Two good friends of mine are embarking on a 1000 mile hike from the Everglades to Northern Florida in the name of habitat conservation. Prior to entering the world of wildlife biology at UK, I only knew Florida as having beaches and Disney World. While I was conducting my master's project on Kentucky black bear, our lab was also running a project in the wilds of Florida. For habitat conservation in Florida, a black bear wearing a GPS tracking collar has become the best method for delineating key habitat areas. These bears are forced to navigate fragmented patches of swamp and timber hammocks while finding the best paths between safe cover. As they move, their GPS collar tracks every step and allows researchers to plot these points on a map to illustrate the areas that bears use most often. It just so happens, that other species also use the same areas as the black bear. In ecological terms, the black bear has become an umbrella species for Florida wildlife conservation.
Joe Guthrie and photographer Carlton Ward are in the planning stages, but plan to set out for the hike in January.
Please check out Joe's blog at http://joeguthrie.wordpress.com/author/joeguthrie/
Below are a few photos that I took while in Florida on a education vacation. We were lucky enough to spend time on a few local ranches which have become key habitat for the black bear.
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| Florida scrub jay taken at Archibald Biological Station in Venus, Florida |
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| White-tailed deer with a backdrop of palmetto on a ranch in Florida |
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| Florida black bear wandering the trails of a ranch in Florida |
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