Kids, Cameras: He’s No Tenderfoot : Presidency: Bush shows his skills on a Florida nature walk. He also praises an old opponent, Jimmy Carter.

“I’m talking gigantic turtle. I mean large turtle,” the President of the United States said as he peered through a borrowed pair of binoculars at a platter-sized terrapin basking in the south Florida sun.

With six sixth-graders from a local program for gifted children, President Bush, accompanied by Secretary of the Interior Manuel Lujan Jr., toured part of the Everglades National Park Friday.

The day led to no new policy initiatives--a government program to protect endangered wetlands remains stalled by objections from the oil industry, development advocates and Administration conservatives. But the tour did allow Bush to demonstrate one of his greatest skills--few politicians are more comfortable working in front of television cameras with photogenic children.

“Look, there’s a big alligator. That’s a big boomer,” Bush, dressed in an open-collar shirt and tan pants exclaimed. “What do you know about alligators?” he asked the kids.

“The male alligators eat the females’ babies,” one child responded. Bush winced.

As ospreys, vultures and long-necked anhingas passed overhead, Bush and the youngsters chatted and took lessons on south Florida ecology from park ranger David Kronk, who said the park is endangered because of many conflicting demands for the region’s water.

“I guess you all can go away realizing you have to protect this resource,” Bush said. “You can’t stop everything,” he added, referring to the needs of the region’s growing cities and industry. “You need good management.”

The group was precocious, talkative and carefully balanced to mirror the area’s ethnic diversity--one black, three Latinos, an Asian, an Anglo. Bush demonstrated his rudimentary Spanish with two of the children-- Que buena , he said as he pointed out one bird. He asked them what they had learned about protecting the fragile wetlands environment and answered typical school kid questions.

“Is your car bulletproof?” asked one. “Yes,” Bush replied.

“Can you open the windows?” asked another.

“They don’t like that,” Bush said, pointing to one of his Secret Service bodyguards.

Earlier in the day, Bush traveled to Atlanta, where, at the site of last year’s Democratic convention, he offered unusual praise for a man he had blasted during three national campaigns--former President Jimmy Carter.

In two campaigns for vice president and one for President, Bush had ridiculed Carter, referring to him as the “master of malaise” and used him as a living symbol of bad old days. Friday, however, his tenor had changed.

Referring to his thousand points of light volunteerism program, Bush said: “I couldn’t come to Atlanta without taking note of one such point of light, a part-time carpenter and his wife who have provided shelter for so many in this very city. And, of course, I’m talking about the former President Jimmy, and Rosalyn Carter.”

Since leaving Washington, Carter has worked with Habitat for Humanity, a group that builds housing for the poor. His efforts have drawn widespread praise, and the compliment by Bush was another in a series of signs that after years of being a target of GOP attacks, Carter is making something of a comeback in public opinion.

Bush’s purpose in visiting Atlanta was a speech to the National Assn. of Homebuilders. It was a highly sympathetic audience for his repetition of a now-standard appeal for Congress to pass the Administration’s capital gains tax cut program.

Bush reiterated an Administration call for lower interest rates, the second day in a row that the White House has applied pressure on the Federal Reserve Board to ease credit.

“In the last few years, millions of families could afford a new home because mortgage interest rates have dropped, from 18% in the early ‘80s to less than 10% today. But I want to see them come down even more. I am not satisfied at 10%.”

Later, after the Everglades tour, Bush spoke here at a fund-raising event for Florida Gov. Bob Martinez, a Republican who faces a difficult reelection campaign despite the overwhelming margin by which Bush carried Florida last year.

Martinez has been in trouble recently in part because of his strong backing of restrictions on abortion.