DEATH IN THE EVERGLADES: The Murder of Guy Bradley, America's First Martyr to Environmentalism.

Stuart B. McIver. University Press of Florida. 187 pages. $24.95.

Death in the Everglades is an eye-opening, informative account of the rise and demise of the cruel plume hunting trade and of Guy Bradley's heroic dedication to protect a beautiful and valuable natural resource: the egrets and flamingoes, roseate spoonbills and herons that still grace the Glades and our shorelines. Lighthouse Point author Stuart McIver does a great job of bringing Florida's early pioneer days to life. Readers will be familiar with the names of our earliest settlers -- now pinned to roads, rails and waterways -- but will barely recognize the wild terrain.

At the beginning of the 20th century, bird feathers were worth more than gold. Walter Scott, a Princeton ornithologist, discovered a horrible massacre near Pine Island on Florida's Gulf Coast: 'The trees were full of nests. I found a huge pile of dead, half-decayed birds lying on the ground, the `plumes' taken off with a patch of skin from the back.'' Scott called the practice ``a war of extermination. This great and growing evil speaks of itself. The price paid [shows] how profitable the traffic is to these milliners.''

Bradley, born in 1870, grew up on the Florida frontier. By 1886, five million birds were being killed each year for the hat trade. When environmentalists and the Audubon Society finally won legal protection for birds in 1901, Bradley became the first warden to enforce the law. He was killed in the line of duty four years later, ''the first lawman,'' McIver writes, ''to die for the country's emerging conservation movement.'' Today the sort of birds protected by Bradley are threatened by habitat lost to development, air and water pollution, and the battle to save them is a microcosm for the fight to preserve all natural resources in the world.

McIver writes about Florida's past as if he were on the scene at the turn of the century, riding with sailors to Key West and trailing hunters and Bradley into the swamps, his imagination coloring the historical details. In addition to serving as a fine historical document, Death in the Everglades calls attention to the pattern of environmental destruction in Florida since the beginning of the last century. Perhaps this spotlight will improve efforts to protect and preserve the natural Florida that remains -- precariously -- in our care.

Trish Riley is a writer in Sunrise.