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Gliding across the saw-grass prairie, meandering around vast islands of pine or percolating through the mangroves into Florida Bay, the Everglades will always be a river -- a 60-mile wide river. A "river of grass" is what conservationist Marjory Stoneman Douglas called the enormous wetland that covers most of the southern Florida peninsula. She died in 1998 at the age of 108 after teaching the world a valuable and painful lesson: wetlands are not to be drained. Douglas' book, "River of Grass," put the Everglades on the map. "Nothing anywhere else is like them: their vast glittering openness, wider than the enormous visible round of the horizon, the racing free saltness and sweetness of their massive winds, under the dazzling blue heights of space," wrote Douglas. "They are unique also in the simplicity, the diversity, the related harmony of the forms of life they enclose." Everglades' wildlife have depended on a complex annual rhythm of drought and flood. At one time, flying "super-colonies" of wading birds would blot out the sun.
Today, 14 federally-listed endangered species rely on the Everglades unique resources. They include the wood stork, the West Indian manatee and the American crocodile. In fact, the only place in the world where crocodile and the alligator live side-by-side is in the Everglades. In 1949, after years of lobbying by conservationist Ernest Coe and others, the federal government dedicated Everglades National Park to protect the southern portion of the Everglades and Florida Bay from growing human pressures. But the Park's boundaries left out crucial portions of the Everglades -- the upper portion of Key Largo and the coral reefs to the east, and the Big Cypress swamp to the north. Conservationists insisted that without those lands the Park had no control of its water supply and might not survive. In that same year, Congress authorized the Army Corps of Engineers to build a massive system of canals, levees and pumping stations to decrease the risk of flooding and to drain south Florida for development and agriculture. This project, known as the Central and South Florida Project, fueled an economic boom. But it also began the gradual decline of the Everglades system. Water that once flowed as sheets was now compartmentalized and controlled by man and machines. Acres upon acres of sugar farms sprung out of the rich peat soil below Lake Okeechobee, and Miami suburbs consumed the land where saw-grass swamps once reigned. Today 5.5 million people call south Florida home and plans are under way to accommodate another 7 million to 10 million new inhabitants. Sugar farms continue to dump thousands of pounds of phosphates into the water, contaminating plants and wildlife. While the government tries to time its pumps and control structures to imitate the natural water cycle, they generally fail. The natural system always comes third, after urban and agriculture needs have been met. One short century of human settlement in south Florida has pushed the Everglades to the brink. Nearly half the Everglades has been drained. Nine out of every 10 wading birds have disappeared since the turn of the century, and the Florida panther count stands perilously at 30. Mercury-laden fish, a sure sign of polluted water, are ubiquitous. Tragically, the natural but fragile balance that made this wildland flourish has been altered. But with sound science, the natural functioning of the greater Everglades region might be repaired. Engineers, scientists, anthropologists, land managers and conservationists agree that drastic steps are necessary if we are to rescue the Everglades. Plans are in development to rework south Florida's complex plumbing system and restore the ecosystem's natural balance. Land acquisition is a key component of any restoration plan. Extending the park's boundaries will bolster habitat-protection efforts and provide a protective buffer between the natural landscape and ever-expanding urban areas. Removing lands from destructive sugar farming will help improve water quality, and will provide much-needed water storage capacity. Land acquisition for water preserves must come first, before the land available is lost forever to development. Funding from the Land and Water Conservation Fund would enable the Park Service to purchase critical lands from willing sellers, thus carrying out the first step toward restoring the viability of this wondrous ecosystem. It is essential that new water storage be used to water the withering wildlands of the Everglades, rather than to develop more agriculture and sprawling suburban communities, as some plans have proposed. In addition, Everglades restoration efforts must remove the dikes that prevent fresh water from reaching the Everglades in order to restore natural characteristics of water flows in south Florida not seen in decades. More than 1 million tourists from all over the world flock to Everglades
National Park expecting to see the healthy, natural "river
of grass," first made famous by Douglas. But her vision of
the Everglades is gone. A major national restoration effort is needed
to ensure this national treasure is not entirely lost for future
generations."The Everglades is a test," said Douglas.
"If we pass, we get to keep the planet." Let's hope we
do.
National Wildlands | SPARE Report Main Photo courtesy Tom Till; used with permission. Up to TopHOME | Email Signup | About Us | Contact Us | Terms of Use | © 2008 Sierra Club |
The Everglades headwaters actually begin just south of Orlando from the
Kissimmee River, which runs into Florida's largest lake, Okeechobee. The water
historically "spilled over" the bottom half of the peninsula in a solid sheet
generally no more than two feet deep. This 300-mile sheet of water provided habitat for
hundreds of thousands of wading birds like herons, spoonbills and pelicans. Panthers,
deer, crocodiles and alligators roamed the banks of this "river."
