Old is no longer here. It has been replaced with strip malls, Disney and hunting leases that cost an arm and a leg.

I chatted with a gentleman in Wyoming who was a Florida resident. As a kid he would give this old man a couple bottles of whiskey to gain hunting permission on his land. He said it was a paradise.

Now it is Epcot. I think a poor trade in the long run.

[Rusty]

I don't know Bigbore. I live an hour from the talking mouse if I were to want to go there which I don't. I haven't been there in at least 15 years. If I travel south there are hogs a plenty and gators and even a few deer.
I was headed over towards Daytona a few weeks ago on I-4 and at about the 127 mile marker I saw a deer that had tried to jump over the fence that DOT puts along the interstate. It's take off point had been in a bog and I'm sure it didn't get up well because it's rear legs were hung in the fence and it had drowned in the water on the other side.
I see hogs everywhere. On the interstate, on the side, and tons of them along county roads. I wonder why the state bothers to spend out tax money to put up those fences when they don't really keep out that which they were intended to.
There is plenty of wild Florida left, just don't look for it with a tourist guide in your hand.

[RIHMFIRE]

Enjoyed that!
I think I've been through most of Tates Hell!
We surely do have some nasty looking swamps down here...
with skeeters so big.....they can carry you off!
rattlers...pigmy rattles, water mocasins, coral snakes,
copper heads, never mind the non-poisoness snakes
aligator snapping turtles...
Florida panther.....only seen one in my time,
black bear...some pushing 450 pounds, 2 and 4 legged Gators ,
biggest gator harvested so far this year...is 12'-9"
banana spiders....these suckers get big....I cant tell you
how many spider webs I have walked through at night on my
way to the deer stand...and man is it hot.....
and just when you think is safe to go in the water to cool off...
we live in the shark bite capitol of the world....

but its better than shovelling snow!

[Rusty]

Yep it snow here twice last week. Once for three days and the other time for four days. Only problem was it was melted by the time it it the ground and we couldn't shovel it.

[JerryB]

I sure did enjoy that Rusty, reminds me of the old days around Arcadia and down around Fisheating Creek.

[66GTO]

If you guys automatically think Orlando or Miami when you think of Florida, take a look at the map and find Northwest Florida. That is where Tate's Hell is (between Tallahassee and Apalachicola). Panama City Beach, Destin, and South Walton have changed and or more like Miami Beach now, but the area between Mexico Beach and Cedar Key haven't changed much.

I am a lifelong resident of what has been called "The Forgotten Florida" (there was a book with that title). Unfortunately, much of it has now been "Remembered" and will never be the way it was when I was growing up around here in the 1950's. If you promise not to tell, the best place for a laid back vacation in the state is the Apalachicola/St. George Island/Cape San Blas area. No high rises, no amusement parks, no big hotels , no noisy night clubs. Just vacation houses, family restaurants, bait and tackle shops, great fishing, camping, and hunting, and nice uncrowded beaches. Shhhhhhh, keep it a secret!

And yes, we do have yellow flies. They are yellow and they do bite. We also have dog flies, horse flies, mosquitos, sand flies, no-see-ums, and they all bite.

[bigbore442001]

I know there is a wild Florida left. Many years ago I used to go down to the Polk County area to hunt feral hogs on a citrus ranch. The cost wasn't too bad but then the rancher raised his prices and it became too expensive.

Don't laugh but one thing I would like to try is a hunt for sambar stag on St. Vincent Island. I know the success rate is abysmally low but it would be interesting anyways.