Blanco River Pocket Guide

Blanco River Pocket Guide PDF Author: David Ellzey
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781541354647
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 120

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Book Description
Whether you are looking to take a multi-day paddling excursion or just go out for an afternoon splashing with the kids, the Blanco River Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need. It's designed with a full-color visual layout that allows you to meticulously plan out your trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river. "A must-have guide! It really opens up a river that everyone thought had little or no access."-Chris Johnson, fly fishing guide and owner of Living Waters Fly Fishing "I grew up paddling the Texas Hill Country rivers, and this guide has already opened my eyes to the areas that I never knew existed."-Thomas Flemons, owner of Diablo Kayaks

Blanco River Pocket Guide

Blanco River Pocket Guide PDF Author: David Ellzey
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781541354647
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 120

Get Book Here

Book Description
Whether you are looking to take a multi-day paddling excursion or just go out for an afternoon splashing with the kids, the Blanco River Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need. It's designed with a full-color visual layout that allows you to meticulously plan out your trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river. "A must-have guide! It really opens up a river that everyone thought had little or no access."-Chris Johnson, fly fishing guide and owner of Living Waters Fly Fishing "I grew up paddling the Texas Hill Country rivers, and this guide has already opened my eyes to the areas that I never knew existed."-Thomas Flemons, owner of Diablo Kayaks

The Blanco River

The Blanco River PDF Author: Wes Ferguson
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 1623495105
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 183

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Book Description
For eighty-seven miles, the swift and shallow Blanco River winds through the Texas Hill Country. Its water is clear and green, darkened by frequent pools. Wes Ferguson and Jacob Botter have paddled, walked, and waded the Blanco. They have explored its history, people, wildlife, and the natural beauty that surprises everyone who experiences this river. Described as “the defining element in some of the Hill Country’s most beautiful scenery,” the Blanco flows both above and below ground, part of a network of rivers and aquifers that sustains the region’s wildlife and millions of humans alike. However, overpumping and prolonged drought have combined to weaken the Blanco’s flow and sustenance, and in 2000—for the first time in recorded history—the river’s most significant feeder spring, Jacob’s Well, briefly ceased to flow. It stopped again in 2008. Then, in the spring of 2015, a devastating flood killed twelve people and toppled the huge cypress trees along its banks, altering not just the look of the river, but the communities that had come to depend on its serene presence. River travelers Ferguson and Botter tell the remarkable story of this changeable river, confronting challenges and dangers as well as rare opportunities to see parts of the river few have seen. The authors also photographed and recorded the human response to the destruction of a beloved natural resource that has become yet another episode in the story of water in Texas. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

Muck City

Muck City PDF Author: Bryan Mealer
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307888630
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 346

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Book Description
In a town deep in the Florida Everglades, where high school football is the only escape, a haunted quarterback, a returning hero, and a scholar struggle against terrible odds. The loamy black “muck” that surrounds Belle Glade, Florida once built an empire for Big Sugar and provided much of the nation's vegetables, often on the backs of roving, destitute migrants. Many of these were children who honed their skills along the field rows and started one of the most legendary football programs in America. Belle Glade’s high school team, the Glades Central Raiders, has sent an extraordinary number of players to the National Football League – 27 since 1985, with five of those drafted in the first round. The industry that gave rise to the town and its team also spawned the chronic poverty, teeming migrant ghettos, and violence that cripples futures before they can ever begin. Muck City tells the story of quarterback Mario Rowley, whose dream is to win a championship for his deceased parents and quiet the ghosts that haunt him; head coach Jessie Hester, the town’s first NFL star, who returns home to “win kids, not championships”; and Jonteria Willliams, who must build her dream of becoming a doctor in one of the poorest high schools in the nation. For boys like Mario, being a Raider is a one-shot window for escape and a college education. Without football, Jonteria and the rest must make it on brains and fortitude alone. For the coach, good intentions must battle a town’s obsession to win above all else. Beyond the Friday night lights, this book is an engrossing portrait of a community mired in a shameful past and uncertain future, but with the fierce will to survive, win, and escape to a better life.

