50 Fun Facts About Everglades National Park

Roughly what share of the original Everglades does the national park protect?

The park is nonetheless the largest tropical wilderness in the United States and the biggest wilderness of any kind east of the Mississippi.

The Everglades are fed by a very slow river flowing out of which body of water?

The sheet of water moves about a quarter of a mile a day and can be 40 to 70 miles wide on its way to Florida Bay.

Whose 1947 book gave the Everglades the nickname 'River of Grass'?

She published it a month before the park was dedicated, campaigned for the Everglades until her death at 108, and has been called the 'Grande Dame of the Everglades'.

What made Everglades unusual among national parks when it was established?

Earlier parks preserved mountains, geysers and canyons; persuading people that a shifting wetland deserved the same status took decades.

Which president dedicated Everglades National Park on 6 December 1947?

Congress had authorised it in 1934 with a rider banning any spending for five years; Senator Spessard Holland and editor John Pennekamp helped raise the land money.

Everglades is one of only three places on Earth to hold which trio of designations?

UNESCO named the biosphere reserve in 1976 and the World Heritage Site in 1979; the Ramsar listing came in 1987.

How does the park rank in size among national parks in the contiguous United States?

It covers about 1.5 million acres across three counties, and roughly a million people visit each year.

The Everglades hold the largest ecosystem of which kind in the Western Hemisphere?

Red, black and white mangroves line the coast, sheltering 220 fish species and forming Florida's first line of defence against hurricanes.

How many threatened or protected species live in the park?

They include the Florida panther, American crocodile and West Indian manatee, among 350 bird, 300 fish, 40 mammal and 50 reptile species.

South Florida is the only place in the world where which two reptiles live side by side?

The American crocodile tolerates the saltier coastal water; it did not spread north because of cold, not because of the alligators.

Roughly how many Florida panthers survived in the wild in the 1970s?

Numbers climbed to an estimated 230 by 2017 and about 200 remain in 2024; it is the only confirmed cougar population in the eastern United States.

Which 1992 event is widely blamed for boosting the Everglades' population of invasive Burmese snakes?

Released pets had been sighted since the 1930s, but a breeding population was only confirmed in 2000; importing the snakes was banned in 2012.

By how much had road sightings of raccoons, opossums, bobcats and rabbits fallen where pythons spread?

Pythons wiped out a reintroduced marsh rabbit population in under 11 months and will eat almost any bird, mammal or alligator.

How many pythons did 1,600 hunters remove in the first Florida Python Challenge in 2013?

The 2023 edition took 209 with 1,050 participants; more than 2,000 have been caught since 2005, some over 17 feet long.

Which two Native peoples lived on Florida's southern tip when the Spanish arrived, separated by the Everglades?

The Tequesta lived in one big village at the mouth of the Miami River and the Calusa in 30 villages to the west; both were gone by 1800.

What is the highest point in the park, rising some 20 feet above sea level?

Everywhere else the land sits between zero and 8 feet; Chokoloskee Island is another Calusa midden roughly 20 feet high.

Which land developer turned conservationist led the 1928 commission to create the park?

His original vision included Key Largo, Big Cypress and Biscayne Bay, all protected separately later; the main visitor center near Homestead bears his name.

Which Florida governor campaigned in 1904 on draining the Everglades?

His 1905–1910 canals let developers sell tracts at $30 an acre and opened land for sugar cane; Broward County is named for him.

Why were entire rookeries of wading birds shot in the Everglades in the early 20th century?

Alligators, frogs and fish were hunted on a huge scale too, and melaleuca and Australian pine were introduced to help drainage.

What was Royal Palm State Park, created in 1916?

It became the site of the park's first visitor center and is now the Royal Palm area where the Anhinga Trail begins.

What was 'The Hole in the Donut'?

It was too valuable as farmland to buy in 1947; a Cold War Nike missile base was later built on part of it.

The Cold War Nike site HM-69 inside the park was built in response to what?

It opened in 1964 with above-ground launchers because of the high water table, carried some nuclear warheads and closed in 1979.

Why were the Nike missile launchers in the Everglades built above ground, unlike most such sites?

The three launch units held four missiles each; the fire-control site is now the park's Daniel Beard Research Center.

The Shark Valley Visitor Center's 15-mile loop leads to what?

It lies on the Tamiami Trail west of Miami; tram tours run in the busy winter season.

How long is the Wilderness Waterway canoe trail from Everglades City to the park's southern outpost?

Backcountry campsites along it include chickees, raised platforms over the water; permits are required.

