Category: Florida

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evolution Florida politics science news

Creationism bill being discussed in Florida Senate

Every year around the US, creationists try to pass bills in state Legislatures either limiting discussion of evolution in classrooms or promoting a strategy called “teaching the controversy.” The latter approach essentially requires science teachers to teach students about both the scientific evidence for evolution and religiously-based philosophy that claims that evolution does not exist (or, alternatively, that some aspects of evolution have occurred, but not others).

Evolution is a fact, backed up by copious amounts of evidence. Natural selection, the modern theory describing how evolution happens, is probably about as well-supported as other scientific theories you may have heard about, such as the theory of gravity or cell theory. Some details of the theory of natural selection are currently being fleshed-out by scientists- a normal and healthy part of the scientific process. There is no debate, however, that natural selection is the best explanation we have today to explain the evidence for evolution that we see all around us. Philosophy and religion can offer no better, evidence-based, explanation of how evolution occurs.

This year, Florida Senate Bill 1854 would require “a thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution.” Sounds reasonable, right? Well, Florida State Science standards already require critical discussion in the science classroom. It turns out that the sponsor of this bill, Senator Stephen Wise, sponsored a bill in 2009 that advocated a “teach the controversy” approach to evolution. That bill failed, so he’s apparently trying to sneak religion into science classrooms again this year.

What does Sen. Wise suggest is a good “critical” alternative to evolution? He won’t say. In interviews by reporters, he calls it “non-evolution” or a “theory of whatever.” (In 2009, he called for teaching “intelligent design,” a Christianity-based philosophy which has legally been ruled religion, not science.) If this bill passes, Florida will be opened up to lawsuits similar to those that have cost other states quite a bit of money. It will also presumably have a chilling effect on the state’s efforts to attract high-tech businesses, such as medical research. Perhaps most importantly, it will teach our students something that just isn’t true. Evolution has occurred, and is occurring, and natural selection is the best explanation we have based on the evidence we have.

Floridians! If the prospect of poor science education, revenue-draining lawsuits, and general philosophical confusion bothers you, then you can sign this petition! One useful feature is that this petition sends an e-mail to your state legislatures when you sign, which helps make a greater impact. Non-Floridians can sign too, but the signatures of FL residents will have greater impact. I also urge you to add comments, as well as just signing. And, pass this on!

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birds environment Florida outdoors

Windley Key Fossil Reef Geological State Park

Windley Key Fossil Reef Geological State Park. …If that isn’t a mouthful of a park name, I don’t know what is. Located on Windley Key (no surprise there) in the Florida Keys, this park has some interesting things to see.

We visited this park in the spring of 2010, on a trip through the Keys. Unfortunately we didn’t take any photos 🙁 so the ones here are from the park website.

Windley Key quarry
Windley Key quarry (FL state Parks)

The central feature of this park is a rock quarry which provided stone for the Keys Overseas Railroad, and was used until the 1960s. The “fossil reef” part of the title comes from the limestone rock, formed by fossilized coral. There are two big quarries in the park, and you can walk along the walls looking at fossilized shells and coral, finding some neat stuff. One of the highlights was a huge fossil brain coral. Pretty cool.

Fossils in rock
Fossil coral in limestone. The vertical lines were made by machinery. (FL State Parks)

On the day we stopped at the park it was hot. We got there after the visitor’s center had closed early for some reason, but fortunately the hiking trail (and water fountain) was open. There are a few connected trails you can take- you can circumnavigate the quarry walls, and also make your way through the tropical hardwood hammock- for about a mile and a half of walking. There are a number of markers describing different plant species along the route- plants here are quite different from those around Orlando, so many of these species were new to us. The shade in the hammock was a welcome relief from the blazing sun.

Hardwood hammock
Hardwood hammock. Yay, shade! (FL State Parks)

Windley Key Park is a listed stop on the Great Florida Birding Trail, and the possible combination of White-crowned pigeons (a big dark pigeon with a white ‘scalp’) and fossils was just too interesting to pass up. I was really excited to see a few of the pigeons there- they’re pretty rare, and found in the US only in the Keys. Little did I know they would be flying overhead all the time in Key West… But they were a new species for me at this point. One of the main reasons they’re threatened in the Keys is that they need both mangrove forest and hardwood hammock (a drier type of forest) to eat and nest in- both of these types of forest are disappearing in Florida as development continues in coastal areas.