Nymph Fishing

Nymph Fishing PDF Author: George Daniel
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 0811767701
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 217

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Book Description
Best-selling author George Daniel shares expert tactics and techniques for a new generation of nymph anglers. He covers specialized equipment, flies, and presentations, focusing on advanced lessons and tips for anglers with a solid grasp of fundamentals. Important technique sequences and fly patterns are photographed in detail.

The San Marcos

The San Marcos PDF Author: Jim Kimmel
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 9781585445424
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
The San Marcos springs have flowed for around ten million years. In this ode to the river they form, Jim Kimmel brings us a picture of a watercourse brimming with life, past and present. Native, non-native, prehistoric, and modern-day plants, animals, and people have inhabited the river and its banks. Kimmel touches on them all with the affectionate and knowledgeable voice of one whose own life has been closely linked to the San Marcos. As readers journey with Kimmel from the river's headwater springs to its junction with the Guadalupe River, The San Marcos: A River's Story will capture the imagination and provide valuable information about the river and its crucial role in the ecological health of Texas. Original photographs by Jerry Touchstone Kimmel add a sense of the beauty and complexity of the river.

Borderlands

Borderlands PDF Author: Derek Lundy
Publisher: Vintage Canada
ISBN: 0307398633
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 434

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Book Description
"The periphery of a place can tell us a great deal about its heartland. along the edge of a nation's territory, its real prejudices, fears and obsessions - but also its virtues - irrepressibly bubble up as its people confront the 'other' whom they admire, or fear, or hold in contempt, and know little about. September 11, 2001, changed the United States utterly and nothing more so than the physical reality, the perception - and the meaning - of its borders." -from Borderlands Derek Lundy turns sixty at the end of a year in which three good friends have died. He feels the need to do something radical, and sets out on his motorcycle - a Kawasaki KLR 650 cc single-cylinder "thumper," which he describes as "unpretentious" and also "butt-ugly." Fascinated by the United States' post-9/11 passion for security, particularly on its two international borders, he chooses to investigate. He takes a firsthand look at both borders. The U.S.-Mexican borderlands, often disorderly and violent, operate according to their own ad hoc system of rules and conventions, and are distinct in many ways from the two countries the border divides. When security trumps trade, the economic well-being of both countries is threatened, and the upside is difficult to determine. American policy makers think the issues of drugs and illegals are ample reason to keep building fences to keep Mexicans out, even with no evidence that fences work or are anything but cruel. Mexicans' cheap labour keeps the wheels turning in the U.S. economy yet they are resented for trying to get into the country illegally (or legally). More people have died trying to cross this border than in the 9/11 attacks. At almost 9,000 kilometres, the U.S. border with Canada is the longest in the world. The northern border divides the planet's two biggest trading partners, and that relationship demands the fast, easy flow of goods and services in both directions. Since the events of 9/11, however, the United States has slowly and steadily choked the flux of trade: "just-in-time" parts shipments are in jeopardy; trucks must wait for inspection and clearance; people must be questioned. The border is "thickening." In prose that is compelling, impressive and at times frightening, Derek Lundy's incredible journey is illuminating enough to change minds, as great writing can sometimes do.

Freshwater Fishes of Texas

Freshwater Fishes of Texas PDF Author: Chad Thomas
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 9781585445707
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
Containing habitat information, physical descriptions, photographs, and range maps for more than 150 species of freshwater fishes that can be found in Texas, this field guide is an indispensable reference and research tool for ichthyologists, professional fisheries biologists, amateur naturalists, and anglers alike. The introductory section offers an illustrated guide to the common counts and measurements used for fish identification; a brief explanation of fish phylogeny; and a scientific key to help identify the fish families in Texas. The book includes species accounts of native and introduced fishes found in the freshwaters of Texas. Each account covers the physical characteristics, habitat, and distribution of the fish, with additional comments of interest or importance to its life history and conservation status. With the largest collection to date of color photographs, including various color phases (breeding and non-breeding colors), the book also includes range maps within the species accounts. The closing pages of the book feature a glossary and reference section. In a time when the state’s water resources are beset by issues growing in both number and complexity, this book provides information for professionals and policy makers. It also contributes to the natural history education of the public. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

