Linda Conway Duever
Conway Conservation, Inc.
10952 County Road 320
Micanopy, FL 32667 USA
352/466-4136
conwayconsrv@conway.com
The following notes were extracted from the Florida historical and ecological literature for use in developing the Final Report on the Old Bellamy Road Project. If you would like to quote or otherwise use any of the materials presented here, please refer to and cite that document:
Duever, L. C., H. M. Platt, G. L. Ellis, R. Denson, and P. C. Gibbs. 1997. A Plan For the Restoration, Preservation, and Interpretation of Old Bellamy Road -- A Portion of the St. Augustine to Pensacola Road at River Rise State Preserve. (A Report to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection for the Florida Department of Transportation).Berryman & Henigar, Conway Conservation, and Ellis Archaeology, Micanopy, FL.
"The colonial episode of deforestation probably cost most of a once-extensive community type: the red oak/longleaf pine/mockernut hickory/fox squirrel community that exists today only on small islands in a sea of agricultural fields and pine plantations" (Ewel 1990).
Ewel (1990) commented on how Florida conservation efforts have neglected the red oak woods: "Is it preferable to strive for open stands of longleaf pine that would benefit the red-cockaded woodpecker, at the expense of the Sherman's fox squirrel, which prefers pine/oak woodlands? Species and communities become trendy. Experts point out that the upland longleaf pine forests have been reduced to 3 percent of their former distribution, not recognizing or acknowledging that associated oak woods have had a similar fate. Thus, current management prescriptions target only the former."
Pine-oak-hickory woods occurred in two situations in the original north Florida landscape: they either covered hilltops or formed transition zones on the slopes between hilltop xeric longleaf pine communities and downslope mesic hardwood communities (Clewell 1981).
Harper (1915) explained that the central Florida red oak woods lay between high pine land and high (clayey or calcareous) hammocks , intergrading with these communities in soil and vegetation, to create "a connecting link between two dissimilar types."
Southern red oak - mockernut hickory transition zones were apparently prominent in the landscapes Vignoles (1823) observed [in the Tallahassee Red Hills]. He commented on "oak hickory lands" that "produce almost exclusively those two kinds of forest trees, with occasionally gigantic pines...[which are typically] on the exterior edges of the high hammocks and separate them from the pine lands." He describes the "underbrush" as "generally composed of sucker saplings of the oak and hickory", [which suggests that fires periodically burn into this forest fringe.]
Clewell (1981) interpreted Vignoles (1823) description of the Tallahassee oak-hickory woods to indicate that they "...served as a buffer between the longleaf pinelands and the other hammock lands. The frequent fires in the longleaf pinelands burned into the pine-oak-hickory woods, causing the coppicing (suckering) of the oaks and hickories, but did not continue into the hammocks containing less fire-tolerant trees."
The transition zone between the mesic hammock and sandhill is not simply a mixture of species from these two communities. At San Felasco Hammock, Monk (1960) determined that the transition was floristically more closely related to the sandhill community. Monk considered longleaf pine and southern red oak to be a sandhill variant, whereas it can be argued that this association is only the xeric end of the transitional red oak forest spectrum. The presence of large southern red oaks along the hammock edge suggested that the hammock margin at San Felasco was once within the transition zone. The abundance of dogwood and mockernut hickory in the edge of the hammock and extending into the transition suggests that these species are among the first hammock trees to invade as succession moves from sandhill and towards hammock. Monk (1960) found mockernut hickory scattered throughout the hammock , but observed that it was most abundant in the forest fringes grading into the hammock-sandhill transition zone. Southern red oak was encountered only in this outer edge. Most of the larger red oaks were found along the contact between the hammock and the transition zone. The transition zone was dominated by southern red oak and mockernut hickory. Young laurel oaks were abundant towards the hammock and turkey oak and longleaf pine entered the transition zone on the sandhill side.
