Enemies of the Everglades
King, Terry Johnson
ENEMIES OF THE EVERGLADES by TERRY JOHNSON KING Some two and one half million acres at the southern tip of Florida comprise the Florida Everglades — a sprawling coffee-colored river of grass that...
...He could not add that number of new ones, for Park funds were severely cut during the Johnson Administration and have not been restored...
...Everything seemed an enemy...
...Allen Ellender, Louisiana Democrat, refused to require the Army Engineers to live up to a 1968 pact with the National Park Service to give the Everglades prior rights during flood control periods...
...Not the half-million Australian pines...
...You're not supposed to hang anything from the vegetation...
...Alligators lie sleepily in the sloughs, and tarpon, dolphin, manatees, and bonefish are found in the surrounding bays and canals...
...Included in the wildlife of the 'Glades are the last known roseate spoonbills, some 500 of them, which nest near the Flamingo Visitor Center...
...Environment-conscious pilot William Guthrie had been fired by Eastern Airlines for refusing to burn off excess fuel in the air, as is the Port Authority procedure...
...The snowy egret—nearly killed off decades back by hunters of plumes for ladies' hats—flourishes along the Anhinga Trail...
...Fire, of course, is the scourge of the Everglades in dry times...
...Another adverse factor is the upsetting of the ecology as hot water from the Turkey Point power plant is dumped into the 'Glades...
...So I was the enemy at that point...
...Of all the types of pollution, the pesticides—a residual from the whole state, as well as those used in the private in-Park areas—are the worst...
...1 had tied two half-hitches in a nylon rope, and slung a hammock in the last primitive frontier...
...Not the hyacinths...
...Not the jet-port builders...
...As my hammock moved in a gentle wind, I began glancing through the stack of resource material I had brought with me...
...Dade and Collier Counties, within whose borders the Everglades falls, decided to build a regional jet airport in the heart of the area...
...The pesticides "have imposed a 'sentence of death4 on the 'Glades...
...I leafed through more pamphlets and clippings, all of which seemed to spell doom for this lovely area...
...She, with Ian Glass, wrote the article, "Cuban Caper," in the February, 1969 issue of The Progressive...
...I found that the most obvious problem—the people who leave behind them a silent trail of styrofoam bits, throwaway bottles, aluminum beer cans, and plastic jugs—is not the most serious...
...After a bitter fight the U.S...
...The Australian pines, in which I was securely swinging, are getting out of hand...
...While it is still, however, a primitive frontier, I welcomed the opportunity to hide myself in its pine scrub and saw-grass while researching the problems of the 'Glades...
...Poachers, both frog and alligator, are such a problem that Secretary of the Interior Walter J. Hickel in 1970 began an anti-poacher crusade by transferring ten rangers from other parks to the Everglades...
...Some University of Miami faculty members are so opposed to the school's stand that they boycotted, as hypocritical, a recent "Save the Everglades Conference" co-sponsored by the University with the Flood Control District of South Florida...
...As I extracted more research material from my briefcase, I watched some of the 135 "rare and endangered" species of birds and wildlife that populate the 'Glades...
...Clotheslines were strung, barbecues were going...
...Not Turkey Point...
...Except when they set fires, their tracks can be cleaned up by garbage men...
...I went back to my reading...
...We have found no way to check the spread of hydrilla," says Florida state agricultural specialist Robert Blackburn...
...Many of them were nearly decimated by the diversion of water during the last drought, and many are dying now as the water level from drainage projects threatens to drown all but the strongest deer...
...The salt water intrusion that results from tampering with the water table has hurt many plants, too, as has the backwash from raw sewage which all of South Florida pumps into the water...
...Instead, they sold the oil rights to Triton Oil and Gas Corporation, of Dallas, Texas, which is drilling for oil...
...Interior Department blocked the use of the strip for commercial carriers and decreed it could only be used for training flights...
...And other parts of the 'Glades are still being eyed as an alternative jetport site...
