One of the truly wonderful things about environmental education in Florida is that it includes a large network of centers, zoos, aquariums, and museums, with a relatively small community of colleagues. Thanks to organizations like the League of Environmental Educators of Florida and the Florida Marine Science Educators Association I’ve been able to build and maintain some friendships with other educators across the state and learn tremendously from each places’ variations in approach to teaching styles, program design, and mission.
Two years ago I had the wonderful opportunity to volunteer time with the Environmental Learning Center down in Vero Beach on their lagoon days (field trips into the estuary systems for elementary school children in the local area) and meet Heather Stapleton, their Education Coordinator. The ELC don’t usually participate in rescue or rehabilitation work with Florida wildlife, but during the recent cold snap, it was all hands on deck to assist turtles. Thanks to Heather’s training and permitting through the state to work with sea turtles the ELC’s classrooms became a staging ground full of kiddie pools and cold stunned animals.
A total of 91 turtles came through the center and most were released from January 14 - 16th into area beaches like Sebastian Inlet, Hobe Sound NWR, and Juno Beach. A number of rescued animals showed signs of papilloma virus infections and were sent on to two wildlife centers in Florida equipped to treat the animals for the disease and will (with any luck) be scheduled for release at some point in the future.
As you can imagine, the ELC’s volunteers and staff had quite a wild ride and a few sleepless nights during the staging before releasing animals or sending them on for further treatment. What I love about this story is that it highlights the amazing ability of Florida’s centers - whether they are education, research, or rescue oriented - to come together to fill a tremendous need on behalf of our state’s wildlife.
Like the Clearwater Marine Aquarium and the Marine Science Center I’ve mentioned previously in other cold-stun reports the Environmental Learning Center relies on volunteer hours and memberships to further its mission of environmental education. Obviously their mission is very close to my heart, and even more so since the center suffered a fire in the summer of 2008. They are just now getting close to a grand reopening with a lovely silver lining: they were able to incorporate more green technologies into the new building that were not available (or were out-of-reach-expensive) when the ELC first opened.
If you find yourself in the Vero Beach area at any time do consider dropping into the Center, say howdy to the teaching team, and consider participating in their programs.
I chose a different area to cleanup today along the northern IRL and finally ran across enormous evidence of fish kills that were reported from many of Florida’s coastal waterways following the freeze. On a single 300 ft stretch of beachline (about a football field length) I found 621 dead burrfish, 5 northern pufferfish, 18 mojarra, 1 southern lined seahorse, and 19 adult and juvenile stage horseshoe crabs.
While it’s not uncommon to find a carcass or two of various species while tramping around the shorelines in and among the mangroves the sheer multitude of fish and invertebrate bodies was overwhelming at this spot. I imagine the very low and weak tidal forces at work in this spot, as well as its position in relation to the usual oncoming breezes, brought so many decaying skeletons to this area and kept them here instead of washing back out.
At some places in my shoreline walk the dead burrfish bodies were piled so thickly into the sand that I had to make giant leaps to avoid walking on any of them.
I left the decaying bodies in place but did manage to pick up 24 pounds of debris from the field today. Some of the more interesting finds: flip flops, fifteen feet of rope and an attached styrofoam buoy replete with algae and barnacle growth, a lightbulb, a paring knife, swim goggles, and a car battery (which was so heavy I didn’t include it in the weight total).
On the upside, my rather unusual antics caught the attention of no less than seven locals who all talked to me at various stages in my walk about the state of the lagoon, the amount of trash they see, and the effects of fish kills on their recreational angling. It’s times like these that I wish I was wandering around with business cards, or a nicely logo’d polo shirt, to spread the word about WaterNotes and other water-related projects here in Florida.
There are many hunting techniques recorded for various dolphin species around the world. As opportunistic and inventive hunters, they’ve found ways to corral and catch many different types of prey using strategies that often involve barriers, physical prowess, and outright deception. In Australia one group uses sponges as tools; the females carry sponges over their snouts and lull prey fish out of hiding with a seriously false sense of security.
Using bubble as nets that corral schools of fish into dense clouds is a popular tactic to catch dinner but, off the coast of Florida, at least one pod has foregone the bubble rings in favor of mud. The above video is a great demonstration of these animals’ ability to adapt to their local environment and use it to their advantage.
Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s research institute said today that over 100 manatee carcasses were documented in Florida waters following the cold snap during the first half of January. A full 77 of the deaths are currently attributed to cold stress with several losses of perinatal (or newborn) calves. This count beats last year’s all-time-high loss of ‘tees from cold stress of 56; and it’s only January. Unfortunately this number will rise as more carcasses are pulled in and necropsied so the full impact of the event on the population probably won’t be clear for a few weeks still to come.
While these numbers were more or less expected because of the extraordinary cold it’s always a blow to lose individuals in a relatively small population, even to natural causes and weather events. I can only hope that our red-tide season is a mild one this year and that human-caused problems like watercraft strikes and entanglement are overall lower numbers.
Speaking of entanglement, I spent two hours today out in the lagoon cutting enormous rats nests of monofilament out of shoreline mangroves. The biggest mess I found was roughly the size of a basketball, stuck inbetween black mangrove and Brazilian pepper. Unfortunately I wasn’t going slowly enough and managed to hook myself on rusted barbs embedded in the mess. As a result I had to get a tetanus shot today at the local office. Not exactly the worst experience of my life, but it certainly made me reflect for a moment on the situation entangled animals (fish, waterfowl, pelicans, and manatees alike) find themselves in out in the wild when they run across discarded fishing line.
If you’re an angler be sure to look for the monofilament recycling bins that dot Florida’s coasts. (And learn more: FishingLineRecycling.org)
