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Published quarterly from 1953 - 1955

About the Author: Willard E. Dilley

Early experiences birding in the wilderness area of Pymatuning Swamp in northeastern Pennsylvania may in some occult way have led author Willard E. Dilley to a later acquaintance with birds of the Everglades which now provides us with his BIRD VISITORS AND NORTHEAST WINDS. In between Pymatuning and the Everglades National Park author Dilley has, among other things, held several positions in the U.S. Sugar Corporation at Clewiston, Florida, and served as a Lt. Commander in the air arm of the U.S. Naval Reserve during the war.

Coming to the Everglades National Park in late 1947, author Dilley first served as a park ranger. Perhaps his most telling experience in that line was on the lonely strand of the remote sand beach at Cape Sable when an intoxicated commerical fisherman came ashore to insist with the muzzle of his rifle on the "rights" to kill sea turtles on the beach. Author Dilley stood his ground. The bully talked himself out and departed. The martyrs' headstones on lonely Cape Sable beach remained at one.

A life-long hobby of studying native bird-life became professional when author Dilley switched positions in 1948 to Park Naturalist. His work with the Everglades National Park is taking groups of people on conducted walks, showing the Park film to interested organizations, and otherwise helping people to understand what the Park is about.

It surely can not be everywhere that the commonest and most approachable hawk is as charming as our little insular red-shouldered hawk. One must be pre-occupied with care, indeed, to feel no thrill of pleasure upon passing this winsome hawk perched close at hand. ]t is especially pleasant, therefore, that we find in this issue an article upon some of this bird's habits observed in this area, A VERSATILE HAWK OF THE EVERGLADES, by park naturalist Willard E. Dilley.

Author Dilley may already be known to readers of this magazine through his article in the last issue on bird visitors and northeast winds. He owns his home in Homestead and has a wife, Edith, and a seven-year-old daughter, Jeanie. His specialties in his naturalist work in the Everglades are birds, the trees and shrubs, and photography. He produced the colored movie film which is the official park film, and has recently acquired a 400 mm. telephoto lens for which he has great hopes.

Undoubtedly the most important thing a person does when visiting a national park, besides look, is take pictures. Successful photographers in the Everglades National Park give special consideration to such matters as the intense light of the subtropics, importance of cloud effects, the flat terrain, and what one's subject might be likely to do. Park naturalist Dilley's article YOU AND YOUR CAMERA IN THE EVERGLADES modestly refrains from revealing a great deal of the lore he has acquired through experience so costly in sweat and toil amid mosquitoes and mud. No matter how deeply sincere he may be in his article about letting the reader work out his own methods and think out all desirable precautions in order to enjoy more fully the favorable results, author Dilley is ever pleased to answer direct questions about the peculiarities of photography in the Everglades or your chances of getting within snapshot distance of a great white heron, a sea turtle, etc. This fall he has been adding substantially to the Everglades National Park collection of color transparencies which he uses for illustrated lectures on the park.

Author Willard E. Dilley felt that the natural history of park visitors should be reported in Everglades Natural History, too, and his article THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE PARK VISITOR is the result. Readers of this magazine are acquainted with author Dilley through his three earlier articles and notes as well as from reports upon him in this column. His heavy winter season program of day-time dispensing of natural history information to park visitors, conducted night prowls,and Sunday evening slide talks at Royal Palm Ranger Station began before he could get started on his article for this issue. To keep things interesting, instead of getting the two additional seasonal ranger-naturalists needed and required for this season, he has lost his only ranger-naturalist from the Royal Palm Ranger Station where he has had one for six years. In an effort to keep up the natural history information service provided in previous years, as well as keep up with other accumulated responsibilities, author Dilley has accepted assistance from the Girl Scout leaders in Homestead. In return for the training they receive, girl scouts Sondra Weiss, Polly Holden, Annette Lewis, Ann Ray, Clara Lynn Harkness, Beth Krone, and Barbara Lucashave been assisting author Dilley with matchless enthusiasm both in his mailing out Everglades Natural History and in answering natural history questions for park visitors at Anhinga Trail.