The story of the Hyacinth:
Florida's problem with the plants began at the
World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition of 1884 - also known as the
New Orleans World's Fair. The Sun-Sentinel reports the Japanese were giving
water hyacinths to visitors as gifts.
Why the Japanese selected a South American
plant to give away has been lost to time, but among the visitors who left the
fair with a plant was Mrs. W.F. Fuller.
Mrs. Fuller and her husband, a citrus grower,
lived along the St. Johns River in the area of Palatka. Mrs. Fuller brought the
hyacinth home and placed it in her fish pond. When the plant choked her pond, she thinned out the plants and placed the extras at her boat landing on the St. John's River.
Water
hyacinths are floating perennials with large green leaves, lovely purple
flowers and dense, heavy roots that trail them in the water, according to
information from the Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences at the
University of Florida. In Florida, they grow much faster than even rabbits
could think of reproducing, doubling in number in as little as 13 days.
Information from TheLedger.com
Ozel checking out Mrs. Fuller's Hyacinths
It was as though we were parked on ground. Unbelievable....tide and current cleared them out by the time we left in the morning.
We left Astor and headed to Palatka which was also a revisit..to the Palatka Boat House Marina..below. We were at the end of the T Head.
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