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Kissimmee River |
The Central and Southern Florida Flood Control Project's final construction project was straightening the Kissimmee River, a meandering 90-mile (140 km)-long river that was drained to make way for grazing land and agriculture. The C&SF started building the C-38 canal in 1962 and the effects were seen almost immediately... |
Water quality |
Warnings are placed in Everglades National Park to dissuade people from eating fish due to high mercury content. This warning explicitly mentions bass. |
Further problems with the environment arose when a vast algal bloom appeared in one-fifth of Lake Okeechobee in 1986, the same year cattails were discovered overtaking sawgrass marshes in Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge. Scientists discovered that phosphorus, used as a fertilizer in the EAA, was flushed into canal... |
At the same time mercury was found in local fish at such high levels that consumption warnings were posted for fishermen. A Florida panther was found dead with levels of mercury high enough to kill a human.[153] Scientists found that power plants and incinerators using fossil fuels were expelling mercury into the atmos... |
The Everglades Forever Act, introduced by Governor Lawton Chiles in 1994, was an attempt to legislate the lowering of phosphorus in Everglades waterways. The act put the South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) in charge of testing and enforcing low ph... |
Invasive species |
Main article: List of invasive species in the Everglades |
Climbing ferns overtake cypress trees in the Everglades. The ferns act as "fire ladders" that can destroy trees that would otherwise survive fires. |
As a center for trade and travel between the U.S., the Caribbean, and South America, South Florida is especially vulnerable to invasive species, or species of plants and animals that adapt aggressively to conditions in the Everglades, allowing them to reproduce faster and grow larger than they would naturally in their ... |
The Everglades hosts 1,392 exotic plant species actively reproducing in the region, outnumbering the 1,301 species considered native to South Florida.[158] The melaleuca tree (Melaleuca quinquenervia) takes water in greater amounts than other trees. Melaleucas grow taller and more densely in the Everglades than in thei... |
Brazilian pepper, or Florida holly (Schinus terebinthifolius), has also wreaked havoc on the Everglades, exhibiting a tendency to spread rapidly and to crowd out native species of plants as well as to create inhospitable environments for native animals. It is especially difficult to eradicate and is readily propagated ... |
Many pets have escaped or been released into the Everglades from the surrounding urban areas. Some find the conditions quite favorable and have established self-sustaining populations, competing for food and space with native animals. Many tropical fish have been released, but blue tilapias (Oreochromis aureus) cause d... |
Native to southern Asia, the Burmese python (Python molurus bivittatus) is a relatively new invasive species in the Everglades. This species can grow up to 20 feet (6.1 m) long, and they compete with alligators for the top of the food chain. Florida wildlife officials speculate that escaped pythons have begun reproduci... |
Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan |
Main article: Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan |
Although scientists made headway in decreasing mercury and phosphorus levels in water, the natural environment of South Florida continued to decline in the 1990s, and life in nearby cities reflected this downturn. To address the deterioration of the Miami metropolitan area, Governor Lawton Chiles commissioned a report ... |
In 1999, an evaluation of the C&SF was submitted to Congress as part of the Water Development Act of 1992. The seven-year report, called the "Restudy", cited indicators of harm to the ecosystem: a 50 percent reduction in the original Everglades, diminished water storage, harmful timing of water releases from canals and... |
Planned water recovery and storage implementation using CERP strategies |
The Restudy came with a plan to stop the declining environmental quality, and this proposal was to be the most expensive and comprehensive ecological repair project in history.[175] The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) proposed more than 60 construction projects over 30 years to store water that was bei... |
Since its signing, the State of Florida reports that it has spent more than $2 billion on the various projects. More than 36,000 acres (150 km2) of Stormwater Treatment Areas have been constructed to filter 2,500 short tons (2,300 t) of phosphorus from Everglades waters. An STA spanning 17,000 acres (69 km2) was constr... |
Airboating has become a popular ecotourism attraction in the Everglades. |
A series of biennial reports from the U.S. National Research Council have reviewed the progress of CERP. The fourth report in the series, released in 2012, found that little progress has been made in restoring the core of the remaining Everglades ecosystem; instead, most project construction so far has occurred along i... |
Future of the Everglades |
In 2008, the State of Florida agreed to buy U.S. Sugar and all of its manufacturing and production facilities for an estimated $1.7 billion.[183] Florida officials indicated they intended to allow U.S. Sugar to process for six more years before dismissing its employees and dismantling the plant. The area, which include... |
Everglades restoration received $96 million of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.[187] As a result of the stimulus package, a mile-long (1.6 km) bridge to replace the Tamiami Trail, a road that borders Everglades National Park to the north and has blocked water from reaching the southern Everglades, wa... |
A national push for expansion and progress toward the latter part of the 19th century stimulated interest in draining the Everglades, a region of tropical wetlands in southern Florida, for agricultural use. According to historians, "From the middle of the nineteenth century to the middle of the twentieth century, the U... |
A pattern of political and financial motivation, and a lack of understanding of the geography and ecology of the Everglades have plagued the history of drainage projects. The Everglades are a part of a massive watershed that originates near Orlando and drains into Lake Okeechobee, a vast and shallow lake. As the lake e... |
