ABSTRACT
The Everglades Protection Area (EPA), comprised of three Water Conservation Areas (WCAs) (WCA1, WCA2, and WCA3) and Everglades National Park (Park), is the largest subtropical wetland in the United States (Fig. 1). The historic Everglades extended from the wet prairies, sloughs, and tree islands located south of Lake Okeechobee to the mangroves of Florida Bay and the Gulf of Mexico (Davis 1943; Egler 1952; Loveless 1959). Over half of the original Everglades ecosystem has been lost to drainage and development (Harvey et al. 2005). More than 2500 km of canals and levees and hundreds of water control structures, have altered the natural sheet fl ow, water depth and hydroperiod in large areas of the Everglades (Harvey et al. 2005). The remaining Everglades is also threatened due to undesirable changes in water quality.
