Here the road runs entirely through preserved forest land and swampland, including the Green Swamp.

Contrary to what many maps indicate it is not as straight through this area shifting from left to right and vice versa on a random basis.

After leaving the forest the road crosses over the Little Withlacoochee River where the Hernando-Sumter border turns west, and SR 471 is now entirely in Sumter County.

However the amount of farmland is reduced, but not eliminated, once it runs through the City of Webster, a popular farm-to-market trading post.

Near Sumterville, SR 471 shifts slightly to the northwest and runs in close proximity to a former Seaboard Air Line Railroad line that ran towards Winter Haven, and carried Amtrak trains until 1988.