You.

Hello, and welcome to the bookmark.

I'm Christine Brown, your host.

Today my guest is John Floyd, photographer for replenishing our hills, protecting lands in the heart of the hill country.

John, thank you so much for being here.

Glad to be here.

I want to start by asking you to introduce this book to us.

Okay.

The book?

Well, started back in 2000.

17.

The idea of, Brant Evans, who's the author, came up to me and said, would you like to do a book?

I'm thinking, wait a minute.

I'm retired.

I'm on this board of this nonprofit now called this, the Cibolo Center for conservation.

I said, what do you want to do?

A book about?

And we're both passionate about conservation, especially in the hill country.

That's what our nonprofit is all about.

It's about education.

It's about conserving land, etc..

So he said, if we don't do something now, we're going to lose our hill country's the charm of it.

What makes it the hill country?

And I said Okay.

So we started doing the book.

He started doing a narrative.

And I traveled the Hill Country doing photography.

And that's what led up to the book.

It's, I think the best thing about it is the opening line of the book that basically said, our hill country is being loved to death.

So what's that about?

And that's the whole theme of this book.

It's a big book.

I mean it's it's 100 pages of narrative.

It's got 334 of my images.

It's a 4 pound table book.

I'm fond of saying when I talk to a prospective buyer, if you live in the Hill Country, you lived in the hill Country, you're thinking of living in the hill country, or you just been there and you loved it.

That book needs to be on your table.

It's as you say, it's a it's a large book.

It's a beautiful book.

But what I like is, is what you've done together.

And you blend the educational piece, the informative piece and the photography.

So it's you get a little bit of, of art and enjoyment and you get a little bit of education at the same time.

Yeah.

We did.

He asked me to do public and private lands.

And the public's pretty easy because you have city parks, you have county parks, and you have state parks, and you have one national park, actually, in the, in the hill country.

So it was fairly easy to visit some of those.

The private lands are different because you had to get to know the owner.

And if you look at the Hill country, which is 17 counties, it's 17,000mi², only 5%, 5 to 7% of it's preserved.

And half of that, over half of that is in private hands.

In fact, 78% of the lands in the hill country of those 17 counties are owned by individuals or families.

So we had to go out and introduce ourselves.

And we got in basically by asking land trusts to guide us as to who which lands were in conservation easements and, you know, who might be interested in me coming out to film or to photograph.

And that's how I did it.

So it was kind of interesting.

And then it blended with what he was doing by saying or talking about, how can we get more parks?

How can we preserve more private land?

How can we get private land that's preserved to have more public access?

So it all kind of blended.

Private land is always maybe a touchy subject with people.

You know, Texas is notorious for.

Get off my property.

Give out signs.

What was it like visiting with these homeowner, or were they.

Were they.

Well, I mean, I guess you contacted them first.

You weren't just walking up and knocking on doors.

But what was that like, working with the landowners to to photograph their property?

Actually, it was very easy.

It was incredibly informative.

Every one of them had a common way about them, which was natural.

They loved the land.

They would give me a tour of the land and then they just let me go.

And so I could wander wherever I wanted to.

And some of these were pretty big parcels, 5000 acres or more.

So it was kind of fun actually.

You know you get different perspectives when you go way down southwest.

To close to Austin or close to Fredericksburg.

It's pretty fascinating.

You mentioned that, these are all in either land trust or conservation easements and things like that.

I would imagine that, like you say, that if they're if they're inclined to do something like that to protect their land, then maybe they want to show it off.

And if they don't want people walking on it all the time, they want the photographs to to kind of speak for the land to speak for, for what they're proud of.

Yeah.

Some people say, what do I get out of a conservation easement?

In the Hill country, we get 60% of our water that we drink and use from aquifers.

The other 40% about comes from lakes or reservoirs.

All of those are replenished by groundwater.

So the rain comes down, soaks in the ground and goes and eats or comes straight into a reservoir on the lakes.

It's the rivers, like the Guadalupe, which is one of the biggest in the hill country.

So what they get out of it is that that massive piece of land that is privately owned becomes a giant cup.

That allows the aquifers and the rivers to sustain the beauty of what we've got.

We're actually also trying to get public access to some of these.

Recently brought Evans, the author led for the second time, a bond election in Kendall County, and the citizens overwhelmingly voted in favor of a $20 million bond, which I think we can double the amount to buy lands that are either on the aquifer or close right on the river and put them into conservation easements.

