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- Permanent Link:
- http://dpanther.fiu.edu/dpService/dpPurlService/purl/FI14090867/00001
Notes
- Scope and Content:
- Source: Everglades 1
Length of Segment: 00:01:14
Hi, I'm Dr. Jerry Jackson, out with the wild things. The image of a national park is often of beautiful mountains, gigantic trees, or spectacular seascapes. The image of the Everglades, among those who have never visited, is often of a deep, dark swamp. None of these images fits the Everglades; the grandeur of Everglades National Park is in its wildlife and wetlands. Winds churn waves of grasses in a green sea dotted with cypress and alligator holes. Waves are crested, not with wind-blown foam, but with egrets, ibises, and storks riding the wind or plying inches deep water below the grasses for food. Drier sites support tropical hardwood forests. Only inches higher are scattered islands of slash pine. Forests shelter deer, bobcats, an occasional passing Florida panther, and a diversity of songbirds. Tidal influences in the southern Everglades nourish mangroves that provide a perpetual fringe of deep-green. Wood storks, anhingas, and mangrove cuckoos nest here. Mangrove roots hold nutrient-laden water over the land, slow erosion, and provides shelter for myriad fishes and shellfishes. ( English,English,English,English,English )
- Scope and Content:
- Source: Everglades 2
Length of Segment: 00:01:16
Hi, I'm Dr. Jerry Jackson, out with the wild things. Anhinga Trail is just inside the east entrance to Everglades National Park at Royal Palm Hammock. Paved walkways, sturdy boardwalks, and alligators, herons, egrets, and anhingas within a few feet create an aura of zoo-ness. But this is no zoo; the animals at Anhinga Trail are not tame. Why are they here? Why do they allow humans so close? Anhinga Trail was part of a road leading to Paradise Key, renamed Royal Palm Hammock when it became a state park in 1916. It has been a prime attraction of Everglades National Park since the park was opened in 1947. Year-around water is the key. Sawgrass prairie, open water, and narrow ditches with water lilies and other emergent vegetation border the trail. During drought, alligators dig deeper to find refuge. These gator holes attract other wild things. Animals at Anhinga Trail allow close approach because they need the rich resources of Taylor Slough and humans there are not threatening. Wildlife viewing at Anhinga Trail is best in March at the end of the dry season, when birds and gators gather in remaining pools.
- Scope and Content:
- Source: Everglades 3
Length of Segment: 00:01:17
Hi, I'm Dr. Jerry Jackson, out with the wild things. Whitewater Bay is a unique estuary within Everglades National Park. Near the southwest tip of the Florida peninsula, it separates Cape Sable peninsula from mainland Florida. Whitewater Bay is an expanse of brackish water dotted with myriad mangrove islands. Opening to the northwest into the Gulf of Mexico, Whitewater Bay drains the Everglades river of sawgrass. Sloughs are veins and arteries that carry the lifeblood of this rich estuary: nutrient-laden freshwater from the north. Tidal pulses maintain the brackish environment, flushing nutrients beyond Whitewater Bay to nourish the nearby shallow Gulf of Mexico. The name 'Whitewater Bay' is fair warning to those who venture into this wilderness. This vast estuary has more open water than anywhere else in the Everglades. Storms from the west generate rough wave action and continually reconfigure islands and sloughs. Venturing into Whitewater Bay without a guide or extensive experience can be deadly. Wildlife abounds in this mangrove wilderness and Whitewater Bay manatees, wood storks, ospreys, bald eagles, anhingas, and several heron and egret species harvest the riches of the Everglades ecosystem.
- Scope and Content:
- Source: Everglades 4
Length of Segment: 00:01:09
Hi, I'm Dr. Jerry Jackson, out with the wild things. Shark Valley in Everglades National Park is hardly a valley, unless we consider that it's the land through which the Shark River flows. For that matter, the Shark River isn't what we normally think of as a river. The hills that define this valley are measured in inches and the river is more of a slough than a river. Shark Valley is in the northern Everglades National Park and is accessible by foot, bicycle or a tram provided by the park service along a loop road from U.S. Highway 41. During wet years, some of the loop road may be flooded. Wading birds abound along the loop road and Shark Valley is place to find a purple gallinule, a chicken-like bird that makes its living by walking, wading and swimming among emergent vegetation in search of insects and other tiny creatures. True to its name, the purple gallinule has spectacular purple plumage. But the real view is from atop the 65-foot observation tower at road's end. The panorama from this tower provides instant meaning for the Everglades description as 'The River of Grass'.
- Scope and Content:
- Source: Everglades 5
Length of Segment: 00:01:11
Hi, I'm Dr. Jerry Jackson, out with the wild things. Along the road from Royal Palm Hammock to Flamingo in Everglades National Park are sun-drenched forests of nearly miniature dimensions. The trees are widely spaced and the sun reaches the river of sawgrass beneath them. Most of the trees are only ten to fifteen feet tall. The tallest may reach 30 feet. These are not young trees growing in an area that suffered some natural or man-made catastrophe. Some of these dwarf cypresses are more than a century old, but they're doing their best in a very hostile environment; their roots are in sand and rock with few nutrients. Dwarf cypresses of the Everglades aren't a unique species, but a growth form of the pond cypress, which itself is considered a growth form of the sometimes 120-foot tall bald cypress of North Florida. The water and fire cycles, nutrients, and soils of their environment shape these different forms of cypress. Here, red-shouldered hawks, fish crows, and other Everglades birds in this miniature forest are brought to near eye-level by the height of their perches.
Record Information
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- Added automatically
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- Resource Identifier:
- FI00900199
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