Don Kurz has tromped around some of Missouri's best places.

A former supervisor with the state Department of Conservation, Kurz figures he has visited more than 1,600 protected public spots. In his new book, he shares his top 100 places.

He gives directions, descriptions, maps and GPS coordinates to prairies, wildlife areas, springs, waterfalls, swamps, geologic features, caves, trails, scenic drives, nature centers and more.

The spots are listed by region on a state map and also are listed by features. You can find categories for glades and prairies, springs and streams, waterfalls and woodlands.

I've done my share of tromping around, so I looked up Kurz's take on some of my favorite spots. Yep, he listed Alley Spring as the state's most photogenic, Hawn State Park as having the most appealing natural features and Rocky Falls as Missouri's most impressive waterfall.

I was kind of disappointed to see Hickory Canyons Natural Area among the top 100; I'd hoped to keep that little jewel to myself.

There are plenty of new places to explore. I'd never heard of Lick Log Hollow or Ripgut Prairie Natural Area, so I'm making a to-do list for this winter.

One nitpick: Kurz is an excellent photographer and has authored several wildflower guides. He illustrates each of his 100 special places in this book with gorgeous photos, including one that seemed too good to be true. I showed it to Post-Dispatch photo editor Hillary Levin, and she had the same reaction. "That doesn't look real," she said.

The photo is of wintering eagles on the Mississippi River near Clarksville. One flies across a glowing sun, another heads in the opposite direction squarely in the sun's reflection on the water. I asked Kurz about the photo and he said his publisher, Tim Ernst, had "repositioned" one of the eagles to make a more dramatic scene.

This is a growing problem in the computer age. Outside Magazine recently got burned when it ran a stunning photo that showed a tiny surfer on a monstrous wave under threatening skies. When questions were raised, the photographer, Ed Freeman, admitted the scene had been "Photoshopped halfway to death."

"I'm an artist," he was quoted as saying. "I'm interested in creating great pictures, not documentary images. I couldn't care less if they're 'real' or not."

Now, I did a bit of hiking around the Arkansas Ozarks with Ernst this year. He is a good guy and a great wildlife photographer. If he chooses to add a setting sun to a photo for his coffee-table art books, that's his business. But a "guidebook" is photojournalism that should show real scenes. You may use the computer to do basic toning and light corrections, but you should not add, delete or "reposition" subjects to change what you saw through the camera's viewfinder.

Kurz agreed.

"I prefer to use images that I saw in the camera frame, and not something manipulated on a monitor," Kurz said. "Everything else in my book was as I saw it, thank goodness."

Kurz's guidebook is available through the publisher at cloudland.net and 1-800-838-4453, at Barnes & Noble stores, the visitor center at Shaw Nature Reserve in Gray Summit and the gift shop at Missouri Botanical Garden. Kurz will do a book-signing at the garden from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Dec. 5.