Florida Everglades

South Florida Ecosystem Assessment: Phase I/II Everglades Stressor Interactions: Hydropatterns, Eutrophication, Habitat Alteration, and Mercury Contamination

EPA Region 4 initiated the South Florida Ecosystem Assessment Project in 1993. The Project used a statistical survey design to sample the Everglades ecosystem from Lake Okeechobee in the north to Florida Bay in the south, from the Miami urban area on the east to Big Cypress on the west. Within this 2.5 million acre area, a suite of measurements were made on samples taken from water, soil, sediment, plants (both the algae and the standing plants like sawgrass and cattails), floc (organic debris on the soil) and mosquitofish. These samples were taken in canals (1993-1995) and throughout the marsh (1995-1996,1999) in both wet (rainy) and dry seasons. Because the marsh was sampled in 1995-96 and again in 1999, it was possible to detect changes that had occurred in some marsh constituents during this period. The South Florida Ecosystem Assessment has been an innovative research, monitoring, and assessment Project that has produced a number of significant findings from which explicit management implications have been developed.
 
The Project results to date are presented here in a summary report (EPA 904-R-01-002) which is supported by a detailed technical report (EPA 904-R-01-003) including extensive appendices with the complete Quality Assurance Project Plan, data reviews and data files.
 
 
 
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