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Breaking Announcement: Northern Everglades Investment to Benefit Entire Everglades System
By Judy Althaus
One of North America’s last great grassland landscapes, the Florida Everglades is a top Conservancy priority. Indeed, with your support, we have helped protect more than 600,000 acres within the immense landscape of the greater Everglades.
But did you know there is much more to the Everglades than South Florida swamps and alligators? The headwaters of this vast, interconnected ecosystem are themselves a critical conservation resource. Within the roughly 4 million-acre Northern Everglades basin, freshwater travels slowly over hundreds of miles before feeding into the iconic “river of grass.” Today the Conservancy’s focus is on this northern region.
What does protecting the Northern Everglades mean?
- Drinking water for South Florida
- Breeding grounds for the swallow-tailed kite
- A continued legacy for generations of ranching families
- Survival for the Florida panther
Wildlife, Water and a Way of Life
The Northern Everglades is a 170-mile swath of working cattle ranches, longleaf pine savannahs and seasonal wetlands that historically flowed unheeded from headwaters just below Orlando into Lake Okeechobee and Big Cypress National Preserve. Here's why protection and restoration of this region is vital to Florida’s ecological and economic health, as well as to the Greater Everglades system.
- Biodiversity: Many imperiled animals and plants call the Northern Everglades home, and its variety of globally rare habitats and natural communities hold profound biological significance. The Florida black bear and panther, the Eastern indigo snake and gopher tortoise, and birds such as the grasshopper sparrow, snail kite, wood stork, crested caracara and Florida burrowing owl are all native to the region.
- Freshwater resources: South Florida depends upon rainfall in the greater Everglades watershed, but it has been modified for agriculture and urban development. The Northern Everglades once stored large amounts of rain during wet seasons, slowly releasing water in drier times. Today, drought is followed by floods that overburden Lake Okeechobee’s dikes, stressing coastal estuaries’ delicate balance and aggravating water shortages to the south.
- Ranching community: Cattle ranches cover nearly one-sixth of Florida’s landmass and much of its remaining native habitat. They also provide employment and contribute significantly to the local tax base. Ranchers are among the best stewards of natural lands. A well-managed ranch provides some of the same ecological functions as a protected area, and serves as a wildlife corridor between otherwise isolated public lands.
What the Conservancy is Doing to Conserve the Northern Everglades
- Facilitating the protection and restoration of wetlands. For more than a decade, the Conservancy has identified conservation properties, assisted and encouraged ranchers to protect and restore critical lands, and provided expert testimony to Washington decision-makers in support of the region’s protection. Restoring natural wetlands on select ranches will improve water quality, quantity, timing and historic flow patterns in the watershed.
In July of 2010, an $89 million investment in conservation easements for Fisheating Creek basin – one of the least-altered tributaries to Lake Okeechobee – was announced by the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. Their Wetlands Reserve Program will restore nearly 40 square miles of private land for future generations, often reducing taxes for the landowner while protecting wildlife habitat.
- Encouraging efforts to create new national wildlife refuges. In April 2010, President Obama announced America’s Great Outdoors program, which includes conservation of large, iconic landscapes. The Northern Everglades was named a top priority. The Conservancy is working with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on proposals to create new national wildlife refuge sites that will conserve imperiled species and their habitats.
- Documenting the effectiveness of wetlands restoration. At the Conservancy’s 12,000-acre Disney Wilderness Preserve, in Kissimmee near the headwaters of the Everglades, our scientists have demonstrated best practices for restoration of former ranchlands. Within this innovative mitigation project, we evaluate the potential of wetland areas to serve as natural water storage areas and increase water quality.
- Saving Hatchineha Ranch. Despite having one of the country’s highest concentrations of threatened and endangered species, the ranch’s 5,134 acres were slated for suburban development before the Conservancy purchased it in 2009. Restoration of impacted wetlands within this large conservation landscape will be a major milestone in the Conservancy’s Northern Everglades strategy.
- Serving on advisory and management councils. The Conservancy helps advise the South Florida Water Management District on Everglades issues, including land protection strategies and responses to invasive, non-native species. We also lead several innovative Cooperative Invasive Species Management Areas, known as CISMAs, which help private landowners control invasive species on their property.
Why the Conservancy?
With solid, regional relationships and a wealth of natural resource information, the Conservancy is a proven leader in the effort to protect the Northern Everglades. We’re excited about recent interest in the region’s protection, yet recognize that much remains to be done.
In fact, today we have an unparalleled opportunity to conserve and restore a fully functional, reconnected wetland corridor in the Northern Everglades. A window of opportunity is wide open – and the time to act is now!
Nature picture credits (top to bottom, left to right): Photo © Carlton Ward (ranchers in the N. Everglades); Photo © Carlton Ward (Florida panther); Photo © TNC (N. Everglades map).
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