My vote's for Travis McGee. He still haunts the bayous and the sloughs here, ageless, but world-weary.

" "Now, of course, having failed in every attempt to subdue the Glades by frontal attack, we are slowly killing it off by tapping the River of Grass. In the questionable name of progress, the state in its vast wisdom lets every two-bit developer divert the flow into drag-lined canals that give him 'waterfront' lots to sell. As far north as Corkscrew Swamp, virgin stands of ancient bald cypress are dying. All the area north of Copeland had been logged out, and will never come back. As the glades dry, the big fires come with increasing frequency. The ecology is changing with egret colonies dwindling, mullet getting scarce, mangrove dying of new diseases born of dryness."

"Bright Orange for the Shroud", Ross MacDonald

"This was in a paperback originally published in 1965 when the general public was still not conversant with the concept of environmentalism."

From the Wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travis_McGee