Eco-Attractions in the Florida Keys
May 3rd, 2008
Florida Keys - Boasting more sportfishing records than any other destination, along with world-class diving and a rich literary and artistic community, the Florida Keys also offer an appealing variety of environmentally oriented eco-attractions.
Topping the list are the Florida Keys Wild Bird Center in Tavernier, Dolphin Research Center and the Turtle Hospital in the Middle Keys, the National Key Deer Refuge in the Lower Keys and the Florida Keys Eco-Discovery Center in Key West.
The Florida Keys Wild Bird Center, mile marker (MM) 93.6 bayside, is the northernmost of the eco-attractions. This haven for bird lovers is the labor of love of Laura Quinn, affectionately known as the “Bird Lady,” who founded and runs the center.
The facility’s primary purpose is to rescue, rehabilitate and release ill, injured and orphaned wild birds. A boardwalk that offers a breathtaking water view at its halfway point winds through cages that house wild hawks, ospreys, spoonbills, egrets and more. Some are there to recuperate and will later be released, while others would be unable to survive in the wild on their own and have become lifelong inhabitants.
For more information on the center, visit www.fkwbc.org.
Dolphin Research Center, at MM 59 bayside in Grassy Key, is a research and educational facility that’s home to a family of Atlantic bottlenose dolphins and California sea lions. The center and its staff, winners of numerous awards, specialize in behavioral research and maintain liaisons with university research programs and independent scientists around the world.
Visitors to the center can participate in enjoyable and educational programs that provide knowledge and insights about dolphins, their environment and their remarkable abilities.
The center also initiated a groundbreaking study revealing that dolphins can perform simple math equations. Through the number concepts research study, researchers discovered that the marine mammals could identify simple math and distinguish the difference between numbers they were presented on a board.
For more information on the center’s menu of offerings, visit www.dolphins.org.
Just a few miles away from Dolphin Research Center is the Turtle Hospital, MM 48.5 bayside, the only facility of its kind in the world. At the hospital, opened in 1986, founder Richie Moretti and his staff treat injured sea turtles and, when possible, return them to the wild.
Educational tours of the facility are offered to introduce visitors to the resident sea turtles and to the hospital’s curative programs for loggerhead, green, hawksbill and Kemp’s ridley turtles. The hospital’s goals include working toward environmental legislation to make beaches and oceans safer and cleaner for sea turtles.
For more information about the Turtle Hospital, its continuing work and educational programs, visit www.turtlehospital.org.
The Lower Keys are home to the National Key Deer Refuge, down Key Deer Boulevard off U.S. Highway 1 at MM 30.5 bayside on Big Pine Key. The refuge was established in 1957 to protect the endangered Key deer — a subspecies of the Virginia white-tailed deer that ranges in size from 45 to 80 pounds fully grown — and its habitat. Today the refuge encompasses more than 8,000 acres of prime Key deer territory extending from Bahia Honda Key to the eastern shores of Sugarloaf Key, out to the edge of the Gulf of Mexico.
A nature trail winds through the protected pinelands of the refuge, where the tiny deer roam freely, protected by fences that border along U. S. 1. Visitors can learn about the Key deer and their environment at the refuge’s visitor center, located in the Winn Dixie Shopping Center, 701 Key Deer Blvd.
For more information, visit www.fws.gov/nationalkeydeer.
The newest eco-attraction in Key West, at the southwestern tip of the Keys, is the Florida Keys Eco-Discovery Center, which opened its doors in January 2007.
Located on the Key West waterfront at Truman Annex, the 6,400-square-foot center showcases the underwater and upland habitats that characterize the Keys, with an emphasis on North America’s only living contiguous barrier coral reef that parallels the island chain.
The most recent addition to the center is the Living Reef Exhibit, featuring a 2,400-gallon reef tank with fish and invertebrates indigenous to the Keys.
The center also includes interactive and touch-screen modules, text and audio/video components and an ongoing film, featuring stellar underwater footage, about the vibrant Keys ecosystem and reef.
For more information, visit www.floridakeys.noaa.gov/eco_discovery.html.
To find out about area accommodations in the Florida Keys, call the Florida Keys visitor line at (800) 352-5397 or visit www.fla-keys.com.