White-crowned pigeon
White-crowned pigeon (Great FL Birding Trail)

Other than the pigeons, we saw magnificent frigatebirds, mourning doves, northern mockingbirds, common grackles, a great crested flycatcher, and a mangrove cuckoo (also a first for me!). Given the heat of the day, it’s not a very impressive list, but seeing two new species, plus some cool fossils, was pretty nifty.

Categories
environment Florida outdoors politics

Florida state parks safe- for now?

This (mostly) good news update comes from Florida Audubon. Apparently, state budget cuts will be directed in a way that does not mean closing the 53 parks previously targeted for closure.

However, that doesn’t mean there won’t be massive cuts to funds for managing public lands. There’s a massive budget shortfall to make up for, and the governor and legislature want to cut corporate property taxes on top of that (FL noes not have a personal income tax, so property taxes essentially fund state government). So that means big cuts to schools, social services, land management, environmental protection, etc.

With that in mind, I’ll try to keep posting about the Florida parks on that closure list, if only to get the word out that they’re there to visit. Here’s a soothing photo of Lignumvitae Key Botanical State Park, which I haven’t been to: it’s in the Keys, and you need a boat to get to it. Maybe something to combine with the ever-elusive spring birding in the Dry Tortugas trip some year…

Lignumvitae Key (FL Parks)
Categories
environment Florida outdoors

Estero Bay Preserve State Park: one of 53

Estero Bay Preserve State Park is one of 53 Florida State Parks proposed for closure in order to overcome budget shortfalls this year. This is one of very few Florida state parks centered on an aquatic area- in this case, Estero Bay, located just south of the massive sprawl of Cape Coral/Fort Myers in Southwest Florida. This part of the state is one of the current foreclosure capitals of the nation; abandoned homes and half-planned developments now blight the landscape here. Estero Bay Preserve is one of a handful of protected areas in the region.

Map of Estero Bay (FL Parks)

I’ve never been into the hiking trails of the preserve, which run through a variety of habitats and provide homes to venerable gopher tortoises, delicate orchids, powerful bald eagles, and many other species. I’ve also never gone kayaking among the sheltering mangrove islands, sturdy oyster reefs, and prehistoric Native American shell middens of the bay. However, I have been birding along the protected shoreline.

Sunset over Estero Scrub (Photo: FL Parks)

In December of 2007, we went for a walk along the beach at Estero Bay. As I recall, the tide was pretty low, so the exposed mudflats and sand were attracting a wide array of bird life despite the beach’s popularity with people. There were no doubt munching manatees and frolicking dolphins in the area, as well as a bunch of other species that we just didn’t see. For example, we saw a bunch of these critters hanging around in the shallow water- I think it’s a sea cucumber, but maybe someone else will be able to I.D. it:

Sea cucumber?

As we walked along the mudflats and through the shallow water, we watched out for stingrays and broken shells. I found a dying man-o-war (which we stayed a respectful distance away from) and Yan found several living sand dollars (which we left to do their thing).

My eBird list for the day records that I saw 21 species. Nothing too rare, given the type of habitat, but a fair variety of species:  wood storks soaring overhead, Wilson’s plovers dashing on the sand, reddish egrets dancing for fish, short-billed dowitchers poking for worms, and so on. If we’d visited in the early morning, before the arrival of swimmers, there probably would have been many more birds to see. There were a fair number of fishermen, as well as swimmers:

Little blue heron & snowy egret watching the fishermen.

This estuary is a rich habitat for many different species, and provides a wealth of recreational opportunities for local residents and visitors alike. I’d assume that “closing” this park would mean closing the interpretive parts of the park, the kayak rentals, and access to trails, while keeping the aquatic areas open for boating and fishing. Unfortunately, this would deprive visitors of the context by which to understand the history and ecology of the area. It will still be a rich natural resource, but our understanding of it will be shallower. And just that much poorer.

Categories
environment Florida outdoors politics

Florida government proposes closing 53 state parks

In an effort to cut the massively-in-the-red state budget, the Florida legislature has ordered state agencies to target their programs for a 15% across the board spending cut. For the Department of Environmental Protection, the agency tasked with…well, protecting the environment, this has resulted in a proposal to close 53 state parks.

Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek Preserve may be closed (photo: DEP).

As the link above suggests, while these parks tend to be smaller and less-visited (parks with camping facilities are absolutely swamped with visitors pretty much all rear round- no pun really intended but hard to avoid), they’re often the economic engines for poor, rural communities. They are also places where Florida residents-many of them recent immigrants into the state-and visitors can learn about the unique history and ecology of the state. Many of the parks proposed for closure contain lesser-known archeological sites, or threatened and endangered species. Without maintenance, these sites could easily be overrun by weedy invasive species or perhaps looted for artifacts (a definite possibility, in the challenging economy).