So citizens want to preserve those lands.

But one of the restrictions were there needs to be trails through part of them.

So we're going to make them sanctuaries.

And in fact we're designing our first one right now.

Well that's wonderful.

If there's one thing I think a lot of Texans love, it's getting out in nature and finding new places that we weren't previously able to access to explore to, to see what we can see.

Yeah.

That's wonderful to hear.

That's that's very exciting.

That's cool.

Yeah.

I want to you mentioned something that I believe I read in the book about one of the important things was preserving these lands to preserve the water.

If these lands stay undeveloped.

You know, if you come in and you build a new subdivision or an apartment complex, we you're basically covering up that cup, as you call it, and we're losing that.

And water is such an important natural resource that we're learning.

We need to protect more and more as the temperatures happen and we get droughts and things.

We need to protect that water.

Yeah, it's if you look at what's happened to the hill country has become incredibly popular.

I, I we we read one time in 1992, I think it was.

Yeah, the Nature Conservancy, which is the is second only to the federal government in preserving land in America, called the Hill Country of Texas, called one of the seven bio serves of our country and quote, what it is, is having the capacity to show the balance between sustainable development and the conservation of biodiversity and beauty.

That was kind of cool.

And I think a lot of people moved here because of that beauty.

So now they're estimating that within 15 years will more than double the population in the 17 counties, and that probably 90% of that growth is going to occur in unincorporated areas of the county.

The issue is the county don't have the same power as the the city does in regulating development.

So the counties and the water districts, which are unique, kind of unique to Texas, are the ones will have to try to do something to have conservative sustainability.

That means we we've got to do something to conserve the water.

Right now, we're in a fourth year drought.

The people who travel to the hill country, you see, our beautiful lakes are going to see lakes that are least 50% down.

And, I talked to a friend of mine several years ago.

He grew up here, and he said, John, in 1954, I, as a young kid, rode a horseback down the Guadalupe River bed.

It was dry.

That had been the biggest drought.

And October 3rd, on October 3rd of 2023, I walked the Guadalupe bed and took pictures dry as a bone that hadn't occurred in almost 50 years.

And now we're fourth year drought and we don't see an end to it.

So what are we going to do about the water?

That's why we're hoping the book encourages people, landowners, to think about conserving the land, and citizens to vote for funds to help protect that land or to build parks, do things like that.

There is $1 billion bond issue approved by Texas voters for new parks.

So we hope some of those come into the Hill Country.

But experts have looked at it and said, well, you're going to need in the hill country, about 30% of the land preserved to to preserve your water.

Well, right now we have 5 to 7, as I said before.

So we've got a ways to go.

Well, I hope that this book and the message that you and bright are putting out there is that it's important to protect it, but it's also about balance.

I mean, we want to enjoy it.

We want to appreciate it.

But that means we also have to do a little work to protect it so that it'll be here in 20, 30, 40, 50 years, etc.. Also, a lot of, a lot of these, homeowners, there's a section in the back Robert talks about, you know, okay, you have a piece of land.

What do you want to do?

How do you how do you manage it?

How can you improve it?

How can you, you know, things like planting native grasses and trying to, return it to a state where maybe it'll be more effective at absorbing that water, to make it more sustainable.

Well, I think there's a common pattern.

To land that eventually gets into a conservation easement.

It first starts with sustainability.

The landowner has a passion to learn how to sustain that land.

One of the great examples.

And I've got pictures of it in the book, and we talk about it in the book.

Brant does, the Bamberger Ranch up near Jack Johnson City 5000 acres.

David Bamberger was a former CEO of Church's Fried Chicken, and he has a passion for sustainability.

They won every award in sustainability you can get.

He even has the first world's first bat cave manmade.

But you have the the person learns sustainability.

So they have this passion for the land and they give it to their kids.

Pass it down.

And that starts that ball rolling for them.

And when it gets time for turnover ownership, which it is now over the next 15 years, that you get more conservation easements and, that's where we have to start.

So we partner, for instance, we partnered and talk about in the book last Master Naturalists who go out and help landowners learn sustainability and stewardship.

And so that's really good.

We at the up at the center for Conservation and Birdie, we have we bought her farm next door to the nature center, which was built by two co-founders.

And that farm we show was the sustainability is, we won last year one of seven awards on sustainability from Texas Parks and Wildlife.

