Close Encounters
Where the Wild Wander
Florida's Native Wildcat Still Threatened
Florida's Native Wildcat Still Threatened
Whether in your driveway, under your car, on the golf course, on the banks of your waterfront backyard, the Florida alligator has long made known it's position in the Florida food chain. Residents oblige it's majesty, and simply stay clear of it's path.
However, not all stories end up with a peaceable truce. Sadly, alligator fatalities are as common as any other habitat in America where wildlife will wander back into their previous dwellings, where man once invaded theirs. Sadly, according to TCPalm.com, " From 1948 to 2021, 442 unprovoked bite incidents have occurred in Florida. Twenty-six of the bites resulted inpeople being killed by wild alligators. " Mating season is not the friendliest. Much like shark week, "As their mating season begins, alligators are out in full force in the sunshine state, disrupting traffic and daily routines, sometimes evenly severley injuring residents", according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commision. “...alligators are more active and visible” as the weather warms and the mating season kicks off.
Florida alligators: Are attacks common and how many are there? (tcpalm.com)
Florida's Native Wildcat Still Threatened
Florida's Native Wildcat Still Threatened
Florida's Native Wildcat Still Threatened
Although the gorgeous Florida panther, seen here, were protected under 1967’s predecessor law to the Endangered Species Act, efforts to replenish their population is steadily imploding under the big cat's "slow-motion extinction" with no relief in sight, according to Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.
At one time, their threatened status was a byproduct of the sugar cane industry run-off that seeped into their drinking systems, atrophying their repopulation organs, like many other species were affected in the like. Now that the problem has been remedied for the most part, according to John R. Platt of The Revelator, there is a new threat with the increase of imposing inroads veering into their habitat. "Roads kill, especially if you’re a critically endangered Florida panther....the most recent estimates put the population at somewhere between 120 and 230 adults and juveniles... [yet] more than a third of this year’s mortalities were breeding-age females, limiting the cats’ chance of bouncing back."
For Florida Panthers, Extinction Comes on Four Wheels • The Revelator