Florida Audubon is organizing a Facebook campaign to get park users to share their stories about the parks which are proposed to be closed. I’ll also write about my experiences at some of them on this blog. Meanwhile, here’s a list of the parks:

  • Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek Preserve State Park, Haines City
  • Atlantic Ridge Preserve State Park, Stuart
  • Big Shoals State Park, White Springs
  • Bulow Plantation Ruins Historic State Park, Flagler Beach
  • Camp Helen State Park, Panama City Beach
  • Cedar Key State Museum State Park, Cedar Key
  • Colt Creek State Park, Lakeland
  • Constitution Convention Museum State Park, Port St. Joe
  • Crystal River Archaeological State Park, Crystal River
  • Dade Battlefield Historic State Park, Bushnell
  • Dagny Johsnon Key Largo Hammock Botanical State Park, Key Largo
  • Deer Lake State Park, Santa Rosa Beach
  • Devil’s Millhopper Geological State Park, Gainesville
  • Don Pedro Island State Park, Boca Granda
  • Dudley Farm Historic State Park, Newberry
  • Dunn’s Creek State Park, Pomona
  • Estero Bay Preserve State Park, Estero
  • Fort Cooper State Park, Inverness
  • Fort George Island Cultural State Park, Jacksonville
  • Fort Mose Historic State Park, St. Augustine
  • John Gorrie Museum State Park, Apalachicola
  • Judah P. Benjamin Confederate Memorial at Gamble Plantation Historic State Park, Ellenton
  • Lake Jackson Mounds Archaeological State Park, Tallahassee
  • Lake June-in-Winter Scrub State Park, Sebring
  • Lake Talquin State Park, Tallahassee
  • Letchworth-Love Mounds Archaeological State Park, Tallahassee
  • Lignumvitae Key Botanical State Park, Islamorada
  • Madison Blue Spring State Park, Lee
  • Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Historic State Park, Cross Creek
  • Natural Bridge Battlefield Historic State Park, Woodville
  • Olustee Battlefield Historic State Park, Olustee
  • Orman House Historic State Park, Apalachicola
  • Paynes Creek Historic State Park, Bowling Green
  • Peacock Springs State Park, Luraville
  • Perdido Key State Park, Pensacola
  • Ponce de Leon Springs State Park, Ponce de Leon
  • Pumpkin Hill Creek Preserve State Park, Jacksonville
  • Rock Springs Run State Reserve, Sorrento
  • San Felasco Hammock Preserve State Park, Alachua
  • San Marcos de Apalache Historic State Park, St. Marks
  • Savannas Preserve State Park, Jensen Beach
  • St. Lucie Inlet Preserve State Park, Stuart
  • St. Sebastian River Preserve State Park, Fellsmere
  • Suwannee River Wilderness Trail/Nature and Heritage Tourism Center, White Springs
  • Terra Ceia Preserve State Park, Palmetto
  • The Barnacle Historic State Park, Coconut Grove
  • Troy Spring State Park, Branford
  • Wacasassa Bay Preserve State Park, Cedar Key
  • Washington Oaks Gardens State Park, Palm Coast
  • Werner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park, Port Richey
  • Windley Key Fossil Reef Geological State Park, Islamorada
  • Ybor City Museum State Park, Tampa
  • Yellow River Marsh Preserve State Park, Holt
Categories
birds Florida outdoors

Hiking Paynes Prairie Preserve

It’s been a while since I posted, so I thought I should try to get something up here… I did pass my first candidacy exam (yay!), and am getting ready for exam #2 right now (on the public understanding of science material I blogged about earlier). I’ve also started to working on my reading for my last reading list, so I’ll be starting to post those summaries shortly.

For now, I’ll mention my excursion last weekend to Gainesville, to Paynes Prairie Preserve. This is a state park with a wide range of habitat, including oak uplands, pine flatwoods, and the eponymous prairie. Which was actually quite shrubby, rather than grassy, which surprised me. I was mainly three looking for birds, and the visibility was really limited by the head-height vegetation. But there were definitely a lot of birds around. Overall, it was a great day- not too hot, sunny but shady in the woods, and a light breeze.

