The Nature Conservancy in Florida

Help Protect Nature!

With your help, we can protect North America's largest wetland for people and nature.

There is hope. The Nature Conservancy has helped protect more than 600,000 acres in south Florida. But there is much more to be done if we are to improve the future of the "River of Grass."

For more information

For more information about efforts to protect the Everglades, contact the Conservancy’s South Florida Office at (305) 745-8402.

The Everglades was once a wide, shallow river of grass. This seemingly endless mosaic of sawgrass marshes, pine rockland forests, tropical hardwood hammocks, mangrove swamps and coastal estuaries was unlike anywhere else on Earth.

Today at roughly 4 million acres, the Everglades is one of the largest wetlands in the Western Hemisphere (about the size of Rhode Island and Connecticut combined) and serves as one of the main sources of drinking water for south Florida.

Rare Plants and Animals

Florida panther
West Indian manatee
snail (Everglades) kite
wood stork
red-cockaded woodpecker
American crocodile
swallow-tailed kite
roseate spoonbill
anhinga
purple gallinule
red-shouldered hawk
orchids

Threats

Although there are many protected areas within the Everglades, only about half of the original Everglades ecosystem remains. Much of the original Everglades was drained in a massive effort to create a system of canals and dikes that would control the flow of water and accommodate agriculture and urban development. Since that time the following threats have grown dramatically:

Changes in water flow quantity, quality and timing.
Explosive human population growth.
Infestations of invasive, non-native species.

Conservancy Action

Conservancy Backs South Florida Water Management District Approval of US Sugar Buyout

The Nature Conservancy has helped acquire more than 600,000 acres in the Everglades watershed; supported the passage of county bonding programs for land acquisition in St. Lucie, Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties.

As a member of the Water Resources Advisory Council, the Conservancy helps advise the South Florida Water Management District on Everglades issues, including promoting additional land protection and strategies to deal with invasive, non-native species in the Everglades.

For more than a decade, the Conservancy has worked to restore wetlands and other habitats at The Disney Wilderness Preserve, a former cattle ranch south of Orlando at the headwaters of the Everglades. Today, the preserve serves as a place to demonstrate effective wetlands restoration at a large scale.

To improve understanding of the immensity and connectedness of the Everglades system, and to promote support of the restoration, the Conservancy joined with partners to create the Everglades Trail—a driving tour of the Everglades.

The Conservancy is also working with ranchers within the watershed to develop projects that protect important seasonal wetlands in a way that is compatible with ranching practices.