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BIG CYPRESS

Workers allowed to haul dirt from planned Everglades project
ERIC STAATS /Naples Daily News /April 27, 2005
The dirt already has been mined from a 160-acre homestead that the state Department of Environmental Protection bought earlier this month from landowner Jesse Hardy after years of high-profile negotiations. ...

Man who used goat as bait for panther gets suspended sentence
CHRIS W. COLBY /Naples Daily News /April 26, 2005
It was clear as Jan Jacobson pleaded to the judge for mercy Monday that he thought he was helping when he tied the goat to a pole, allowing it to be attacked by a panther marauding around the campground. The panther had already plundered 14 goats and two emus at Trail Lakes in Ochopee. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission wouldn't act. ...

Hardy off the hook with code enforcers
ERIC STAATS /Naples Daily News /April 23, 2005
The end of Jesse Hardy's fight to stay on his land in Southern Golden Gate Estates means Hardy is off the hook with Collier County code enforcers. Collier County is dropping its code enforcement case against Hardy now that the state of Florida owns Hardy's 160-acre homestead, said Code Enforcement Director Michelle Arnold. ...

County receives grant to clean Naples Bay
Unknown /NBC2 News /April 26, 2005
"My goal is to have people fishing at the city dock in five years and feel comfortable eating those fish and in ten years for people to swim in Naples Bay," said Bauer.http://www.nbc-2.com/articles/readarticle.asp?articleid=3163&z=3&p= ...

Agency admits faulty data on panthers
JOHN HEILPRIN /AP /April 2005
The Fish and Wildlife Service agreed Monday with a whistle-blower’s complaint that it bungled some of the science used in protecting Florida’s endangered panthers. The agency conceded it violated the Data Quality Act of 2000 in three instances by issuing documents based on faulty assumptions about the habitat of one of the world’s rarest animals. That conclusion, based on a review by senior Interi ...

Saving woodpeckers on minds of lawmakers
Eric Staats /Naples Daily News /April 27, 2005
A new way to preserve nature in Collier County will get a closer look, but a debate is looming about who will do the looking. County commissioners Tuesday voted 5-0 to create a committee to review the idea of a Habitat Conservation Plan for red-cockaded woodpeckers, which experts say are struggling along the edge of the county's urban area as growth pushes eastward past Collier Boulevard. ...

Researcher to study Henderson Creek springs
Cathy Zollo /Naples Daily News /May 1, 2005
Not even the people who live a few feet away knew they were there. Easily hidden by the slightest water movement, the gentle ripples from freshwater springs in and near Henderson Creek were easy to miss. Residents who live nearby the creek in southwest Collier County and adjacent to Rookery Bay knew manatee use the canals and little back lagoons for birthing areas. ...

Ivory-Bill Sighting A Reality Check
Frank Sargent /TBO /May 1, 2005
The giant bird was declared extinct some 60 years ago, but for the past year at least one survivor has been flickering in and out of the cypress swamps of Arkansas and Louisiana. There have been six sightings, according to a report in The Washington Post, and a kayaker's video of a flying ivory-bill in Cache River National Wildlife Refuge was aired on national television last week. ...

A Bellwether of the Wild, the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker
Thomas Maugh /Yahoo /April 29, 2005
Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton called the find an exciting opportunity. "Second chances to save wildlife once thought to be extinct are rare," she said at a Thursday news conference where she announced $10 million in new funds to bolster restoration of the Big Woods of eastern Arkansas, where the bird was spotted. ...

SOUTHWEST COAST

'Dead zone' area in Gulf could be increasing, researchers say Public release
Keith Randall /Texas A&M /26-Apr-2005
The "dead zone" area of the Gulf of Mexico – a region that annually suffers from low oxygen which can result in huge marine life losses – has appeared much earlier this year, meaning it could be potentially larger in 2005 and affect marine life more adversely than normal, researchers are reporting. ...

Do rains in May keep 'canes at bay?
Maya Bell /orlandosentinel /April 27, 2005
During 33 years of predicting South Florida's weather, Lushine, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Miami, has found a link between May rainfall and the chance of hurricanes striking South Florida. When May rainfall exceeds the regional average of 5 inches, the risk decreases. But when rainfall is less than normal, the likelihood of a strike increases -- raising the probability th ...

LAKE OKEECHOBEE

Hurricanes Exacerbate Lake Okeechobee's Declining Health
Unknown /WPBFNews /April 25, 2005
The lake is expected to turn an unsavory green color this summer owing to toxic algae that blooms from the pollution spreading through the lake, smothering plants and fish. ...

Hurricanes exacerbated Lake Okeechobee's failing health
AP /USA Today /April 1005
"What you're going to find this summer is this lake is going to turn just as green and just as slimy as anything you've seen in a science fiction movie," he says. "When that starts, no one will get on that water." ...

