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Saving Special Places
Save Our Swamp

Audubon's Campaign to Protect Water, Wetlands, Wildlife and Wood Storks

Read the latest: Audubon targets wetland rules

What's Going On?
A few decades ago, shallow, seasonal wetlands dominate the southwest Florida landscape, providing rich habitat and foraging grounds for endangered wood storks in the nation’s largest nesting rookery at Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary. Today precious few natural areas remain, and these are threatened by developers, including Mirasol, which is seeking to build 799 houses and two golf courses on 1,700 acres, 1,400 of which are wetlands in Cocohatchee Slough, adjacent to the Sanctuary. Learn more.

Wood Stork © RJ Wiley

The History Behind This Issue
Developers, such as Mirasol, set their sites on destroying the Cocohatchee Slough back in 2000 when Mirasol applied for a state and federal permits to build its residential golf course project. The original proposal to the South Florida Water Management District and US Army Corps of Engineers called for a regional drainage ditch. Read more about the history behind this issue.

Why You Should Care
Wetlands, such as those that would be destroyed if the Mirasol project is approved, provide essential life-support functions, not only for wood storks and wildlife, but for all of us.

Natural wetlands recharge and clean our fresh water;
The threatened wetlands connect the water flowing from Corkscrew Swamp Watershed (often called the Western Everglades) into the Wiggins Pass/Cocohatchee River coastal estuary; and,
This and other proposed development in the Slough will severely threaten the rest of these natural lands, their ecological connections, and the wildlife that depend on them.

Continue here to learn more about the impact Mirasol will have.

Photos courtesy RJ Wiley, click here to visit his A Day in the Swamp web site.