Everglades
A vast, slow-moving river of grass in southern Florida, shaped by water, fire, and human ambition.
Last updated
Where it is
Coordinates: 25°18′43″N 80°41′17″W (25.3120, -80.6880) · Open in OpenStreetMap
Coordinates and connected clubs: the infobox of Wikipedia: Everglades National Park (CC BY-SA 4.0). Map: drawn by Codexery from OpenStreetMap tiles.
No other tropical wilderness in the United States is larger than this park.[1] The Everglades & Dry Tortugas Biosphere Reserve was created by UNESCO in 1976, and the park gained World Heritage Site status three years later, in 1979.[2]
Last updated 2026-10-04 from the source article.
Geography and history
The park covers 1,508,976 acres across Dade, Monroe, and Collier counties.[3] It was the first national park created to protect a fragile ecosystem rather than unique geographic features.[4] South Florida's landscape is characterized by its nearly level and uniformly flat terrain.[5] The varied ecosystems found within the park are fundamentally shaped by the limestone bedrock beneath the Everglades.[5]
It was between 100,000 and 150,000 years ago that the Florida peninsula first emerged above sea level.[6] A river that moves at a rate of 0.25 miles each day, flowing out of Lake Okeechobee, supplies the water for the Everglades' network of wetlands and forests.[4] The year 1947 marked the official designation of the area as a national park.[2] For tropical wading birds in North America, this park provides the most critical breeding habitat.[4]
What the cited sources add
The National Park Service notes that the bedrock geology of Everglades National Park has responded to weathering, erosion, and sea-level rise to produce the landscapes seen today.[7] UNESCO recognized that the underlying geology predefines existing Everglades landscapes and ecosystems.[7] That same report notes that conversion of this landscape to uniform sawgrass stands has had deleterious impacts on Everglades plants and animals.[8] The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service describes at least five major types of hammocks in the region, including rockland hammock and tree island hammock.[9]
A 2024 study by de Fouw et al. indicates that freshwater inflows from the Everglades strongly influence salinity patterns in Florida Bay.[10][11] The study mentions that changes in upstream water management can determine whether seagrass meadows persist or collapse.[10]
References
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Park Statistics", National Park Service (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: nps.gov (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "The National Parks: Index 2012–2016", nps.gov, p. 47 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Whitney, p. 167.; "Everglades National Park", National Park Service; Robertson, pp. 27, 21, 38.; A few locations in Palm Beach County, primarily Highland Beach, get their fresh water from the Floridan aquifer, treating the high saline and mineral content be (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Lodge, p. 3; "Everglades Geology", National Park Service (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: McCally, pp. 9–10. (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- "Everglades Geology", National Park Service. facts only, no text reused. nps.gov
- "Does Water Flow Influence Everglades Landscape Patterns? (2003)", www.nationalacademies.org. facts only, no text reused. nationalacademies.org
- "Tropical Hardwood Hammock", U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 1999. facts only, no text reused. crocdoc.ifas.ufl.edu
- Wikipedia, "Everglades National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: de Fouw, "Reduced seagrass resilience due to environmental and anthropogenic effects may lead to future die-off events in Florida Bay", Frontiers in Marine Science, 2024-07-15 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Jimmy de Fouw, "Reduced seagrass resilience due to environmental and anthropogenic effects may lead to future die-off events in Florida Bay", Frontiers in Marine Science (2024), doi:10.3389/fmars.2024.1366939. OpenAlex metadata CC0; paper not read. doi.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Everglades National Park (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
More in US National Parks
Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Everglades National Park (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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