Atchafalaya Book

CC LOCKWOOD’S ATCHAFALAYA

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Lockwood revisits and reflects on the places he has frequented most in the swamp, recalling his escapades both long past and recent among gators and skeeters. He shares the thoughts of basin residents about how the Atchafalaya has changed over time, for better and for worse. Increases and decreases in various bird and other animal populations, changes in water levels and consistency, flora mainstays and trees gone missing, burgeoning aquatic vegetation—all are keenly observed by this explorer. Lockwood finds undiminished the seductive seasonal and diurnal moods of the swamp: Autumn and spring, sunset and moonrise, as breathtaking now as in the past.

In ninety seven dazzling color photographs, Lockwood brilliantly documents the Atchafalaya’s timeless beauty. He shows amazingly diverse and abundant wildlife, rookeries with thousands of egrets and herons, waters with billions of crawfish, and ridges with deer, squirrel and woodcock. Waters run deep in Lockwood’s soul, as evidenced in his intimate treatment of the meandering bayous fringed with bald cypress trees, the many glassine lakes reflecting vegetation into double images, and the mighty Atchafalaya River—the lifeline of the swamp.