Manitou Cave is a mile-long cave near Fort Payne. It was a ceremonial site for Cherokees in the nineteenth century, and inscriptions in the Cherokee syllabary, created by Sequoyah, describe [more]

The Alabama red-bellied turtle was named the Alabama state reptile by the Alabama Legislature in 1990. Found almost exclusively in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, the turtle is named for the color [more]

The Alabama canebrake pitcher plant is a carnivorous plant that is unique to Alabama, growing in only Autauga and Chilton counties. The canebrake is one of two Alabama pitcher plant [more]

Oak Mountain State Park, located just south of Birmingham in Pelham, is Alabama’s largest state park. The park’s 9,000-plus acres include heavily forested hills and bottomlands. Set amidst a wooded [more]

Fire Ants, native to South America, first entered the United States through the port of Mobile. Two species are found in the state. Black imported fire ants probably arrived about [more]

The Wetumpka Crater in Elmore County is the result of an ancient meteoritic impact about 85 million years ago. The crescent-shaped ridge of hills rising up to 300 feet above [more]

The Mobile-Tensaw Delta, or simply the delta, is located directly north of Alabama’s Mobile Bay. This vast region of wetlands and broad river valley begins northward to the confluence of [more]

The Wiregrass Region of Southeast Alabama is named for the long-stemmed grass of its native ecosystem. When the boll weevil devastated cotton crops in the early 1900s, farmers diversified their [more]

Alabama’s Gulf Coast is renowned for its white sand beaches. Bordering the Gulf of Mexico, it is an important part of the quality of life for many of the state’s [more]

The Black Belt of Alabama, named for its dark, rich soils, contains counties in the central part of the state. Alabama’s Black Belt is part of a larger crescent-shaped area [more]