The Anhinga Trail, one of the park's most visited spots, is how long?

It runs through sawgrass marsh from the Royal Palm area, with alligators, turtles and wading birds close at hand; the Gumbo Limbo Trail nearby is the same length.

The Guy Bradley Visitor Center and marina are at which old settlement on Cape Sable?

A 38-mile road from the Coe visitor center winds there through pineland, cypress, marl prairie and coastal forest; a dirt road first reached it in 1922.

What happened to the original lodge at the park's southern outpost in 2009?

Katrina, Wilma and Rita all hit the park in 2005; 125 mph winds and an 8-foot surge wrecked the 50-year-old lodge, and Irma did more damage in 2017.

What did the 1960 Hurricane Donna leave along the coastal forest for miles?

Storms are part of the ecosystem: within 30 years the trees had completely recovered.

How many distinct ecosystems does the National Park Service recognise in the park?

They include freshwater sloughs, marl prairies, hardwood hammocks, pinelands, cypress, coastal forest, coastal lowlands, Florida Bay and the marine estuary, shifting with the water.

What vital role do alligators play in the marl prairies during the dry season?

'Gator holes' become oases that repopulate the prairie when the rains return.

Why do the park's tree islands, or hammocks, often look like teardrops from above?

They are often the only dry land, rising inches above the marsh; gumbo-limbo and wild tamarind rarely top 50 feet there.

What do the park's slash pines need in order to release their seeds?

Pine rocklands are burned deliberately every three to seven years; without fire, hardwoods take over. Less than 4,000 acres survive outside the park.

How many orchid species grow in the park?

They grow as epiphytes on cypress trees alongside bromeliads, Spanish moss and ferns.

Which two soils are found in the Everglades?

Peat forms where land floods for most of the year; marl is dried periphyton, a grey mud of algae, found where flooding lasts six months or less.

Which raptor, a specialist feeder on apple snails, is a signature bird of the park's sloughs?

Also called the snail kite, it and the limpkin feed on the snails, which in turn graze the sawgrass; herons, egrets, ibises and roseate spoonbills wade the same waters.

Roughly how much of the park was designated as protected backcountry in 1978?

That is roughly 1.3 million acres, making it the largest wilderness of any kind east of the Mississippi.

Congress approved which programme in 2000, billed as the largest environmental repair job in history?

It aims to spend $10.5 billion over 30 years on 50 projects, capture 1.7 billion gallons of water a day and tear out 240 miles of canals.

How much canal and levee was built in the 1950s–60s to steer water from the Everglades to cities?

Along with 150 gates and 16 pumping stations; wading-bird numbers collapsed between the 1940s and 2000s.

The author of River of Grass founded Friends of the Everglades in 1968 to fight what?

She was 79 when she took up the cause and won; the group grew to more than 4,000 members.

How old was the author of River of Grass when she died in 1998?

She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and worked for restoration almost to the end; critics in agriculture called her 'the anti-Christ'.

Which Native groups still live within the park's boundaries and help approve its policies?

A few hundred Seminole hunters hid in Big Cypress after the Seminole Wars to escape removal to Oklahoma.

What was the entrance fee for a private vehicle in 2021?

In 2006 nearly a million visitors spent $48 million in local economies and supported more than 900 jobs.

Which months are the busiest visitor season, and why?

Summers are long, hot and very wet under a tropical monsoon climate.

Which vehicles are banned in the park's waters?

Low-powered motorboats are allowed, and most saltwater areas are no-wake zones to protect manatees; swimming is not recommended.

Roughly how many acres does Everglades National Park cover?

It spans Dade, Monroe and Collier counties, with elevations mostly between sea level and eight feet.

What is the largest body of water within the park, stretching from the mainland to the Keys?

Its 800-plus square miles of seagrass, coral and sponges support sharks, barracudas and a resident population of bottlenose dolphins.

Which president signed the 1989 act that added 109,506 acres to the park and closed it to airboats?

He remarked at the signing that 'that river of grass may now be restored', and the law told the Army to return water to the ecosystem.

By roughly what percentage did the park's wading bird populations fall between the 1940s and 2000s?

Diverting water to South Florida's cities is rated the park's number one threat, leaving fish exposed and sawgrass prone to burning.

Roughly how many Florida panthers were estimated to survive in the wild in 2017?

The estimate was about 230 in 2017 and around 200 by 2024; vehicle collisions, inbreeding, disease and even mercury poisoning threaten one of the world's most endangered mammals.