'04 storms made Lake Okeechobee ill
Jill Barton /herald tribune /April 24, 2005
The unsavory green color comes from toxic algae, which bloom from the pollution spreadingthrough the lake and smother plants and fish. The coming algal bloom is drawing alarming comparisons toan ecological disaster at Central Florida's Lake Apopka, which succumbed to similar problems caused by a 1940s hurricane. It still hasn't recovered and is undergoing a costly restoration. ...

Lake Okeechobee Ailing After Storms
Jill Barton /TBO /April 23, 2005
With the next hurricane season starting in six weeks and the likelihood of heavy rains, state officials don't expect to see improvement until next spring.``Everybody is looking at this with some degree of horror,'' said Audubon's Gray. ``You realize you probably can't save the lake this spring.'' ...

Algae could turn big stink into something even I could smell
Emily Minor /Palm Beach Post /April 28, 2005
"Depending on their treatment process, they might nip it right in the bud," Vaughn said. ...

Water bad, but glass is half full
Randy Schultz /Palm Beach Post /May 1, 2005
When Lake Okeechobee was a problem just for Pahokee and South Bay, West Palm Beach didn't care. After last week, however, West Palm Beach understands that the lake can be a problem for everybody. ...

EVERGLADES RESTORATION

Everglades Restoration Conference to Draw Top Experts
PR /SFWMD /April 2005
environmental experts from around the globe will gather to discuss the ongoing restoration of America's Everglades. Hosted in Palm Beach Gardens at the gateway to the famed wetland ecosystem, the conference marks the first International Conference on Restoring the Everglades.Scientists, engineers, government, educators and legal experts in ecosystem restoration will examine the Everglades restorat ...

Build skyway to restore free flow of fresh water
Editorial /Miami Herald /April 26
Seventy-seven years ago today, my great uncle, James Franklin Jaudon, finally opened his road. It had taken him 15 years to sway local politicians and businessmen to secure the funding, blast through limestone and plow through miles of muck and sawgrass. But when Uncle Frank's road finally opened, the entire town threw a parade that would make today's Calle Ocho organizers smile. You may not know ...

Official presses Scripps work
DAVID ROGERS /Palm Beach Daily /April 25, 2005
Palm Beach County Commissioner Mary McCarty said Friday the county shouldstart constructing a $122 million building for Scripps ResearchInstitute's Florida campus as soon as possible — even with pending lawsuits that challenge the proposed permanent location. ...

Everglades still needs advocates
OpEd /Miami Herald /Apr. 24, 2005
Next to drilling for oil in Alaska, few conservation issues have generated as much debate as the effort to restore the Everglades. Congress ostensibly settled the Everglades debate in 2000, when it approved the nearly $8 billion Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Project.CERP is the largest, most complicated and expensive restoration project in U.S. history. There are 12 federal agencies, seven ...

Task force may help plan Everglades zone
Neil Santaniello /Sun Sentinal /April 23, 2005
Poised to take on the massive issue of potential development in the Everglades Agricultural Area, county commissioners will no longer go it alone. State environmental and growth management officials plan to inject themselves into that debate. ...

Environmentalists File Lawsuit To Prevent Scripps Institute On Farmland
Unknown /WPBFNews /April 22, 2005
The Sierra Club and Florida Wildlife Federation are seeking an injunction against an initial permit issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. ...

High level of bacteria in St. Lucie River puzzles scientists
Suzanne Wentley /TCPalm /April 24, 2005
With high levels of unsafe bacteria, poor water quality under the Roosevelt Bridge has persisted for the second-longest time since testing began almost five years ago, Martin County health officials said. It has been six weeks that levels of fecal coliform — a bacteria associated with fecal matter of warm-blooded animals — has been above state limits. ...

Ag Reserve taking final shape as uneasy mix of farms, homes
Meghan Meyer /Palm Beach Post /April 11, 2005
The American Farmland Trust estimates that farms in the United States are disappearing at the rate of 2 acres a minute. It's an oft-repeated story as suburban sprawl gnaws away at prime farmland across the country. State and county governments have tried to slow the loss by creating agricultural reserves like the one west of Boynton Beach. But the name is deceptive: Not all of the land in an agric ...

Palm Beach County's growth rules not open-space friendly, critics say
Josh Hafenbrack /Sun Sentinal /April 25, 2005
In a rural, nature-laden area poised for massive growth, open space was considered a last line of defense in preserving natural areas and farms. But now, weakened open-space rules will only contribute to the area's suburban makeover, critics of the county's growth-management plan charge. Developers can count upscale amenities in townhouse developments toward a requirement that open land be equal t ...



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