...When conservationists accused officials of a reckless disregard for the ecology, pointing out that rare nesting and breeding grounds would be destroyed and the balance of nature upset, Port Authority Director Alan Stewart called them "butterfly chasers" out looking for "yellow-bellied sapsuckers...
...Conservationists say that if the drillers find the black gold, it will be another blow to the primitive areas, with attendant commercialism and pollution...
...Instead, he had it drained before take-off...
...Occasionally the nearly-extinct bald eagle imperiously wheels overhead...
...They have imposed a "sentence of death" on the 'Glades, according to Florida State University biologist Robert Harris: "The Everglades are going to be gone, whether it's the year 2000 or 2100...
...I'm sorry, ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to move...
...But almost as if they resent the presence of such a natural preserve, industries and bureaucrats—and even University of Miami trustees—are pushing this beautiful wilderness toward eventual destruction...
...Just about every known palm and pine tree can be found in the 'Glades...
...So pines, the lovely, friendly Australian pines, were an enemy too, I brooded...
...Thirty miles away in Miami, motorists—their eyes burning from smoke that hangs low over the expressways—accept with appalling equanimity the theory that the long-burning flames are inevitable, unaware that they need not be, given a fair and intelligent distribution of water...
...ENEMIES OF THE EVERGLADES by TERRY JOHNSON KING Some two and one half million acres at the southern tip of Florida comprise the Florida Everglades — a sprawling coffee-colored river of grass that is part swamp and part prairie...
...My reverie was interruped by a polite, sympathetic ranger...
...I looked forward to gazing up through a still-unpolluted atmosphere at a starlit sky, from the simplicity of a hammock slung between two Everglades trees...
...The malaleucas trees, which defy fire, herbicides, the ax, and hurricanes, threaten to crowd out other plants...
...Even so, as my hammock swayed gently from the pines I was conscious of kerosene trails overhead: Big jets were winging their way somewhere, dropping their residue as they climbed...
...What should be a natural flow of water in the Everglades is either diverted for farmers during the dry periods—done at the insistence of the powerful Water Users' Association, made up of farm conglomerates—or increased when other areas need drainage for development...
...Along their banks roam the last of the Florida black bears and bobcats...
...At a closed-door hearing in early 1970, Senator TERRY JOHNSON KING is a staff writer for The Miami News...
...One other pollutant was a near-miss...
...It's because of your hammock...
...Five hundred yards from me (I had slung the hammock in a stand of pines, away from the campground) more than 100 trailers and campers—most from out of state—were parked, their owners finding out what this part of Florida is all about...
...The Army attorney, Robert Jordan III, denied there had ever been any agreement, to the astonishment of Park representatives...
...Not the engineers who took the water away and then gave too much back...
...Were they aware that all this was in peril...
...One of these preserves is owned by the University of Miami, whose trustees have been implored to merge it with the Park...
...We have no reason to believe it won't become established in Everglades National Park...
...There are one-half million of them, crowding out other plants on higher ground, and on beaches they present barriers to the big sea turtles when they come ashore to lay eggs...
...Ranger James Raftery, in charge of the National Park portion, reckons positive action to save the area must be taken—"for if we sit passively and leave it up to our children, it won't be there...
...I read that this unpeopled area is whipsawed whether there is drought, as there was five years ago, or too much water, as there is today...
...The Everglades are going to be gone, whether it's the year 2000 or 2100...
...I would blend into a landscape not yet permanently scarred as I explored the tentacles that encroach...
...About half of this unique subtropical wilderness has been set aside as a National Park...
...One of the difficulties in catching poachers is that the area is studded with private land, even within the National Park boundaries: if the thief can make it to a private preserve, the 'Feds' can't touch him...
...Not the Texas oil drillers...
...Even some of the vegetation: Water hyacinths, despite a strong riddance program, were taking over streams and canals, a newcomer—hydrilla-verti-cileata, a water plant from India which chokes all other vegetation around it—is being discovered...
Vol. 35 • March 1971 • No. 3
