The Everglades - gators, more gators and a touch of the past!

This is the left side of the map below
















The right side is below. 






To have shown one map, both parts side by side, would have made the whole visual too small.

this is the map given by the motel which details out the nearby areas.

I wanted to go to the Amazon only but my then acquaintance (and now friend) Commodore A B L Gupta, (I.N. Retd.) was very keen to see the Everglades and Cape Canaveral after the Amazon trip. So, as he had accommodated me, this was a quid pro quo on my part as I felt travelling companions always adjust their needs and I had achieved one of my bucket list destinations!!

Frankly, after the majesty of the Amazon, everything else is insignificant if one goes to see forests and jungles. However, here we were from Miami, in our Toyota Altima en route to see the Glades.  The distance from Miami to Everglades City is 79.4 miles. My Garmin worked beautifully taking us out of the danger zone of the airport’s spaghetti circles onto a straight stretch of road for 60 miles.

There are many confusing aspects of the Glades. The park encompasses 1.5 million acres of tropical and subtropical habitat with a truly diverse ecosystem.  There are the multiple entrances. There is the vast distance one has to travel back and forth on a one way system due to the waterways and fixed traffic routes. There are the tremendously different, always well promoted, scenic points and rides / exhibits spread all over at various places.  So the only way was to fix oneself in one place as we were not spending weeks there and be selective. We chose Everglades City Motel as our base – a wise decision as the rooms are spacious, all the mod cons supplied, excellent house cleaning & laundry everyday and the restaurant / diner next door provided solid breakfasts / meals.

                  In parts of this blog, I will quote various aspects from different sources as there is no point in reinventing the wheel.

“Origin of the word

The first written record of the Everglades was on Spanish maps made by cartographers who had not seen the land. They named the unknown area between the Gulf and Atlantic coasts of Florida Laguna del Espíritu Santo ("Lake of the Holy Spirit") The area was featured on maps for decades without having been explored. Writer John Grant Forbes stated in 1811, "The Indians represent [the Southern points] as impenetrable; and the [British] surveyors, wreckers, and coasters, had not the means of exploring beyond the borders of the sea coast, and the mouths of rivers". A British surveyor John Gerard de Brahm, who mapped the coast of Florida in 1773, called the area "River Glades". Both Marjory Stoneman Douglas and linguist Wallace McMullen suggest that cartographers substituted "Ever" for "River". The name "Everglades" first appeared on a map in 1823, although it was also spelled as "Ever Glades" as late as 1851. The Seminole call it Pa-hay-okee, meaning "Grassy Water."^[4] The region was labelled "Pa-hai-okee" on an American military map from 1839, although it had earlier been called "Ever Glades" throughout the Second Seminole War. A 2007 survey by geographers Ary J. Lamme and Raymond K. Oldakowski found that the "Glades" has emerged as a distinct vernacular region of Florida. It comprises the interior areas and southernmost Gulf Coast of South Florida, largely corresponding to the Everglades itself. It is one of the most sparsely populated areas of the state.”

"THE PARK HAS FOUR VISITOR CENTERS:

Ernest Coe Visitor Center, Homestead, +1 305-242-7700. Nov-Apr: 8AM-5PM; May-Oct: 9AM-5PM. Open year round, this center offers educational displays, orientation films, informational brochures and a series of walking trails a short drive away. A bookstore sells film, postcards, and insect repellent. Restrooms.

Flamingo Visitor Center, Flamingo, +1 239-695-2945. Generally open from 8:30AM-5PM from mid-November to mid-April. Summer hours are intermittent and subject to change. Educational displays, informational brochures, backcountry permits and restrooms. Public boat ramps are also located nearby. Several hiking and canoeing trails begin nearby. 
Shark Valley Visitor Center, Highway 41 (Tamiami Trail) (25 miles west of the Florida Turnpike exit for S.W. 8th Street), Phone: 305-221-8776. Daily 8:45AM-5:15PM in winter, 9:15AM-5:15PM in summer. Hours subject to change. In the heart of the "River of Grass", with educational displays, informational brochures, and guided tram tours. Bicycles may be rented at the center. Books, postcards, film, insect repellent, and other items are available for sale. Vending machines dispense snacks and soft drinks. Restrooms.
Gulf Coast Visitor Center, Everglades City, +1 239-695-3311. Daily, 8AM-4:30PM in winter; 9AM-4:30PM in summer. The gateway for exploring the Ten Thousand Islands, a maze of mangrove islands and waterways that extends to Flamingo and Florida Bay. Offers educational displays, orientation films, informational brochures, boat tours and canoe rentals. Backcountry permits available. Restaurants, stores, lodging and campgrounds are nearby. Restrooms". 