During his 1904 campaign to be elected governor, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward promised to drain the Everglades, and his later projects were more effective than Disston's. Broward's promises sparked a land boom facilitated by blatant errors in an engineer's report, pressure from real estate developers, and the burgeoning ... |
Severe hurricanes in 1926 and 1928 caused catastrophic damage and flooding from Lake Okeechobee that prompted the Army Corps of Engineers to build a dike around the lake. Further floods in 1947 prompted an unprecedented construction of canals throughout southern Florida. Following another population boom after World Wa... |
Exploration |
A black and white drawing of Seminoles crouched behind the massive roots of a mangrove tree while U.S. Marines in three canoes are shown in the background |
Marines search for Seminoles among the mangroves during the Second Seminole War |
American involvement in the Everglades began during the Second Seminole War (1836–42), a costly and very unpopular conflict. The United States spent between $30 million and $40 million and lost between 1,500 and 3,000 lives. The U.S. military drove the Seminoles into the Everglades and were charged with the task of fin... |
Opinion about the value of Florida to the Union was mixed: some thought it a useless land of swamps and horrible animals, while others thought it a gift from God for national prosperity.[4] In 1838 comments in The Army and Navy Chronicle supported future development of southern Florida: |
[The] climate [is] most delightful; but, from want of actual observation, [it] could not speak so confidently of the soil, although, from the appearance of the surrounding vegetation, a portion of it, at least, must be rich. Whenever the aborigines shall be forced from their fastnesses, as eventually they must be, the ... |
A black and white hand-drawn map of the lower two-thirds of the Florida peninsula |
Map of the Everglades by the U.S. War Department in 1856: Military action during the Seminole Wars improved understanding of the features of the Everglades. |
The military penetration of southern Florida offered the opportunity to map a poorly understood part of the country. As late as 1823, official reports doubted the existence of a large inland lake, until the military met the Seminoles at the Battle of Lake Okeechobee in 1837.[6] To avenge repeated surprise attacks on hi... |
The final blame for the military stalemate was determined to lie not in military preparation, supplies, leadership, or superior tactics by the Seminoles, but in Florida's impenetrable terrain. An army surgeon wrote: "It is in fact a most hideous region to live in, a perfect paradise for Indians, alligators, serpents, f... |
In 1897, Hugh L. Willoughby spent eight days canoeing with a party from the mouth of the Harney River to the Miami River. He wrote about his observations and sent them back to the New Orleans Times-Democrat. Willoughby described the water as healthy and wholesome, with numerous springs, and 10,000 alligators "more or l... |
Drainage |
As early as 1837, a visitor to the Everglades suggested the value of the land without the water: |
Could it be drained by deepening the natural outlets? Would it not open to cultivation immense tracts of rich vegetable soil? Could the waterpower, obtained by draining, be improved to any useful purpose? Would such draining render the country unhealthy? ... Many queries like these passed through our minds. They can on... |
Territorial representative David Levy proposed a resolution that was passed in Congress in 1842: "that the Secretary of War be directed to place before this House such information as can be obtained in relation to the practicability and probable expense of draining the everglades of Florida."[3] From this directive Sec... |
Nevertheless, Smith returned a report to the Secretary of the Treasury asking for $500,000 to do the job.[13] The report is the first published study on the topic of the Everglades, and concluded with the statement: |
The Ever Glades are now suitable only for the haunt of noxious vermin or the resort of pestilent reptiles. The statesman whose exertions shall cause the millions of acres they contain, now worse than worthless, to teem with the products of agricultural industry; that man who thus adds to the resources of his country ..... |
Smith suggested cutting through the rim of the Everglades (known today as the Atlantic Coastal Ridge), connecting the heads of rivers to the coastline so that 4 feet (1.2 m) of water would be drained from the area. The result, Smith hoped, would yield farmland suitable for corn, sugar, rice, cotton, and tobacco.[14] |
In 1850 Congress passed a law that gave several states wetlands within their state boundaries.[clarification needed] The Swamp Land Act of 1850 ensured that the state would be responsible for funding the attempts at developing wetlands into farmlands.[14] Florida quickly formed a committee to consolidate grants to pay ... |
Hamilton Disston's canals |
A black and white image of a land sale notice announcing 4 million acres (16,000 km2) purchased by Hamilton Disston; 20,000 acres (81 km2) are up for sale, specifically featuring town lots for sale |
Hamilton Disston's land sale notice |
After the Civil War, an agency named the Internal Improvement Fund (IIF), charged with using grant money to improve Florida's infrastructure through canals, rail lines, and roads, was eager to be rid of the debt incurred by the Civil War. IIF trustees found a Pennsylvania real estate developer named Hamilton Disston wh... |
Disston's engineers focused on Lake Okeechobee as well. As one colleague put it, "Okeechobee is the point to attack"; the canals were to be "equal or greater than the inflow from the Kissimmee valley, which is the source of all the evil."[18] Disston sponsored the digging of a canal 11 miles (18 km) long from Lake Okee... |
Though Disston's canals did not drain, his purchase primed the economy of Florida. It made news and attracted tourists and land buyers alike. Within four years property values doubled, and the population increased significantly.[15] One newcomer was the inventor Thomas Edison, who bought a home in Fort Myers.[20] Disst... |
Henry Flagler's railroads |
Due to Disston's purchase, the IIF was able to sponsor railroad projects, and the opportunity presented itself when oil tycoon Henry Flagler became enchanted with St. Augustine during a vacation. He built the opulent Ponce de Leon Hotel in St. Augustine in 1888, and began buying land and building rail lines along the e... |
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