I hiked on two trails: Cone’s Dike and Bolen Bluffs. Cone’s Dike goes through oak forest before heading onto the prairie proper. I did see a lot of birds, and a few deer. Bolen Bluff heads through similar habitat (though the different types of oaks), and terminates at an observation deck (more on that later).

Paynes Prairie is known for its feral horses, supposedly descended from Ponce DeLeon’s expedition to find the Fountain of Youth. In reality, they’re escaped from more recent ranchers. I did run into three of them- two mares and a half-grown foal. I was a little leery of approaching them closely, but other people were going right up to them taking photos. I will say that the ground contained copious evidence of horse passage (and also bobcat territory marking), which was pretty evident given that we have not been getting much rain lately. Yes, there was a lot of poo lying around.

In terms of birds, I saw a flock of turkeys, and a number of raptors (including a sharp-shinned hawk being mobbed by blue jays, bald eagles, red-shouldered hawk, and northern harrier). There were also a number of wood storks, some sandhill cranes calling, and a bunch of smaller species. I also saw a baby (pencil-sized) ribbon snake, and a more intimidating cottonmouth who was extremely casual about moving off the trail when it saw me.

from Wikipedia

The only jarring note was running into some UF students (or so I assumed from their Gator-themed clothing) having sex on the observation platform. I must assume they were there in order to be seen, because after all they were on top of a platform on a prairie. I must say that I’ve never run into people having sex in public while hiking before, and didn’t expect it in that visible of a spot- and the destination of the trail. I also wouldn’t have expected them to notice me, confer for a moment, then just keep on going (more loudly). Given that I was hiking alone, I wasn’t sure how to react, and just ended up walking back the way I came.

That episode made me think about the intimidation inherent in that sort of exhibitionism- it’s not like they were in a tent at night or in a really secluded area, so presumably they wanted to be seen, and were expecting not to be confronted about their activities. Or maybe they wanted a confrontation? Alternatively, they might get their kicks out of asserting their right to do whatever they want to wherever they want to, while sending a big “fuck you” to other people trying to use a public park. Would they have stopped if I had been a man? Or if I had been in a group? What if there had been a family with kids? What if I’d pulled out a camera and started taking pictures?

At any rate, it definitely made me conscious of my status as a woman hiking alone- not as scarily as if I’d been in a more secluded location, but enough to really be upsetting. Granted, there are much more dangerous situations to encounter while hiking while female, but this was plenty troubling. Confronting them wasn’t really a good option, but neither was waiting them to finish up before using the viewing platform to look for birds. So I turned around and walked away. A frankly shitty end to what had otherwise been a good day of hiking.

Categories
birds Florida outdoors

Hiking Econlockhatchee Sandhills

Today, we went on our first hike of the semester. Yes, the semester is halfway over, so it is a sad commentary on our general busyness level… We decided to check out a newish trail (at least new to us), the Econlockhatchee Sandhill Conservation Area. It’s located east of UCF, in unincorporated Orange County, near the intersection of Lake Pickett and Tanner Rds.

It’s now in the low 80’s, so great hiking weather. This hike would have been pretty brutal in the shadeless spots in the summer- it’s partly shaded. The conservation area includes patches of sandhill scrub, pine flatwoods, and some riparian forest (though the trail doesn’t take you to the river). There were some nice open oak woodland areas with lichen on the ground, and some cool old snags that I bet would make great hawk perches (didn’t see any, though).

The trail goes through mixed pine and oak forest, then cuts through a treeless area, before getting back into the patchy pines and oaks for the long loop. There were several types of oak trees, some pines, and a wider variety of trees near the entrance. Since it was about 1 pm, there wasn’t a lot of wildlife up and about, but we did hear what we assume were a bunch of armadillos trundling through the saw palmettos. We did see a few birds- I’ll put my list at the end of this post. There were raccoon and armadillo tracks- didn’t see deer tracks, though they are definitely around.And more butterflies than I expected to see, including a bunch of nice looking swallowtails.

The trail was well-marked, and there were a number of old roads that you could probably take in addition to the trail. If you wanted to get to the river, these roads are probably your best bet. Overall, it was nice to just get out and enjoy the day.

Birds: black vultures, turkey vultures, red-shouldered hawk (heard), turkeys (heard), 2 falcons (probably peregrine, but way overhead), Carolina wren, eastern phoebe, tufted titmice (2 noisy flocks), mockingbirds, American robin, Northern cardinal, blue-gray gnatcatchers, downy woodpecker, red-bellied woodpeckers, palm warblers, prairie warbler, black & white warbler, possible brown thrasher