And we were the only non ranch.

So we're trying to teach it also.

And that's the important part about how that all happens.

I do want to talk about the nature center and the, her farm because that's an interesting the way it came about is interesting, but also the work that y'all are doing there to, as you say, educate adults, children, everyone to to help everybody learn about why conservation is important.

But there's also community events like farmer's markets, trails you can walk.

It's it sounds like a really lovely place.

So I would like for you to talk a little bit about that.

It, I'm happy to, it was started almost 40 years ago.

Actually, 36 by a small group headed by a husband, wife, Brant Evans, who authored the book, and his wife, Carolyn.

Carolyn became the CEO.

She's since retired last year or beginning of this year.

What they started to do was they said, we'd like to take a disused portion of land in the city limits of Burnie and make it into something that the citizens will really enjoy.

And she pitched it by saying, can you imagine trails going through it's 100 acres.

That ended up being Cibolo Nature Center, which is world class.

Brant wrote a book about it.

They toured the world and talked about how do you develop nature centers?

It's it has five, habitats, including Cibolo Creek that runs through it.

And it gets almost as many visitors today as do visit enchanted Rock Natural Area, about 100,000.

And it's in the city limits.

And you get out there.

There's nothing like it.

We, we have title five public schools coming out with the old school busses four days a week, every week of the year, and they get taught environmental and conservation education.

They go birdwatching.

They do all kinds of things.

One of the teachers told us, one time they had a class out there, and she was talking about, can you imagine, back in the 1800s, the wild mustangs roaming this prairie?

We have a prairie out there.

And one little boy looked at her and said, they had cars back then.

They're funny.

But in, So it started out as the nature center, and there's nothing quite like it in the country.

There are other nature centers.

And by the way, and then in early 2000, her farm crossed Cibolo Creek from our 65 acres, became available.

We bought it and renovated.

And the house now is on the historic register.

Then in 2015, we started the campaign to build what is now the Nest Nature School.

It is a preschool for 3 to 5 year olds that learn in nature.

The best way to describe it, I mean, when I grew up, my screen time was outside, you know, and if you look at experts on education, they say kids from from the beginning through age eight learn primarily from play, and outside is where it's best done.

So we have a in credibly inspiring curriculum, great teachers.

And we're completely full committed.

And we teach these little preschoolers and they come out as independent little adults.

You know pretty incredible.

I, I ask one parent, what do you like best about the school?

She said, we pick our son up, we go home.

He runs in the house, he drops his backpack, and he goes out in the backyard and plays.

Doesn't go to the TV, doesn't get on an iPad, doesn't get on a phone.

That's it.

We on that farm, we have a farmers market.

We have, public gardens, we grow our own, we have culinary classes, we teach environmental and conservation education.

I once they ask, what's the difference?

And she says, well, the real difference is conservation is when you add a human being to it.

So we teach a lot of things, what?

And and now we are adding lands.

We have our first, sanctuary, which was donated to us 30 acres in sister Dale, Texas, which we're going to manage.

And we have a lot of the states that trust us and they are giving us their land in their wills, and we're establishing annuities for those one of those, we're already planning public spaces for it, and they're going to allow it in a conservation easement, because that's where we put them into.

And we have a whole land conservation group that does nothing but look at lands and either puts them in conservation easements and we hold it or we sell it.

We sell the easement because there are investors that really want those.

Just depends on the property.

So it's it's evolved a lot.

I think today it's the largest nonprofit in Kendall County, and we employ 45 people full time.

And it's great.

It's a wonderful.

And there's a there's a lovely chapter in the book about it.

And I would hope people would be inspired to go visit a but also if they're not living in or around the Hill country, maybe see how they can apply that model to lands in their own areas and regions, because it's a wonderful way to start to preserve these lands.

And also, like you say, the education piece is invaluable.

Oh, it's if you start with a nature center, which can basically be an enhanced park.

It sort of evolves.

You get the right people involved.

It evolves.

I want to make sure we talk about your photography, because that is why you're here.

But there's some beautiful photography in the book.

We talked a little bit about how you went out and got it.

But I want to talk about because I think it's interesting that you you haven't been a professional photographer for very long.

You started somewhat recently.

Can you, can you talk about how you got into, photography?

Oh, I got into photography.

Well, I when I was young, my dad was a nut with cameras, and at that time was slides.

And so we got oriented to it.

