The Florida Panther is one of 30 subspecies, tawny brown in color with pale gray underneath. It’s habitat is cypress swamps and pine and hardwood hammock forests. They are solitary animals, territorial and often travel at night. Males can weigh up to 130 pounds, with females to 70 pounds, and they eat mostly white-tailed deer, wild hog, rabbit, raccoon, armadillo and birds. They have become endangered by habitat loss because of human development and population growth, collation with vehicles, parasites, feline distemper and other diseases. Current efforts to save the Panther include reduced speeding zones, construction of panther underpasses, public education, and captive breeding programs and research. This beautiful animal is protected under the Endangered Species Act.

The American Crocodile is well armored with tough, scaley skin. They are grey-green in color (or olive green) with long, slender snouts. Adult crocodiles can reach 7 to 15 feet in length. They are found in southern Florida, the Caribbean, southern Mexico, and along the Central American coast south to Venezuela. They inhabit areas where fresh and salt waters mix, such as coastal wetlands and canals, and their diet consists of a variety of crabs, fish, waterfowl, and small mammals. These impressive animals are less aggressive than the famous Nile crocodile and are rarely seen by humans. They are now endangered because they were once hunted for their hides, and today poaching and loss of habitat due to human development are their greatest threats. The American Crocodile is protected under the Endangered Species Act.

The Green Sea Turtle gets it’s name from the green colored fat tissue in its body. Adult turtles can grow to 4 feet and weigh up to 400 pounds. The males have a longer, thicker tail than the females. These turtles are found throughout the world’s oceans, but the major populations are found off Florida’s east and west coasts, as well as the Caribbean and off the coast of Mexico. The feed mainly on algae (or limu), as well as plankton, jellyfish and fish eggs floating near the surface of the open ocean. The females nest at night, laying eggs as many as five times at 11 to 18 day intervals, and depositing a clutch of 100 to 120 eggs. These marvelous animals can live up to 80 years! Threats: entanglement in fishing gear, bycatch from commercial fisheries, ingestion of plastics which art toxic, ingestion of cigarette butts which are toxic, and noise, lights and beach obstructions are disruptive to the nesting habits of the Green Sea Turtle. They are protected under the Endangered Species Act. It is illegal to kill, capture or harass sea turtles.

The Florida Manatee is a migrating aquatic, air-breathing mammal. Manatees have hair on their skin, instead of fur. They will surface every 3-4 minutes for air, and sleep on the bottom and float up every 20 minutes for a breath. Adult manatees grow to about 10 feel in length and weigh around 1,200 pounds. Their skin is grayish-brown in color, and rough, similar to the elephant. Manatees communicate to each other by making high-pitched sounds, and leave messages to each other by putting a scent on a rock for other manatees to find. They are herbivores, eating grass, turtle grass, hydrilla, water hyacinth and water lettuce, and eat over 150 pounds of grass a day. They live in springs during the winter months, and move out to the Gulf of Mexico in summer months. Only about 2000 Manatees are left in Florida, putting them on the Endangered Sspecies List. The main threat to Manatees: speeding boats which run over them in shallow waters, like spring. Also a hazard: cold weather, red tide, and starvation.

The Key Deer live on Big Pine Key and surrounding keys in Florida. The are the smallest of the white-tailed deer and are not found anywhere else in the world. They deer’s height is between 24 and 28 inches and they weigh about 45 to 65 pounds. Bucks can weight up to 75 pound, and only bucks have antlers. The Key Deer feed on plants such as red, black, and white mangrove, thatch palm berries, and over 150 different kinds of plants found in the keys. The origin of the Key Deer is not know, but believed to have migrated to the keys thousands of years ago, through a land bridge (before the keys became “islands” of Florida). Main threats: uncontrolled hunting and habitat destruction. This put the Key Deer numbers at less than 50 in the 1940’s, therefore putting them on the endangered species list. Due to the National Key Deer Refuge and new laws, numbers are now estimated at 250 to 300 deer.