Myers (1990) described a distinctive transition zone between sandhill and mesic hardwood forest as "longleaf pine intergrading with the moderately fire-tolerant southern red oak, mockernut hickory, dogwood, and sassafras."
The hammocks that grew downslope of the red oak woods were characterized by trees such as loblolly pine, live oak, water oak, laurel oak, sweetgum, and magnolia. Clewell (1981) notes that now "these species have largely replaced those of the original pine-oak-hickory forests on the uplands". Clewell (1981) reviewed how observers have chronicled bottomland hardwood invasion of the pine-oak-hickory woods. He notes that Jones (1907), Bennett and Mann (1909), and Harper (1914) all described shortleaf pine, oaks, hickory, and dogwood in the uplands of the Tallahassee Red Hills, without mentioning loblolly pine, water oak, or diamondleaf [laurel] oak. The first authors to record bottomland hardwoods mixed with trees typical of the pine-oak-hickory association were Gano (1917) and Kurz (1944). Kurz included laurel oak and water oak along with shortleaf pine, southern red oak, post oak, black oak, and mockernut hickory as the typical species of the Red Hills.
Platt and Schwartz (1990) state that "the presettlement high hammock zone between upslope sand/clayhills and midslope hammocks" supported pines, oaks, hickories, and other species from both habitats, with the degree of intermixing dependent upon slope and fire frequency. They name the oaks Quercus alba, Q. falcata, Q. stellata, Q. hemisphaerica, and Q. incana and the hickories Carya pallida, C. glabra, and C. tomentosa as characteristic of this zone, commenting that some species, including shortleaf pine, may have occurred almost exclusively within this transition zone (Pessin, 1933; Chapman, 1942; Harper, 1943; Clewell, 1986) "... in which low intensity fires occur every one to two decades".
Harper (1915) noted that southern red oak and mockernut hickory were virtually confined to the red oak woods, but most of the other species he observed were "equally at home either in the high pine land or in the calcareous hammocks".
Smith (1880) recognized this transition zone as a component of the pinelands: "In those parts of Florida where the long-leaf pine forms the principal timber there are three kinds of pine lands, which, in their extremes, may easily be recognized. These are the long-leaf pine uplands or ridge lands associated with the oak uplands, the rolling pine lands, and the pine flats or 'flatwoods'."
Harper (1915) described the character of the central Florida red oak woods: "The red oak woods resemble the high pine land in having little underbrush, but in their typical or extreme development, where the trees are all deciduous, they are rather shady, and have considerable humus and very little herbaceous vegetation. As the pine land is approached they become more open, wire-grass and other pine land herbs appear, and evidences of fire become more frequent." Harper (1915) calculated that the percentage of evergreens varied from zero in the richest and most mesic spots to about 70 percent in the xeric fringes. He estimated the community's average proportion of evergreens at 35 percent, "a very low figure for Florida." Writing in 1921, Harper observed that in central Marion county "on dry uplands with somewhat clayey soil rich in potassium, phosphorus and iron," red oak was the dominant tree. He reported that its' most common central Florida associates were sweetgum, hickory, and longleaf pine, noting that "at one extreme this grades into high pine land, and at the other into high hammocks, which have neither red oak nor pine. Fire goes into the red oak woods just about as far as the pine does."
Very little is known about the fauna that inhabited these forests. We can only assume that it was a mixture of the species characteristic of sandhill and mesic hammock. Harper (1915) explained that pocket gophers inhabited the outer fringes of the red oak woods where longleaf pine occurred, but did not go into the mesic hammock transition. He commented that he had not observed "some of the other characteristic subterranean animals" of the sandhills even in the outer edges of the red oak woods. Harper (1921) commented that pocket gophers and gopher tortoises were rare or absent in the Gainesville loamy sand that supported most central Florida red oak woods "..perhaps because it is a little too rocky as well as too shady".
