<
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/kissimmee-biggest-river-restoration-ever-completed>
"If you’ve been to Disney World in Orlando, you’ve been to the Northern
Everglades. Much of the water within the famous “river of grass” originates in
Central Florida and flows south via the Kissimmee River—one of the more
important and lesser-known waterways nationwide.
Sixty years ago, the Kissimmee meandered for more than 100 miles from the
Kissimmee Chain of Lakes to Lake Okeechobee, and its floodplains were home to
seasonal wetlands rich with life. But in the 1940s, in response to flooding and
hurricanes, the state asked the federal government to help build a sprawling
network of canals and waterways to drain the land.
The Army Corps of Engineers complied and, beginning in the 1960s, turned the
meandering Kissimmee into a 30-foot-deep, channelized canal. Within a few
years, populations of waterfowl dropped by 90 percent, bald eagle numbers by 70
percent, and some fish, bird, and mammal species vanished. The channel acted
like a pipe, moving water quickly off the landscape to Lake Okeechobee, and
then to the ocean. While that helped prevent some flooding in the short term,
it robbed the stream of oxygen, which decimated the fish community and gave
nutrient pollution no time to settle and be absorbed by the wetlands.
The disrupted hydrology and ecological problems were so glaring that, beginning
in the 1990s, the Army Corps and a variety of state, federal, and local
partners cooperated to undo the damage. More than 20 years later, at a cost of
over $1 billion, the physical restoration of the river is now complete: 40
square miles of wetlands have been reestablished and rehydrated."
Via
Future Crunch:
<
https://futurecrunch.com/good-news-women-uzbekistan-conservation-colombia-river-florida/>
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
