Florida Wildlife
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The Endangered Key Deer. Taken at the National Key Deer Refuge, Florida Keys.
"Golden Heron"
The rare, and once hunted to extinction, great white heron poses in the last light of the evening.
Brown Noddy in Sea Lavender
Reddish Egret portrait
"Welcome to my World"
Black Crowned Night Heron, Turner River- Big Cypress National Preserveblack crowned night heronBig Cypress National Preserveheronbird
Lower Keys Marsh Rabbit
Sylvilagus palustris hefneri clings to survival as the tide rises around it and an assortment of human-caused problems plague its remaining habitat. Habitat loss and modification, competition from a host of invasive competitors and predators, and other factors leave the future of this subspecies in question.7677lower keys marsh rabbitendangered marsh rabbitSylvilagus palustris hefneriendangered species of floridaflorida keys
Reddish Egret and catch in the shallow north beach lagoon of Ft. Desoto at the mouth of Tampa Bay.
A rare site in modern Florida. It is said that once these birds were more common in Florida than vultures. However, they do not do well in urbanized environments and need large tracts of prairie to survive. They can still be found in the most rural parts of interior central Florida. Good places to see them include Myakka State Park and Dinner Island WMA.
63142webCrested CaracaraFlorida birdsChad Anderson Photography
Florida race of the red-shouldered hawk searches for prey, Everglades National Park
Great Blue Heron on Black
Gopher tortoise
Key Deer Buck, National Key Deer Refuge
This image was created recently and it shows the endangered Key deer in its native habitat, the pine rockland of the lower Keys. The Key deer is the smallest sub-species of the North American white-tailed deer, usually weighing less than 80 pounds and standing less than waist high on most people. Key deer were threatened by over-hunting until it was prohibited in the early 1950s when the population was estimated to be 50 individuals. Since that time things have changed dramatically in the Keys, and new anthropogenic threats are new placing pressures on the abundance and distribution of the Key deer--like habitat loss, vehicular traffic, habitat fragmentation, and illegal feeding. We can be proud that after half a century of protection, their population has increased by more than ten times. However, today in the age of climate change and sea level rise, their future remains uncertain.
Green Heron in breeding plumage, Everglades National Park
Raccoon portrait
Loggerhead Shrike
Banded Water Snake
Sherman's Fox Squirrel
Great Egret flies into the Sunset
Eye to Eye With an Armadillo
Black-bellied Plover, Ft. Desoto Park
Semipalmated Plover Watches the Sunset
Tricolored Heron, Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge
tricolored heronbirdFloridaMerritt Island National Wildlife Refuge
Glance from a Key Deer
Key deerdoewildlife of floridaendangeredflorida keysbig pine key
Semipalmated Plover, Ft. Desoto Park
Gator with Dragonflies
Downy Woodpecker
Florida Panther
(captive)
White Morph Reddish Egret
Ruddy Turnstone working the wrack line for a meal
"Sooty Tern in Flight"
Dry Tortugas National Park
Yellow Crowned Night Heron
