Introduction

            The Weekiwachee Preserve offers visitors the opportunity to see a wide variety of plants and animals in native Florida habitats.  It includes several miles of river frontage within its 7,500 acres.  There are 14 stations along the five-mile, self-guided interpretive trail.  Expect to spend a minimum of one hour bicycling or two hours walking the trail enjoying the wildlife and the views.

Station 1 –Cabbage Palm Hammock

            The cabbage palm is a staple of Florida wildlife.  Its clusters of flowers buzz with insects, and a number of birds, including cardinals, cedar waxwings, pileated woodpeckers, crows and yellow-rumped warblers.  The berries, a source of food for a variety of wildlife, ripen in the fall.  Florida black bears feed on the berries, too.  When more tasty foods are scarce, they climb to the top to get to the berries or to pull out and dine on a palm heart.

Station 2 – Freshwater Marsh

            Little Blue herons, snowy egrets, white ibises and limpkins live in this freshwater marsh.  These are wading birds, making their livelihoods by foraging the shallow wetland for frogs, small fish, shrimp, worms, and aquatic insects.  Look carefully and you might see cabbage palms with scratch markings on their trunks.  These are signs that black bears have clawed their way up to the fronds searching for food.  The Florida black bear feeds on a variety of animal and plant material throughout the changing seasons of the year.  Black bears require large areas of natural lands to maintain a healthy population.  The average home range of an adult female is about 11 square miles and the males home range can approach 66 square miles.  The Florida black bear is considered and ?umbrella@ species because protecting it ensures the protection of many other plant and animal species that share its habitat.

Station 3 – Exotic Shrubs and Herbs

            Most noticeable here is the shrub lantana.  It grows along the earthen banks and, in the spring time, produces a profusion of yellow and purple flowers.  This shrub is an invasive exotic, or non-native, species that can take over and threaten native Florida habitat. Along the trail you may also notice these other invasive exotics:  Brazilian pepper, sesban or sesbaania, cogon grass, skunk vine, mimosa, and torpedo grass.  The invasive exotics found at the Weekiwachee Preserve are monitored and appropriate measures are taken to remove and control them.  If invasive exotics are present on your property, your efforts to contain and destroy them will help ensure the survival of Florida native plant and animal life.

Station 4 – Open Grassland

            This open, soft limerock substrate was created by limerock mining and now supports an interesting variety of grasses, including muhly grass.  Muhly grass is a perennial bunchgrass that grows in coastal dunes, pine flatwoods and sandhills.  It has soft blue foliage and produces purple flowers.  The whole plant turns golden brown in winter.  This attractive grass is a popular ornamental in Florida gardens.  Sawgrass is a very tough plant lined with upwardly pointing teeth.  It grows in swamps, marshes and along lake shores.  It is the dominant plant in the Everglades.

Station 5 – The Lakes

            The lakes in the Preserve are filled with fresh water from the underlying Floridian aquifer.  The sides are very steep and depth caries from 35 to 60 feet.  They were created by a commercial limerock mining operation that covered about 800 acres.  Littoral shelves were constructed to create shallow, lake-shore habitats.  Several of the lakes were linked together to improve visitor access and increase littoral habitat areas.

Station 6 – The Underlying Limerock

            The large limerock boulders here are the remnants of the former mining operation, as is the nearby heap of spoil, or waste material.  Some pieces of rock have been cut away to expose the fossils of marine mollusks and other invertebrates that make up the bulk of this ancient limestone.  Large fossils, such as sea shells and sea urchants, can be found on the surface of the old mine workings.

Station 7 – Least Terns

            The limerock substrate here mimics the traditional tern nesting areas found between the light-colored sand and shell substrates on out beaches.  Historically, the least tern nested on barrier islands rather than the mainland.  Oceanfront development has drastically reduced their habitat and, in order to survive, they have moved ashore and adapted to different living conditions.

Station 8 – Forested Wetland

            The hydric hammock before you contains bald cypress, one of the most characteristic trees found in southeastern swamps.  The cypress seeds provide food for wood ducks, sandhill cranes and squirrels; the trees provide important habitat areas for bears, which make their dens in tree hollows, and for wood storks, which roost and nest in the tree’s canopy.

Station 9 – Open Field

            Most of Florida’s native plants and animals depend on fire to maintain their vigor and diversity.  Prior to man’s invention, lighting-caused fires burned out of control until they were rained out or reached natural barriers.  Wildfires no longer can be left unchecked; that is why the District and other land management organizations use controlled burns to enhance and maintain native Florida plant communities.

Site 10 – Sand Pines

            Tall sand pines dominate this area, which features a number of gopher tortoise burrows just a short distance from the trail.  The tall sand pines are marked by slender trunks and small cones.  They share this area with turkey oaks, so named because the tree’s leaf resembles the foot of a turkey.  The sand pine is easily distinguished from the longleaf and slash pines by its shorter and denser needles, relatively smooth bark and a leaning, slender trunk.

Station 11 – Coyote Den

            It is likely that a coyote den which was here, was originally inhabited by a gopher tortoise.  Gopher tortoises live in well-drained sandy habitats where the soils are suitable for digging their burrows.  They look for sites where there are enough low-growing plants for food and open, sunny areas for nesting.  The underground burrows offer habitat for many other species, including several rare and protected ones such as the Florida mouse, the gopher frog, and the eastern indigo snake.

Station 12 – Saw Palmetto

            The low growing saw palmetto gives food and shelter to a variety of native Florida wildlife.  Both black bears and the Florida panther rely on dense thickets of saw palmetto for den sites and nurseries where they can give birth to new generations.  The bear and panther share this homesite with the vulture, which nest under the palmetto shrubs.  The strong fibers of the palmetto are also used by a number of birds and rodents to build their nests.  Its nectar provides food for numerous insects species and its summer berries are prized by songbirds, gray fox, deer, raccoon, and bears.

Site 13 – Pine Flatwoods

            If you are lucky, high among the pines near the edge of this pine flatwoods, you’ll spot a bald eagle.  This is a favorite area for them, and the tall trees here provide excellent perches for this majestic bird.  At least three active bald eagle nests have been identified on the Weekiwachee Preserve.  Adults typically mate for life and produce an average of one to two chicks a year.

Site 14 – Research Area

            The research area is closed to visitors to give wildlife an undisturbed are for foraging and nesting.  Several reclamation techniques are being tested here that will help land managers revegetate the remainder of the mine surface.  One reclamation strategy will include extending the forest to the mine lakes to allow black bears, river otters and other wildlife use of this water resource.