Out of these, the nearest to us was Shark Valley Visitor Center. There was a large crowd of tourists, all applying anti mosquito sprays on themselves. We filled up two trams and Robert the guide was competent. Within ten minutes, we saw our first crocodile. I must point out that I use that term freely as I cant differentiate between a gator and a croc. They both have similar vicious teeth and facial / body features. Robert said that to check the length of an alligator is to measure the distance between the eyes and the nostrils. 6” = one foot. I wasn’t going checking lengths anyway, so no sweat.

You get excellent clear views either side or even across the aisle.

Alligators after reaching max length will then grow round the girth... like humans?

Robert said the Everglades is the 3^rd largest national reserve after Death Valley Nevada and Yellowstone.  The Florida Everglades are home to a diverse array of wildlife within the park’s five different habitats: the Hammock, Mangrove, Pineland, Sawgrass, and Slough. Everglades animals include tree frogs, alligators, the American crocodile, manatee, Key deer, otters, and the Florida panther. The park is located along avian migratory routes, so birding is also a popular activity.  Flamingo Park Florida is the only place where alligators and crocodiles co exist. 

The tropical climate means that there are two primary seasons in the Florida Everglades: wet and dry. From December to April, the dry season brings low humidity and mild temperatures from 53°F to 77°F. This is peak tourist season because the water levels are lower and the animals congregate in central water locations. The wet season lasts from May through November. Temperatures during this time of year can exceed 90°F. Humidity levels are higher and it rains the majority of the time. The land we stood on is 2.5 ft underwater in the wet season.

the Black Throated Ahinga which we had seen in the Amazon

“The Everglades are a natural region of tropical wetlands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large watershed. The system begins near Orlando with the Kissimmee River, which discharges into the vast but shallow Lake Okeechobee. Water leaving the lake in the wet season forms a slow-moving river 60 miles (97 km) wide and over 100 miles (160 km) long, flowing southward across a limestone shelf to Florida Bay at the southern end of the state. The Everglades are shaped by water and fire, experiencing frequent flooding in the wet season and drought in the dry season. Writer Marjory Stoneman Douglas popularized the term "River of Grass" to describe the sawgrass marshes, part of a complex system of interdependent ecosystems that include cypress swamps, the estuarine mangrove forests of the Ten Thousand Islands, tropical hardwood hammocks, pine rockland, and the marine environment of Florida Bay.

Unlike any other wetland system on earth, the Everglades are sustained primarily by the atmosphere. Evapotranspiration — the sum of evaporation and plant transpiration from the Earth's land surface to atmosphere—associated with thunderstorms, is the key mechanism by which water leaves the region. During a year unaffected by drought, the rate may reach 40 inches (100 cm) a year. When droughts take place, the rate may peak at over 50 inches (130 cm), and exceed the amount of rainfall. As water leaves an area through evaporation from groundwater or from plant matter, activated primarily by solar energy, it is then moved by wind patterns to other areas that border or flow into the Everglades watershed system. Evapotranspiration is responsible for approximately 70–90 percent of water entering undeveloped wetland regions in the Everglades.i find this fascinating as I never knew about it.

Sawgrass thrives in the slowly moving water, but may die in unusually deep floods if oxygen is unable to reach its roots. It is particularly vulnerable immediately after a fire. The hydro period for the marsh is at least nine months, and can last longer.  Where sawgrass grows densely, few animals or other plants live, although alligators choose these locations for nesting. Where there is more room, periphyton grows. Periphyton supports larval insects and amphibians, which in turn are consumed as food by birds, fish, and reptiles. It also absorbs calcium from water, which adds to the calcitic composition of the marl.

