As my dear husband and I drove along on an epic day trip through small-town Central Florida, today, we heard wonderful news on NPR, that the Secretary of the Interior has proposed the creation of a new national wildlife refuge and conservation area of 150,000 acres in the Kissimmee River Valley, south of Orlando, as part of President Obama’s America’s Great Outdoors initiative. With this proposal, the survival of one of the few grassland and longleaf pine savanna landscapes in eastern North America would be guaranteed. This is the kind of landscape that was bulldozed into oblivion with the advent of that 20th century phenomenon, the Theme Park, in Central Florida — initiated by Walt Disney with his acquisition of 27,000+ acres of flatlands and cattle pastures in the 1960’s. What is gratifying about the deal is that it is the result in great part to a new approach: agreements with Central Florida cattlemen to create conservation easements on their property. These “cracker cowboys”, descendants of some of Florida’s oldest cattle families, see this as a way to preserve their way of life, according to the NPR report. In so doing, they are giving an incredible gift to their fellow Floridians — folks who don’t like to see the what is most beautiful and unspoiled transformed into generic developments: commercial, residential, or theme park.
We are already blessed in Florida with an amazing array of state parks, with more being added every year: so many in fact, that my dear husband and I could spend a lot of years just trying to see them all (my personal Bucket List!). In Central Florida alone, there are 29: parks with dense forests, lakes, rivers, freshwater springs, beaches, lagoons, islands, forts, ruins of early 19th c. plantations, and even a pioneer cracker village. But Florida boasts so many different and distinct habitats, even these protected areas are not enough to adequately support the flora and fauna shoveled aside in the massive development that has made ours such a populous state (and popular tourist destination) — development that has increasingly encroached on fragile environmental areas. This Everglades Headwaters area supports the well-being of that magnificent National Park in South Florida — and 98 endangered and threatened species in the Headwaters habitat alone.
For me, this happy news was the culmination of a day spent admiring broad vistas of undeveloped Florida: the landscapes that our Florida cracker cowboys must love even more, for having had the privilege of spending every day with those amazing views. To those of you who have not ventured into Florida’s Outback, try it! Take a blue highway, find a brown state park sign, and you will discover the wonders of real Florida.
NPR report on Everglades Headwaters: http://www.npr.org/2011/09/12/140403285/agency-takes-new-approach-to-save-everglades-land
Department of the Interior Press Release:
Florida State Park System:
http://www.floridastateparks.org/
