Florida just enacted a sweeping law to protect its vast wildlife corridors — And save its panthers
Florida’s wildlife, especially its star player, the Florida Panther, within the Everglades are making a comeback and here’s why. The Florida Wildlife Corridor Commission, a conservation non-profit, has been engaged for many years in developing the idea of the Corridor, and including helping to define and write it into a law. This Commission was set up in large part by photographer Carlton Ward Jr. and some of his environmentalist friends. The law protects a large area of Florida’s wildlife and nature, and the Corridor spans from the Everglades to Okefenokee. It also allows the wildlife to survive without any human interaction and ensure genetic stability of many species. In June of 2021, Florida’s governor signed the new bill into a law as the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act. Funds in the amount of $300 million were secured to protect these ecosystems, and another $100 million was set aside by the largest state-controlled public land acquisition program of its kind in the United States, called Florida Forever, for the general conservation program.
Ward Jr. was also responsible for helping set up a conservation initiative program called Path of the Panther, a program that protects Florida’s native panthers. With these new laws set in place, Florida’s iconic panther will be able to migrate more freely through protected land, without barriers, such as highways blocking parts of their native range. Ward Jr. explains that at one point, there is an area where the corridor becomes quite narrow, then is promptly blocked by the I-4 highway. Currently, this causes animals to have to travel east or west for miles outside the Corridor in order to find a crossing point. The new law will hopefully rectify that by creating more and safer wildlife crossings through blockades such as these.
To learn more about this environmental victory and the Florida Wildlife Corridor Act, click on the link here.
