Audio
Saturiwa Trail Tour Stop 14
Transcript
MARKER # 14 – RICE DAM
Early during the plantation era, the area immediately to the west or your right may have been dammed for rice cultivation. J.Tucker, Esquire, owned the island from 1767 to 1783. Tucker exported rice and indigo to England, which subsidized the crops to encourage colonists. The technology of rice cultivation was well developed in the sea islands of Georgia and South Carolina, and remained an important crop there until the civil war.
Rice was never a major crop on Fort George Island. Perhaps the labor and fresh water required for the crop was simply not available here. After being cleared and leveled, potential rice fields required flushing with freshwater to remove the salt. Once the rice was planted, the field was repeatedly flooded with freshwater during the growing season. The rice seedlings tolerated the inundation while undesirable grasses and weeds drowned.
Description
Rice Dam
Credit
Florida Park Service/NPS
Date Created
12/21/2021
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