 In 1897 , an explorer named Hugh Willoughby spent eight days <unk> with a party from the mouth of the Harney River to the Miami River . He wrote about his observations and sent them back to the New Orleans Times @-@ Democrat . Willoughby described the water as healthy and <unk> , with numerous springs , and 10 @,@ 000 alligators " more or less " in Lake Okeechobee . The party encountered thousands of birds near the Shark River , " killing hundreds , but they continued to return " . Willoughby pointed out that much of the rest of the country had been mapped and explored except for this part of Florida , writing , " ( w ) e have a tract of land one hundred and thirty miles long and seventy miles wide that is as much unknown to the white man as the heart of Africa . " 
