Paved Over and Pushed Out
A NARROW GAME TRAIL coursed through saw palmetto, hugging the edge of a swamp deep in Florida's Big Cypress National Preserve. I followed the faint path, eyes on the ground. Shin-high cypress knees snagged my boots. Mosquitoes buzzed my ears. The trail skirted a hammock of soaring cabbage palms, their fronds rattling in a dry November breeze.
Just a few hours earlier, a Florida panther had walked this path. I'd seen its tracks from a jeep traversing this muck of pine flatwoods and cypress stands. Scrambling off the vehicle, two biologists and I plunged into the dense woods, picked up the panther's trail through towering live oaks, and tracked it back to the trail crossing.
At the edge of the trail, in a thicket of wax myrtle and red bay, the big predator had stopped, sinking its front paws deep into black mud. Something had caught the cat's eye-the left edges of the tracks were pushed slightly deeper into the soil, as if it had leaned in that direction, raising a tawny muzzle. Perhaps the panther had caught wind of a deer, a primary prey animal, or glimpsed an armadillo scuffling through the briars. I couldn't tell. But this much I did know: There are roughly 60 adult Florida panthers remaining in the world, and one of these magnificent felines had been standing right here, sifting the air for scent, pondering its next move.
In the three-quarter-million-acre Big Cypress preserve, that panther had plenty of options. Not so its kin in the surrounding region. Rich upland forests to the north and west are ideal habitat for the big cats, but they also are home to one of the nation's fastest-growing human populations. Kneeling beside the fist-sized panther tracks we'd discovered, Kris Thoemke, a biologist for the National Wildlife Federation's Everglades Project Office, sounded a rueful note. "This is wild country," he said, "but it's also the front line for the battle over urban sprawl and wildlife habitat."
Long cited for its pernicious effects on the quality of human life, from increased traffic to air and water pollution, urban sprawl is also putting the squeeze on wildlife as diverse as panthers, bears, birds, fish and mussels. From the outskirts of Naples here in Florida to the growing footprints of major cities in Georgia, California, Arizona and beyond, ever-expanding suburbs are gobbling up millions of acres of wildlife habitat every year. Local officials have begun to grapple with solutions to the problem, but it's still too soon to predict whether relief will come in time for the most vulnerable species.
Sprawl's impact on wildlife goes beyond the obvious. More roads and cars spawn air and even water pollution (when gas and oil run off roadways into streams). Land clearing also loads streams with sediment, which smothers fish eggs and bottom-dwelling invertebrates and chokes out streamside food and cover plants. And simplified suburban landscapes give exotic and weedy competitors an edge over natives. Even if patches of land are left undeveloped, sprawling growth often swallows up niche habitats, taking away the homes of species that depend on specialized ecosystems. Wide-ranging animals, meanwhile, which need large, contiguous blocks of wild or semi-wild landscape, find themselves hemmed in by roads, golf courses and new neighborhoods.
That's the case with Felis concolor coryi, the Florida panther. A subspecies of North American mountain lion, Florida panthers can be identified by three distinctive physical features: a right-angle crook near the end of the tail; irregular white speckling on the head, neck and shoulders; and a cowlick in the middle of the back. The cats are impressive creatures, with mature males growing some seven feet long from nose to the black tip of the tail.
Preying mostly on white-tailed deer, Florida panthers are solitary hunters, and the cats need space. The home range of male panthers averages about 185 square miles, and an individual might roam 20 miles during a single day. In the past, the animals ranged from the southern tip of Florida north to South Carolina and west to Texas, but-after being overhunted until 1958-they are being crowded out by human development. Today the only remaining population is in southwest Florida, where new highways, condominium complexes and golf-course communities threaten the cat's survival.
by Eddie Nickens
Just a few hours earlier, a Florida panther had walked this path. I'd seen its tracks from a jeep traversing this muck of pine flatwoods and cypress stands. Scrambling off the vehicle, two biologists and I plunged into the dense woods, picked up the panther's trail through towering live oaks, and tracked it back to the trail crossing.
At the edge of the trail, in a thicket of wax myrtle and red bay, the big predator had stopped, sinking its front paws deep into black mud. Something had caught the cat's eye-the left edges of the tracks were pushed slightly deeper into the soil, as if it had leaned in that direction, raising a tawny muzzle. Perhaps the panther had caught wind of a deer, a primary prey animal, or glimpsed an armadillo scuffling through the briars. I couldn't tell. But this much I did know: There are roughly 60 adult Florida panthers remaining in the world, and one of these magnificent felines had been standing right here, sifting the air for scent, pondering its next move.
In the three-quarter-million-acre Big Cypress preserve, that panther had plenty of options. Not so its kin in the surrounding region. Rich upland forests to the north and west are ideal habitat for the big cats, but they also are home to one of the nation's fastest-growing human populations. Kneeling beside the fist-sized panther tracks we'd discovered, Kris Thoemke, a biologist for the National Wildlife Federation's Everglades Project Office, sounded a rueful note. "This is wild country," he said, "but it's also the front line for the battle over urban sprawl and wildlife habitat."
Long cited for its pernicious effects on the quality of human life, from increased traffic to air and water pollution, urban sprawl is also putting the squeeze on wildlife as diverse as panthers, bears, birds, fish and mussels. From the outskirts of Naples here in Florida to the growing footprints of major cities in Georgia, California, Arizona and beyond, ever-expanding suburbs are gobbling up millions of acres of wildlife habitat every year. Local officials have begun to grapple with solutions to the problem, but it's still too soon to predict whether relief will come in time for the most vulnerable species.
Sprawl's impact on wildlife goes beyond the obvious. More roads and cars spawn air and even water pollution (when gas and oil run off roadways into streams). Land clearing also loads streams with sediment, which smothers fish eggs and bottom-dwelling invertebrates and chokes out streamside food and cover plants. And simplified suburban landscapes give exotic and weedy competitors an edge over natives. Even if patches of land are left undeveloped, sprawling growth often swallows up niche habitats, taking away the homes of species that depend on specialized ecosystems. Wide-ranging animals, meanwhile, which need large, contiguous blocks of wild or semi-wild landscape, find themselves hemmed in by roads, golf courses and new neighborhoods.
That's the case with Felis concolor coryi, the Florida panther. A subspecies of North American mountain lion, Florida panthers can be identified by three distinctive physical features: a right-angle crook near the end of the tail; irregular white speckling on the head, neck and shoulders; and a cowlick in the middle of the back. The cats are impressive creatures, with mature males growing some seven feet long from nose to the black tip of the tail.
Preying mostly on white-tailed deer, Florida panthers are solitary hunters, and the cats need space. The home range of male panthers averages about 185 square miles, and an individual might roam 20 miles during a single day. In the past, the animals ranged from the southern tip of Florida north to South Carolina and west to Texas, but-after being overhunted until 1958-they are being crowded out by human development. Today the only remaining population is in southwest Florida, where new highways, condominium complexes and golf-course communities threaten the cat's survival.
by Eddie Nickens