Sloughs, or free-flowing channels of water, develop in between sawgrass prairies. Sloughs are about 3 feet (0.91 m) deeper than sawgrass marshes, and may stay flooded for at least 11 months out of the year and sometimes multiple years in a row. 

Aquatic animals such as turtles, alligators, snakes, and fish thrive in sloughs; they usually feed on aquatic invertebrates"

The Observation Post gives a great view of the area. Its 30 ft tall and you climb it thru a gentle curve. A similar post exists at Klingsman dome in the Smokies where we had been but not climbed. When you look out from top of the Post’s sightseeing point, imagine people living here in the past. People once did. Prehistoric tribes lived here. Centuries before Europeans first saw the Everglades, Calusa Indians lived on the islands and used the waterways of this area. The Calusa lived with the tidal rhythms of the Ten Thousand Islands.

The Calusa developed a complex social system and built an impressive canal and earthworks. Shells were piled into mounds creating dry ground amidst the watery environment. Apparently the Chokoloskee and Sandfly islands were originally sand mounts.

By the mid 1830’s the Calusa had disappeared. Nobody knows where they went but it’s presumed that contact and disease from foreigners, who invaded this area, led to their extinction. Three hundred years after the first Spaniards arrived; the culture of South Florida’s original peoples was gone. However, in the 1800’s Seminole and Miccosukee tribes arrived in this area.

You may notice small islands of hardwood trees which were locally called ‘hammocks’. These rise a few feet above ground level in the Glades. These were crucial for survival of the new settlers as they provided habitat for deer, an environment suitable for fruits and dry ground for homes, hunting camps and slash & burn cultivation. Sawgrass thrives in the slowly moving water, but may die in unusually deep floods if oxygen is unable to reach its roots. It is particularly vulnerable immediately after a fire. The hydro period for the marsh is at least nine months, and can last longer.  Where sawgrass grows densely, few animals or other plants live, although gators choose these locations for nesting. Where there is more room, periphyton grows. Periphyton supports larval insects and amphibians, which in turn are consumed as food by birds, fish, and reptiles. It also absorbs calcium from water, which adds to the calcitic composition of the marl.

In the 1900’s, development in Florida included diversion of water from the Everglades. Migrants to the region who wanted to develop plantations first proposed draining the Everglades in 1848, but no work began till 1882. Canals were constructed throughout the first half of the 20th century prompting land development. Problems with canals and floods caused by hurricanes forced engineers to rethink their drainage plans. 1,400 miles (2,300 km) of canals, levees, and water control devices were built. The Miami metropolitan area grew substantially at this time and Everglades’s water was diverted to cities. Portions of the Everglades were transformed into farmland, where the primary crop was sugarcane. Approximately 50 percent of the original Everglades have been developed as agricultural or urban areas.

 This radically altered the lifestyle of the Indian tribes residing here.  The tribes navigated Kaa-ha-yat-le (the Miccosukee meaning of Everglades) in shallow hand carved dugouts. The hammocks served as navigational landmarks for them in this otherwise colourless flat landscape.

Many of these Seminole and Miccosukee tribes reside today along the Tamiami Trail. The construction of the Tamiami Trail, beginning in 1928 and spanning the region from Tampa to Miami, altered their ways of life. Some began to work in local farms, ranches, and souvenir stands. Some of the people who interacted more with European Americans began to move to reservations in the 1940s. People who kept more traditional ways had settlements along the Tamiami Trail tend to speak the Mikasuki language. They later were federally recognized in 1957 as the Seminole Tribe of Florida and in 1962 as the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida.

The Great Blue Heron seen eating the fish

There are many activities for the visitor – airboat and motor boat tours, canoe, eco and tram tours, hiking, fishing, alligator hunting, bird watching. As Everglades City is 35 miles southeast of Naples and 83 miles west of Miami, many visitors choose to explore this western entrance to Everglades National Park, located off the Tamiami Trail, on S.R. 29. An annual seafood festival held the first weekend in February is a major event that draws hordes of people. Everglades City (the gateway to the Ten Thousand Islands), where the 'Glades meet the Gulf of Mexico, is the closest thing you'll get to civilization in South Florida's swampy frontier.

There are 60,000 alligators in Everglades today

My notes on the airboats needs to be a separate blog as its so exciting

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