But I got into it in the 80s a little bit.

But every time I did work took over.

I got married in Africa to my beautiful wife, Virginia, in 93 and took 22,000 slides.

Wow.

And made pictures and did.

That was the first time I ever used Photoshop.

But then work took over.

So when I retired, after doing the bucket list and everything else, I said I need another passion and I thought, you know, my wife is an artist.

She's creative with oils and chalk and pencil.

Could I be creative?

And I said, I'm going to try to do it with a camera and software.

So that's what got me into it.

And my first canvas was Cibolo Nature Center, and it just grew from there.

Well, it's that's inspiring because it's never it's never too late.

If there's some poverty you've always wanted to do, do it, you know, try it.

And you, you take some incredibly beautiful photographs.

I mean, there are the I just I would be, you know, flipping through to read it and I would just stop and have to stare because they're gorgeous.

I mean, the whole country is a beautiful subject, but it takes something more than just a beautiful subject to make a beautiful photograph.

Well, one of the one of the Texas photographers I admired, was a guy named Jim Bones.

He passed away a year and a half ago, but he basically said in a book he wrote, Chasing the Light.

My work is devoted to reaching into people's hearts, to the beauty of nature and showing them we and the earth are one.

I really wanted people to feel what I saw.

I mean, when I do a photograph, I first have to envision in my mind before I ever pick the camera what it can be.

What's the emotion, what's what's the composition, what's what, what's there.

And so I want people to feel the same thing.

And they can and you can do it in your mind when you get out there.

And that's the purpose of those photographs.

I also want to highlight too, because, I mean, obviously the landscapes are varied.

It's the whole country.

So there's all kinds of beautiful spots to choose from.

But you've also captured different seasons, different times of day.

Was that I'm sure that was intentional to kind of get an array of, of what it's like year round and day long in the Hill country.

Yeah.

I mean, photographers say we chase the light, and we do, sometimes there isn't that light.

So you provide the light.

It's a matter of what you envision, what you think you can do.

But people need to see it at different times of the day because not everybody wants to.

I think in can get up at five in the morning and go out for a sunrise, or stay up until the wee hours to to see a sunset or afterwards.

So, you know, it's got to be during the day.

So what does it look like during the day?

So I try to provide a, a coverage of the whole thing.

I think you did a great job.

There's there's wonderful sunrise.

I don't see a lot of sunrises myself, but beautiful sunrises, beautiful sunsets.

There's some misty ones.

There's the fog.

I mean, it's you've captured you've captured everything.

It it makes me want to go back and visit.

Even though I have.

It hasn't been that long since I've been there.

But it's it's wonderful.

That's the purpose.

If it can get you out there, we've achieved half the goal.

I mean, if I look at.

We had some accolades, if you don't mind, please.

First, from Carter Smith, who was the former past executive director and head of Texas Parks and Wildlife.

He actually he bought three books.

I think he said Texas just wouldn't be Texas without the majestic centerpiece of rocks and hills and the lands and waters that comprise our beloved hill country.

Yet, as Evans and Floyd so compellingly and visually convey, and replenishing our hills, the region's very allure may also be its greatest threat.

Kudos to these two for championing the urgency of conserving the sense of place and character of such an iconic part of our home ground.

The other one was from Suzanne Smith.

Suzanne is president of the Texas chapter of The Nature Conservancy, which I think is the largest chapter of Nature Conservancy in this country.

She said replenishing our hills is like a Sunday drive along the winding Texas hill country roads, with Brant sharing the twists and turns of conservation history through his writings.

While John's photography photographs capture the beauty of the incredible vistas and natural resources along the journey.

For those of us who have loved the Hill Country forever, or for those who are new to the area, the stories and images in this book serve as the perfect guide.

Through its pages, you will learn of the work of many to protect these cherished, cherished landscapes.

Yet be reminded there is so much more to do.

That's wonderful.

And unfortunately, we're running a little short on time.

Okay.

And our final maybe 30s.

What would you hope people take away from this book?

That we have something precious in the whole country.

It and all of us should be proud of it and want to preserve what we enjoy most out of it.

And there are ways to do that, and we hope that everybody will work towards that.

Wonderful.

Thank you so much for being here, for sharing this book with us and taking these beautiful photographs.

Glad to be here.

That's all the time we have for today.

Again, the book is replenishing our hills.

Thank you so much for joining us, and I will see you again soon.