Paddling the Guadalupe

Paddling the Guadalupe PDF Author: Wayne H. McAlister
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 9781603440219
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
For more than forty years, Wayne H. McAlister has canoed the Guadalupe River, sometimes called the “top recreational river in Texas.” In Paddling the Guadalupe, he guides readers down this 400-mile river whose waters spring from the limestone of the Hill Country in Kerr County, meander across the broad Coastal Plain, and finally empty into the Gulf of Mexico at San Antonio Bay. With the expertise of a life and career immersed in nature, he introduces readers to the places, people, plants, and animals—large and small, aquatic and terrestrial—that depend on the Guadalupe for either their livelihoods or their existence. With affection and humor (and sometimes aggravation), he wryly comments on the development and human activity along the river’s course, from the headwaters west of Kerrville to its mouth near Tivoli, just east of Refugio. For the traveler, either on the river or along its course, McAlister’s knowledge of the grists, sawmills, dams, bridges, swimming holes, and reservoirs bring the history of familiar towns—Comfort, Canyon Lake, New Braunfels, Seguin, Gonzales, Cuero, and Victoria among them—to life. His love of the natural world, which shares the river’s bounty, will inspire and enhance anyone’s experience of the Guadalupe, from the serious canoer to the family vacationer. Photographs taken over many years provide an intimate perspective, and sixteen maps help orient those interested in getting to know the river on a more personal basis. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

Whiskey River (Take My Mind)

Whiskey River (Take My Mind) PDF Author: Johnny Bush
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 1477315489
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
“Fans of live music will get a kick out of” this Texas Country Music Hall of Famer’s “fond but brutally honest memories, playing gigs with Willie Nelson” (Publishers Weekly). When it comes to Texas honky-tonk, nobody knows the music or the scene better than Johnny Bush. Author of Willie Nelson’s classic concert anthem “Whiskey River,” and singer of hits such as “You Gave Me a Mountain” and “I’ll Be There,” Johnny Bush is a legend in country music, a singer-songwriter who has lived the cheatin’, hurtin’, hard-drinkin’ life and recorded some of the most heart-wrenching songs about it. He has one of the purest honky-tonk voices ever to come out of Texas. And Bush’s career has been just as dramatic as his songs—on the verge of achieving superstardom in the early 1970s, he was sidelined by a rare vocal disorder. But survivor that he is, Bush is once again filling dance halls across Texas and inspiring a new generation of musicians. In Whiskey River (Take My Mind), Johnny Bush tells the twin stories of his life and of Texas honky-tonk music. He recalls growing up poor and learning his chops in honky-tonks around Houston and San Antonio. Bush vividly describes life on the road in the 1960s as a band member for Ray Price and Willie Nelson. Woven throughout Bush's autobiography is the never-before-told story of Texas honky-tonk music, from Bob Wills and Floyd Tillman to Junior Brown and Pat Green. For everyone who loves genuine country music, Johnny Bush, Willie Nelson, and stories of triumph against all odds, Whiskey River (Take My Mind) is a must-read.

Barton Creek

Barton Creek PDF Author: Ed Crowell
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 1623497299
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 142

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Book Description
While Barton Springs Pool is an iconic landmark of Austin and many people are familiar with the end of Barton Creek and its seven miles of public greenbelt, less is known about the forty-odd miles beyond that tumble and twist across private lands, eventually feeding the Colorado River. Legendary fights saved Barton Springs in the 1980s and 1990s, when the pool repeatedly was closed because of pollutant runoff from streets, nearby construction, and leaking sewer lines. In 1992, a highly publicized campaign resulted in land protections and stricter water standards. But will the creek and its springs become fouled again? That possibility arises upstream where tributaries and other creeks flow across mostly rural acreage, attracting new housing and business developments. Not only would city bathers lose access to the pool, but endangered species of salamanders and birds that depend on the Edwards Aquifer and its unique habitats face an uncertain future. Following the creek from downtown Austin’s Barton Springs Pool to its source as a cow-pasture trickle, longtime resident and journalist Ed Crowell explores the creek’s contentious political history, its historic and current residents, and the mounting environmental pressures threatening it. Barton Creek highlights the passionate individuals involved in the stream’s preservation, from city scientists to local landowners, who want to see the creek running clear and clean for future generations. Striking photography and vivid descriptions will entice readers to fall in love with Barton Creek all over again.