Harper (1915) reported how the natural resources of the red oak woods had been used. He mentioned that the pines had been exploited "to some extent for lumber and turpentine, and the oaks and hickories for fuel." He also noted that "the Spanish moss which is gathered in a small way for mattress-making in this part of the state probably comes mostly from the red oak woods, because it is more abundant there than in other types of forest." He went on to explain that "the soil is very fertile, and there is no telling how much of the original red oak woods has been replaced by cultivated fields; probably at least half."
Simons (1990) points out that longleaf pine - southern red oak forest once covered much of western Alachua and Marion counties, but most of it was cleared for agriculture. "The little that remains has been changed by hardwood invasion to the point that it is hard to imagine the original...forest [which] grew in well-stocked, but open stands of longleaf pine."
Myers (1990) explains that these good agricultural soils were converted long ago, first by the Indians and more extensively by the Europeans. He points out that the remnants have been "largely obliterated by encroachment of hammock hardwoods", especially laurel oak (Quercus hemisphaerica), water oak, pignut hickory, sweetgum, and magnolia, and mesophytic pines such as loblolly pine. He comments that "A portent of their [the red oak woods] ultimate disappearance is the omission of the categories `red oak woods' and `oak hickory lands' from current vegetation classification systems"
As landscapes have become more disturbed and fragmented, distinguishing transitional communities has become more difficult. Dunn (1982) commented that the red oak forest he attempted to map at San Felasco Hammock "forms a confusing and intergrading complex with sandhill and southern mixed hardwoods."
"...pine-oak-hickory woods are scarcely represented in the panhandle today" (Clewell 1981).
In describing Florida's best agricultural soils, Williams (1837) commented that the oak ridges of the interior produced the best green seed cotton and that pinelands on clay substrates were among the most valuable lands in the territory.
According to Clewell (1981), who cites Groene (1971) and Rogers (1963), in the Florida Panhandle the Cotton Era began when Tallahassee was founded in 1824. The agricultural lands that were developed during that period were almost all located in the Northern Highlands and Marianna Lowlands. Extensive areas there were cleared and planted to cotton, creating large plantations that flourished until the Civil War.
Stoddard (1969) estimated that 75 to 90 percent of the area between Tallahassee and Thomasville (the Tallahassee Red Hills) was cleared (for cotton) by slave labor prior to the Civil War.
Ansley (1952) synthesized scattered comments in Smith's (1880 [sic]) report, summarizing that much of the "fine hummock (hammock) land" in Alachua County was cleared for cotton production.
In the longleaf pine region there were 2.91 acres of cotton per square mile in 1881. Suwannee, Hamilton, Columbia, Bradford, Alachua, Levy, and Marion counties collectively produced 12,367 bales of sea-island cotton, which was 72 percent of the cotton crop of the longleaf region. Alachua County produced most because of the relatively large percentage of the county's area under cultivation and the high proportion of tilled lands in cotton (29 percent). Hamilton and Columbia were also heavy cotton producers.
Smith's 1881 map shows intensive cultivation of short-staple cotton around Tallahassee (up to 10-15 percent of land area). Long-staple production was in the northern peninsula, especially in the hammock belt from Suwannee County through Marion County. In this area, 1-5 percent of the land was in cotton. This long-staple variety (sea island cotton) sold for three times as much as the short-staple kind and was twice as profitable to produce.
In 1860 Florida produced 65,000 bales of cotton. Production had dropped to 39,000 bales by 1870, and despite increasing population, the state produced only 55,000 bales in 1880 (Smith 1880). By this time many of the great cotton plantations had been abandoned or subdivided into smaller farms.
According to Paisley (1968), the cotton era ended in the Red Hills around 1875 as the plantation system and the cotton market collapsed. After plantation agriculture disintegrated in the Red Hills, large areas of cotton fields were abandoned (Brubaker 1956) and reclaimed by forest (Clewell 1981).
In 1921, Harper reported that "perhaps half" of the central Florida red oak woods had been converted to agriculture. At that time, these lands grew mostly corn, cotton, and vegetables. The land was still rich enough that little fertilizer was used on the corn or cotton.
