Florida Everglades

The Everglades National Park in southern Florida provides a unique home to hundreds of species. The area contains an intricate combination of ecosystems; hardwood hammocks pineland, mangroves, coastal lowlands, freshwater slough, freshwater marl prairie, cypress, estuarine, and marine (to learn more about each of these ecosystems, including identifying characteristics, click here.

 Because of the complex variation of ecosystems, the Everglades boasts high biodiversity. Within the park, one can find over 350 species of birds, over 1000 species of plants, and other unique animals such as alligators, crocodiles, sea turtles and West Indian manatees.

The park covers 1,509,000 acres (6,110 km2) including the largest mangrove system in the Western Hemisphere. Though the park boundaries have expanded in protected area over time, the in-tact habitat is shrinking largely due to human development surrounding the park. At different points in the 19th and 20th centuries, communities have built canals to drain parts of the wetland to provide stable, dry land. Due to these draining efforts, over 50% of the wetlands have dried up since the 19th century. Unfortunately, this has led to an unstable and shifting ecosystem, with water flowing through the Everglades faster than the ecosystems can adjust to; today, 1.7 billion gallons per day enter the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico from this watershed. Development has also lead to other issues including water pollution and the introduction of invasive species; of the over 1,000 unique species of plants, roughly 20% are introduced and non-native.

The National Park Service has revived efforts to properly maintain the area by opening up the drainage systems and further researching human effects on the land in order to minimize future damage and hopefully restore stability in the park.

To learn how researchers are analyzing the current state of the Everglades using GIS technologies, check out these maps showing land use, canals, roads, boundaries, and watershed dynamics in the area.

Related Resources:

National Park Lesson Plans and Materials
Estuary and the Watershed
Food and Water Supplies Under Stress

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Photo credit: Rodney Cammauf (front page), Flickr user: Allie_Caulfield (above)